Page 74 of Love and Death
As I struggle to stop myself fromtouchingher ... From hurting her.
“Cerberus,” she gasps.
My name on her lips is like a calming salve, peace amidst a broken battlefield. Come on, say it.Commandme. Give me a means by which to defy him. I plead with my eyes, but it is Hades who speaks.
“I told you to break her,” he commands. “If she will not give you the name,takeit from her. Take everything that she holds dear. Strip her. Now!”
All-out war wages within me at this. Without warning, my leash and my bond strike a harmonizing, terrifying cord as they both will me to obey.
Her scent overwhelms my senses. Soft and sweet, tearing down my defenses.
My hands tremble on either side of her before dropping to the dark silk of her dress.
No.
I tear it, exposing the top half of an undergarment, Hades words echoing in my head over and over.
Break her.
Take her.
Strip her.
Hell’s teeth, I want her, but not like this.
Not forced. Not in obedience tohim.
I rip the fabric again so that it hangs around her hips.
“Cerberus, please, you don’t have to do this. You don’t have to obey.”
Not an order.
My fingers twitch against the fabric, aching to do as they have been told, even as my stomach knots within me and sweat beads on my brow.
The leash tightens like a noose, and I grit my teeth against it and taste iron on my tongue.
“I knew this bond was going to cause trouble,” Hades scoffs. “Force her to submit to it, Cerberus. Now.”
I bend, my mouth finding hers, fierce, hungry, wrong. My hands reach for her as I shove my body against hers, pinning us to the wall.
I grab a fistful of her hair in one hand, her thigh with the other to lift it up over my own hip. It would be so easy to finish this, to claim her and satisfy the leash and the bond. It would be so—
No, I pull away from her lips, sweet and maddening as they are. My body trembles as I continue to try to resist through sheer force of will.
I am unraveling, losing all control.
“Hazel,” I groan in a low rumble between kisses, my heart shattering within me. “Stop me.”
I cannot fight this alone.
And then the beast steps in, its desire scorching, prey at hand. There will be no more resisting. I drop my hand from her hair to yank her skirts out of my way and release myself unto her.
“Cerberus, stop,” Hazel whimpers, her voice small but audible.
The noose around my neck loosens, and I freeze. But, for a single, soul-shattering moment, I think it is already too late.
But I am wrong. The heat of her but a split second from consuming me, and my heart slams back to life in my heaving chest.
