Page 83 of Stalk the Dark
A low, pain-drenched moan echoed in my ear, almost blocking out the slam of wood on stone.
“Dammit, woman!”
Ezekiel?
He grabbed the lantern then threw me over his shoulder.
The last thing I heard before the door slammed behind us was the wrathful screams of vengeful spirits.
Ezekiel threwme on my bed and stood over me. “Are you deaf, Miss Lighthart, or simply stupidly defiant?”
I pushed up on my palms. “What?”
“I expressly told you that the east wing was out of bounds.”
He had? Oh shit, hehad. “I forgot.”
His eyes narrowed to slits. “I don’t believe you. Notfor one moment.” He leaned in, his lips a thin sneer. “You see, I think you’re a snoop. A nasty, sneaky little snoop who thinks that she can find out all my little secrets and use them to control me.”
“I’m not a snoop, but hell yes, I will use whatever I can in my arsenal to control you.”
He raked me over, breath coming faster, nostrils flaring. “What about your cunt?”
Heat flooded my cheeks. “What?”
“Your fragrant, soft, tight cunt, Miss Lighthart. Would you let me have that if it would keep me on a leash,hmmm? Let me fuck you? Taste you? Bury my fangs into the soft peachy skin of your inner thigh and suck until you scream?”
He was trying to get a rise out of me, that was all. Trying to frazzle me, and it was fucking working because his words were now in my head, and that meant they were in my mind, doing things to my body, almost as if he was doing the things that he was suggesting he wanted to do.
He advanced around the bed, and I shuffled across to the other side and leapt to my feet. “Don’t touch me.”
“Why not? Do you like it? Do you like it a little too much?”
“No. You disgust me.”
His smile was wickedly seductive, and my breath snagged in my throat. “Come now, aren’t you watchers meant to be the epitome of truth and justice?”
“The only justice would be if you didn’t exist.”
“And yet you fed me your delicious blood.” His pink tongue licked the corner of his mouth. “Sweet and potent as it slid down my throat. I admit, I would like another taste.” His dulcet tone deepened to a feral growl, and terror spiked my pulse.
“No.” I backed up, sidestepping toward the door, my insides vibrating with fear.
“Take off your amulet, Orina. Take it off and give in to me.” His words had resonance that pressed against me like a command.
The bastard was trying to compel me. “You can’t control me, Tepes.” The amulet protected me from that.
“Take. It. Off.” Needles sliced through my head.
I gritted my teeth and bore the pain to bite back, “No.”
I ran for the door, and he lunged, grabbing me by the nape and hauling me back against his body. He wrapped a steely arm around my waist and curled the other around my throat, caressing my rabid pulse with his thumb.
“Take it off…” he crooned, breath hot on my cheek. “I know it hurt last time, but this time it will feel good. I can make you feel good, Orina.”
The way he said my name…Oh God, I wanted him to make me feel good.
The steel band around my waist softened, and his hand slid up to cup my breast. I closed my eyes,waiting for the delicious squeeze of his palm that would culminate in his fingers pinching my nipple. I wanted that sweet ache to shoot to the apex of my thighs and settle there, wanted his mouth on me there.
