Page 21 of BRATVA'S Avenging Bride
Then I kiss her. I take her mouth like I want to take everything else. Completely, thoroughly, until there's no question about what this is or who we are to each other.
She makes a sound against my lips. Surprised. Hungry.
Then she kisses me back.
Her hands slide from my wrists to my chest, fisting in my shirt. She rises on her toes, angles her head, and opens for me like she's been waiting for this, for me, for permission to want something as fiercely as she hated it.
I walk her backward until she hits the wall. My body cages hers, one hand tangled in her hair, the other at her waist, holding her exactly where I want her.
She bites my lower lip.
Pain sparks through me, sharp and perfect. I groan into her mouth and she does it again, harder this time, drawing blood.
"Fuck," I breathe against her lips.
"Still think this is a good idea?" Her voice is wrecked, breathless.
I look at her. Her eyes are dark and wild, her lips are swollen from my mouth, my jacket is still draped over her shoulders like a claim.
"The best one I've ever had."
I kiss her again before she can argue.
This time, she doesn't just kiss me back. She devours me.
Her hands are everywhere, my hair, my neck, under my shirt, nails dragging across my skin hard enough to mark. She's all teeth and desperation and barely contained violence, like she's trying to prove she can break me.
She probably can, but I don't care.
I break the kiss long enough to move to her neck, my mouth finding that pulse point I've been obsessing over. She tastes like salt and smoke and something indefinable that I already know I'm addicted to.
"Matvey." My name is a gasp. A warning. A plea.
"Tell me to stop," I murmur against her throat. "Tell me you don't want this."
Her hands tighten in my hair. "I can't."
I kiss her again, slower this time. Deeper. Letting her feel exactly how much I want this. Want her.
When we finally break apart, we're both breathing hard. Her pupils are blown wide, her chest rising and falling rapidly against mine.
"This changes things," she says.
"Good."
"You don't even know what I mean,” she argues.
"I don't care." I brush my thumb across her lower lip, feeling the heat there, the slight swelling. "You can spend the rest of the week trying to prove I'm like them. Trying to find the angle, the trap, the moment I betray you." I lean in until our foreheads touch. "But you're going to fail. Because I'm not them, Katherine. And the sooner you accept that, the sooner we can stop pretending this isn't inevitable."
She closes her eyes. "How is it you're so sure?"
"Because you didn't push me away." I pull back just enough to see her face. "You could have. You're fast enough. Strong enough. But you didn't. Because some part of you already knows what the rest of you is too afraid to admit."
"And what's that?"
I smile. Press one more soft kiss to her mouth. "That you're already mine. You just haven't caught up yet."
Her eyes flash with anger, fear, and something that might be hope.
