Page 8 of Shifting Desire
Now we’re walking the few blocks from The Gin Room back to the apartment building where all the single staff live, and every step feels like another inch closer to disaster.
“Do you ever take a night off?”I ask as he holds the door for me, watching me like he’s memorizing every step.
“Off?”he echoes.
“Yeah.Like ...normal.Casual.Not broody and intimidating and in my space.Not wearing a suit and that damn smirk.”
He grins.Not just the smirk he uses when he’s toying with me, but a real, full grin that shows sharp teeth.Fucking predator.
I blink.“Are those...”
“Fangs,” he confirms smoothly, as if it’s no big deal.“They come out when I’m ...hungry.”
I stop at the elevator.“You’re not going to feed on me, are you?”
His smile fades, but the heat in his eyes intensifies.“No, little fae.You’ll have to beg me before I taste you.”He winks arrogantly and I shove at his chest.
But my heart betrays me, stuttering in my chest.A vivid image forms in my mind of me on my knees begging this beast of a man to ruin me.I rub my thighs together and shake my head to dismiss the fantasy.
Why do his words sound more like a promise instead of a threat?
The elevator arrives with a ding, and we step inside.The moment the doors close, the air shifts again.Heavy.Tense.Charged.Like the magic before a storm.
“You’re too close,” I mutter.
“I haven’t moved.”
Exactly.He doesn’t have to.
He’s always there just barely outside my defenses, like he’s waiting for the walls to fall.
The elevator hums quietly between floors, and I realize this is the first time I’ve ever been alone with him.Truly alone.No bar between us.No people.No noise.
Just Malichai.And me.And this pulsing silence that feels too thick to swallow.
“Why do you always look at me like that?”I ask.
He lifts a brow.“Like what?”
“Like you’re waiting.”
He doesn’t answer right away.
Then, softly, too softly, he says, “Because I am.”
I turn to face him fully.“Waiting for what?”
His gaze drops to my lips, then to my throat, then back to my eyes.There’s something dangerous behind his stare, something primal.Something that makes my knees weak and my pulse trip over itself.
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” he says.
“Try me.”
For a moment, he just studies me.His expression unreadable.Then he takes a step forward, just one, but it’s enough to make the elevator feel suffocating.
“I’m waiting for you to fall in love with me,” he says, voice like velvet over glass.“Before I take what’s already mine.”
My brain short-circuits, my heart races, and my pussy flutters.
