Page 69 of Wicked Ends
Rose takes my hand, and I pull her between my knees. Looking up at her like this, with the fairy lights she’s strung around her room casting a glow on her skin, she looks like something out of a dream.
“What?” she asks, self-conscious.
“Nothing. Just looking at you.” I slide my hands under her sweater. “I’ll never get tired of being able to touch you.”
“Then don’t stop.”
I stand slowly, my hands traveling up her sides, taking her sweater with them. She raises her arms, letting me pull it over her head. Her hair falls in dark waves around her shoulders, and I take a moment just to look at her, at the delicate lace of her bra, the freckle on her collarbone, the veins just barely visible under her skin, the way her chest rises and falls with each breath. Wondrous.
“Drake.”
“I’m here,” I reply, and I am.
I kiss her then, slowly, deeply, enjoying feel of her lips, the taste of her mouth. My hands explore her body with new wonder. When I could touch her before, it was good, but this is indescribable.
Rose’s fingers undo the buttons of my shirt, and when her hands finally touch my bare chest, I have to close my eyes.
“You’re so warm.” She spreads her fingers across my skin. “I can even feel your heartbeat.”
The wonder in her voice is echoing my own feelings. I shouldn’t have a heartbeat. I’m dead, have been for a hundred years. But here I am, heart pounding in my chest like I never left the world of the living.
We finish undressing each other slowly. Each new bit of skin revealed is a new territory for exploring. I glide over her body with my hands and lips, committing every curve, every texture to memory. The soft swell of her breast, the shape of her hip bone, the tender skin behind her knee, all of it precious, all of it mine to cherish and adore.
When we finally fall onto the bed together, I take my time, no longer filled with the fear that I might fade at any moment. Now I can linger, can make each moment last.
I trail my lips down her neck, across her collarbone, between her breasts. She bends beneath me, fingers grasping in my hair, guiding me where she wants me, in control. I follow willingly, worshiping her body with my mouth, my hands, learning what makes her breath catch and what makes her moan.
“Drake, I need you inside me. Now.”
I position myself above her, looking down into her eyes as I enter her slowly. The feeling is indescribable, so tight and hot. I have to pause, overwhelmed.
“Are you okay?” Rose asks, her hands on my shoulders, concern in her eyes.
“Better than okay,” I manage.
She smiles, understanding exactly what I mean, and pulls me down for a kiss.
We move together, finding a rhythm that builds slowly. She wraps her legs around my lower back, pulling me deeper, her grip commanding. It makes me want to give her everything. I let her set the pace, let her take what she needs from me. I want her to feel power, to feel worshipped. I move inside her slowly, then faster when she demands it, her hips meeting mine, her eyes never leaving my face.
I kiss her while we move, her lips, her jaw, her eyelids. Her hair fans out around her head, a dark halo. It’s almost funny, the way she looks like an angel and not like the preconceived stereotype of a witch at all. She pushes me over, and suddenly I’m on my back, Rose straddling me, her hands pinning my shoulders to the mattress. I don’t resist. Watching her like this, in control, is better than any fantasy I could conjure up, alive or dead.
She rides me slow at first, then harder, her head tipped back, eyes closed as she chases her release. I reach up to play with her breasts as they bounce, thumbs circling over her nipples.
When she comes, Rose cries out, and it tips me over the edge. I lose myself in the pleasure, in her, in us, and when it happens I am not a ghost. No man ever was more alive.
Afterward, we lie together, her head on my chest, my fingers tracing slow patterns on her back. Her breathing slows, and I think she’s fallen asleep.
“I can hear your heart.” She proves me wrong about being asleep. “It’s the most beautiful sound.”
I press a kiss to the top of her head. But beneath the contentment, guilt eats at me. She deserves to know the truth. About why I first approached her, about what I wanted from her, but not just from her. From every precious Smith witch who entered the academy, the last in 1966, a cousin most likely. I need to tell her about how I would have used her to get my revenge against the Crescent Moon Coven.
Every time I tell myself that the timing isn’t right, I know I’m a coward. I’m terrified of losing this, of losing her, when she learns what I’ve done. But I’m done being a coward. She deserves better.
But before I can speak, Rose shifts on the bed, propping up on her elbow to look at me, and she bites her lip in that way she does when she’s nervous about something completely different. “Um, Drake?”
Head tilted, I peer at her, trying to figure out what she’s about to say.
“Drake, will you go to the Winter Ball with me?”
