Page 33 of Soul of a Witch

I’d just commanded a demon prince to strip off his clothes, and heobeyed. No hesitation, no argument, no anger. It made me giddy as much as it frightened me. It made my head tingle and excitement roil through my stomach.

He was watching me raptly. Waiting. Wanting.

“You’re scared of me.” His tone was amused but gentle. Surprise flickered over his face when I shook my head.

“My mother warned me about demons.” I dared to stand and take a step closer. Then another. And another. “She told me you were all selfish beings.”

His fingers twitched at my approach. Self-control, barely maintained. “Your mother was right.”

“She said you’re dangerous.”

“Absolutely.”

“That you’re killers. That you manipulate humans to get what you want. Our bodies. Our souls.” I was right in front of him now, the closest I’d ever been to naked flesh. I thought suddenly of all the times I’d averted my eyes, every time I’d looked away from something I longed for. Every time I stifled myself because that was what I was told to do.

“You should believe it. All of it.”

And I did. I just didn’t care.

“I was told not to play with dangerous things,” I said, reaching up, my fingers hovering over his chest. Not close enough to touch, but close enough to feel the heat radiating off his skin. Close enough to feel the tension vibrating between his flesh and mine, growing more violent the closer I came. “But my mother is dead, and my father is wicked. So I think I’ll play how I please.”

He was perfectly still when I touched his throat. I traced my fingers along the contours of it, the thick cords of muscle that framed a prominent Adam’s apple. So close I could smell him, warm and earthy, like the way the sun felt on a cold day, or the softness of green moss growing on stone. He was something wild, something that didn’t fit into the world around him.

He didn’t belong, and yet here he was. Just like me.

He made a soft sound, not quite a moan but more than merely a breath, as my fingers stroked over the alcove at the base of his throat.

His wings retracted, tightening against his back. His fingers curled; his lips parting slightly. Those subtle tells were the cracks in his monstrous guise, and I wanted to press my fingers into them and rip them open.

“Why aren’t you breathing?” I said.

“I can smell you.Constantly.Your skin, your sweat. Every change in your hormones, every chemical reaction in your brain. Your magic — I can’t escape it. It’s intoxicating. It’s irresistible. Every instinct in my brain demands I give in to it. So, I hold my breath.”

“And what would happen? If you gave in?”

“I might hurt you, without meaning to. I might not be able to control myself.”

He said this all very matter-of-fact, as if it were entirely normal to be so overwhelmed by the smell of someone that you’d lose control. It should have been terrifying, a giant red flag for my safety.

But as he stood there shuddering with the effort to hold back, waiting for me to give him permission before he even touched me, I was so turned on I felt feral. Nothing I’d read about, no porn I’d watched, had ever been so erotic as simply knowing how desperately he wanted me.

“Start breathing,” I ordered, and his black eyes widened. “I want you to inhale, as much as you can, and hold it.”

“Oh, you are wicked, aren’t you?” he said. His nostrils flared, and he breathed in, a shiver running over his naked body as he did. His cock twitched, standing rigidly at attention as he held the scent of me in his lungs.

“How does it feel?” I whispered, as he closed his eyes and shook his head from side to side, humming.

“Like honey on the tip of my tongue,” he said, his words creating a pulse in the air that made my ears pop. “Like a knife at my throat. Or the first drink of liquor after a very long dry spell.”

He opened his eyes, and I was lost in their beauty once again. Orbs of black marble with veins of gold. It was like he’d been decorated, fitted with jewels and precious stones like the death mask of some ancient king.

“Can you control yourself for me, Callum?” My voice sounded strange, even to my own ears. The softness that usually infected my words was gone.

The demon nodded, never ripping his gaze away from mine. “I can.”

Stepping closer, I reached up on my tiptoes to bring my lips to his ear. This was madness. This was me looking death in the face and laughing.

“I want you to lose control.”

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