But I can’t disguise my own curiosity. I lean in, flicking my tongue along his lip as if it would be that easy to taste someone else he may have kissed. Mara? Bonnie? All I sense in the end is ash and smoke. Him. His skin smells only like coconut, his clothing bone-dry, his boxers straining at the front.
I close my eyes, hating how much the thought of him with someone else bothers me. It’s selfish. It’s pathetic. It’s primal, a raw feeling.
Even if it burns, it’s so much better than nothing.
“Look at me.” He snatches my chin until I do, his nostrils flaring, chest heaving as he turns, dragging me to my couch. He shoves me down and plunges his hand between my legs, extending a finger and slipping it inside.
I whimper, drawing my knees up to his hips as my body expands around the intrusion. He searches me ruthlessly as if by touch alone, he can tell what I can’t just by looking at him. Have I been with someone else?
No. The answer makes him groan, his eyelids lowering, teeth skewering his lip. Satisfied, he withdraws, bringing his mouth to my throat. A fiery burst of pain makes me gasp, and he does it again—snatch a sliver of flesh between his teeth and grind. Bite. There’s no chance he won’t leave a mark—he wants to.
I shiver at the possession, clawing at his shoulders, but for whatever reason, I don’t command him to stop. Not that he would—he’s ruthless, raking with his teeth to create his own twisted version of a tattoo that spans the length of my collar. Anyone who sees will know what caused it.
Panting, he brings his mouth to mine. “Beg me to fuck you.” He presses his lips as if in a demonstration. “Say it. ‘Fuck me, Rafe’…”
I arch into him instead, brushing his lip with my tongue, plunging inside his mouth entirely.
He grunts, shoving me down, and urging my legs apart.
My nails sink into the couch as he guides himself inside me, inch by inch. He goes slow at first, but soon, he’s forging a steady rhythm, and I stop thinking, letting my body move against him however it wants and needs to. Gradually, his tempo builds, driving him deeper, setting me alight.
Every thrust seems to sow a million invisible flames that converge into a blaze—an inferno. I can barely track how it happens—just that the pleasure swells, raging beneath my skin until it boils over and explodes.
Every nerve in my body seems to unravel at once. All I can do is cry out, my spine curving as he stills, grunting against my throat.
It’s fire in its rawest, most destructive form.
And I never realized how good it could feel to burn.
Chapter Seventeen
“Is he coming back?” Rafe’s voice is hoarse, his eyes on my counter where even from here, two empty mugs are visible.
Bit by bit, reality returns, bringing with it a million painful observations. The smashed camera on the floor. The borrowed jacket slung over my armchair. The taste in my mouth and the stench of smoke in my lungs.
“Is he?”
To stall having to answer him, I turn into his chest, seeking out as much heat as I can take in case he leaves now. “No,” I confess when my face is safely hidden. “He’s not.”
He relaxes slightly, a grunt revving in his chest. “You’re a goddamn tease, you know that?”
Do I? No, I decide. He turns that word into something cruel, well beyond any hold I might have over him. Unconvinced by my silence, he laughs.
“What next? You bring him to the club? Fuck him on the dance floor to get my attention?” The venom in his tone doesn’t match the gentleness with which his fingers pick through my hair, parting the strands. “I’m not someone you want to taunt, bunny. You keep playing with fire, and you’re going to get burned.”
He doesn’t even know the half of it.
“Damn…” A sigh rips from his chest, and he adjusts his weight, drawing me against him. My couch is too small for us both, making our current position difficult to maintain. He has to brace one foot against the floor to support most of his bulk. Balanced on top of him, I’ve never felt smaller, in danger of slipping off at any moment.
“Is the bed off-limits, rabbit?” His tone makes it sound like such a dangerous question. A line he’ll only cross with my permission.