I’m glad I could help, she told him.

Inside, he hovered at a crossroads. On the one side, sanity and caution, along with the ghost of the old, cold anger and pain, urged him to withdraw and erect all his barriers again.

On the other side lay the memory of warmth and laughter, and dancing in the kitchen to the rich smell of chocolate cake baking, and Melly saying to him with such transparent, inescapable sincerity, I had so much damn fun with you.

How much weight do you give all of that? How did that compare to the weight of one old, tired lie and a betrayal that was two decades in the past?

How much lighter would he feel if he – the meanest, most unforgiving bastard he knew – chose to forgive her and let it all go? How much warmer?

He had taken enough blood. Easing out of the bite, he rested his mouth against her skin, and in that moment, he truly didn’t know which direction he might choose.

Then she made a sound. It was barely audible even to his sharp hearing, little more than a husky catch at the back of her throat.

That was when he realized he wasn’t standing at a crossroads, but at a precipice, and with that tiny sigh of disappointment, she pushed him over the edge.

Ten

H

e went up in flames and everything inside of him spiraled out of control. His decades-long hunger and his need for her. Lifting his head, he drove his mouth down onto hers and slanted his lips. He felt the shock of it jolt through her body. Then she kissed him back with same kind of ravenous hunger as he kissed her.

She had never minded any of the earthier aspects of their time together¸ not the taste of his semen, or how her private, liquid arousal had tasted on his lips after he had licked her to climax, or the slight salty hint of blood. Mindlessly, he plunged his tongue into her, over and over, while she gasped and arched into him.

Driven by a hectic rush of need, he pulled back, reached for the bundle of bedding that lay nearby, and with a single yank, he untied the strip holding it all together and shook out the mattress. Even that brief moment away from her kiss felt insupportable.

He slid one arm underneath her hips. Lifting her, he twisted to lay her on the mattress and came over her prone body. Then, kneeling over her, he gazed down at her figure.

He loved her body with a greedy carnality that shocked even him. With round breasts and hips and long, muscled limbs, she was intensely feminine and graceful, strong yet welcoming. Her long, curly hair tumbled renegade over the mattress and spilled onto the rough cavern floor.

Even with her dirty clothes, smudged face and tangled hair, she looked burnished and vivid against the dinginess of the bleak cell, shining like a beacon of light. She watched him with a large gaze darkened by some unnamed emotion.

He hesitated. A part of him never forgot the slave pits he had fought his way out of, but she came from a finer, gentler life.

“Tell me no, Melly,” he growled. “Just say the word, and I’ll never approach you again.”

As he paused to give her a chance to respond, he felt a pulse of unbearable suspense. If he had learned nothing else in his long, wicked life, he had learned one thing. “Never” is a heartbreaking amount of time.

Please don’t tell me no.

She wasn’t gentle with her reply. Reaching for the waistband of his jeans, she yanked the fastening open. “Like you said, we’ll have plenty of warning – if she shows up, she’ll blow the whistle. Come here.”

Some kind of fierce, unnamed emotion roared through him. He replaced her hands with his own and yanked the fastening of his jeans open. While he did so, she lifted her hips to tear off her trousers and lacy underwear, and tossed them aside.

After twenty years of starvation, the drive to be inside of her was overwhelming. As he reached for her, she hooked one arm around his neck and lifted her mouth for his kiss.

He hadn’t thought it was possible to be on fire for her any more than he already was, but her eagerness torched through him with the sudden intensity of a flash fire. His need turned aggressive, and he plunged into her mouth with his tongue, but that penetration only fed his hunger. Urging her back on the mat, he knelt between her legs, while he stroked at her soft, private petals of flesh.

She felt so good, so good, silken and so slick with moisture, he had to swallow a groan. As he stroked her, he lifted his head to watch her face. A shudder of pleasure rippled through her body, and he thought with fierce possessiveness, I am doing this to her. She wants me right now, no one else.

As he caressed her, she stroked her hands down his chest and abdomen, and reached greedily for the opening of his jeans. Underneath, he wore black boxers, and she yanked the thin material down so that his stiff penis jutted free.

When she closed her fingers around his cock, the pleasure of her touch was almost unbearable. He jerked in her grasp, hissing, and nearly spilled himself all over her inner thigh. Grabbing her by the wrist, he pulled her hand away.

“I can’t take it,” he muttered. “Right now I’ve got to get inside you.”

He’d had so long to acquire finesse, literally centuries to discover how lovemaking can become a slow and sensual art. But she had reduced him to the most basic, and primal, of urges – the need to cover, protect and penetrate. To rut.

She lifted her head to hiss at him, “Get inside me now.”

He had to pause for a moment to stare at her. Melly was not just photogenic. She was simply pretty, and her feminine looks were enhanced by a normally even temperament and easygoing nature.

Right now, her features were clenched and sharp. She looked as driven as he felt.

She reached again for his cock and urged him down to her. Bracing himself on one forearm, he drove his mouth over hers again, plunging his tongue deep to fuck her mouth while she rubbed the head of his penis against her velvety-soft, fluted opening.

As soon as he felt that he was slick enough with her arousal so that he wouldn’t cause her discomfort, he pushed into her. She made an incoherent noise of pleasure and need. Panting, she kissed him back jerkily.

Melly knew how to finesse too. She knew how to make languid love, focusing on each pleasure point for its own sake, until the act of sex became like a voluptuous banquet. The knowledge of that, along with her urgency and lack of control, made him crazy.

Crazy.

Without fully intending to, he plunged all the way into her, and oh my God, she was so slick and welcoming. He felt as massive as an oak tree, and when she clenched on him, her inner muscles were tight as a fist.