Once Betrayed, Twice Shy

A kiss from the Lycan

FARAH

The kiss is brutal and utterly consuming. Caspian’s lips are pillow soft, a sharp, almost unfair contrast to the harsh way he claims my mouth, like he wants to burn and doesn’t care if the fire takes him with it.

He kisses me as if he’s been starving for it, as if somehow the last thin thread of whatever control he usually keeps locked so tight has snapped. His tongue slides against mine without asking, tasting, demanding, licking into me with a hunger that makes my knees weak. A low, guttural sound rumbles in his chest that I feel more than hear, vibrating against my lips.

My hands come up on instinct, pressing against the hard plane of his chest, but instead of pushing him away I find my fingers curling into the fabric of his shirt, holding on because the floor no longer feels steady.

He deepens the kiss, tilting my head with one large hand cradling the back of my neck so he can take my mouth even more thoroughly, and I gasp into him when his other hand settles at my waist and yanks me flush against him. Heat floods every inch of me. I can feel the solid wall of his body, the restrained strength in the way he holds me, the way his hips press forward so that the thick, hard length of him digs into my lower belly.

Somewhere in the back of my mind a distant voice is screaming that this is insane, that I should be fighting, that he is still the man who dragged me into this world against my will. But the voice is getting quieter by the second, drowned out by the wet, filthy slide of his tongue against mine, by the way he seems determined to memorize the shape of my lips with his own.

When he finally breaks the kiss it is only so he can trail his mouth down the line of my jaw, then lower, finding the sensitive skin of my neck. He nuzzles there first, breathing me in like he needs the scent of me in his lungs, and then his lips part and he sucks hard, tongue flicking against the spot that makes my knees threaten to give out.

I thrash against him—half protest, half something far more complicated, but I can’t for the life of me want him to stop. My head falls back against the wall he has pressed me to, and a soft, helpless moan slips out of my throat when he bites down gently, then soothes the sting with long, wet strokes of his tongue. He licks a slow path up to the hinge of my jaw, sucks the lobe of my ear between his teeth, and whispers something low and rough that I can’t quite make out before returning to my neck, marking me with open-mouthed kisses that leave my skin tingling and damp.

“Caspian—” His name comes out broken, barely recognizable.

He doesn’t answer with words. Instead his hands find the bodice of the red dress and, with one sharp, controlled motion, he rips it open down the front. The sound of fabric tearing is loud in the quiet room. Cool air rushes over my skin and I am left in just my thin bra, the ruined dress hanging off my shoulders in tatters.

Heat floods my face, but it is nothing compared to the fire that races through me when he looks down at what he has uncovered. His eyes are dark, almost black, and the hunger in them steals whatever breath I still had.

Then his mouth is on me again. He licks and sucks my n*****s through the thin material of the bra, the wet heat of his tongue soaking the fabric until it clings to the stiff peaks, outlining them obscenely. I have never experienced anything more erotic in my life. The barrier of the lace only makes the sensation sharper, more intense, the rough scrape of wet fabric against sensitive skin sending sparks straight down between my legs. He switches from one breast to the other, sucking hard enough that I can feel the pull deep in my core, then using the flat of his tongue to circle and flick until I am trembling and arching into him without meaning to. My fingers slide into his hair, gripping tight, and he makes a low, approving growl that vibrates against my skin.

His hands… God, his hands are perfect. They seem to know exactly how to touch me. He peels the bra down just enough to free my breasts, the cups tucking under them so they are pushed up and on full display, and then he cups them fully in his large palms, kneading the soft flesh while his thumbs brush back and forth over the tight, wet peaks.

When he pinches one n****e between his fingers, rolling and tugging it, I jolt, a sharp spark of pleasure racing straight down to the aching place between my thighs. He does it again, harder this time, then leans in to take the other n****e into his mouth, sucking it deep while his fingers continue to work the first. The dual sensation is almost too much. I can only cling to his shoulders and try to remember how to breathe as he lavishes attention on both breasts, licking, sucking, biting gently, leaving them flushed and glistening and so sensitive that every brush of air makes me shiver.

I feel the hard length of him pressed against my hip, thick and insistent even through his clothes, and the realization hits me like a second wave of heat. I am making him react like this. Me. The thought is so wild, so completely outside anything I have ever known, that it steals the last of my coherent thoughts. This is crazy. What the hell is happening? And yet I cannot remember the last time I have felt this alive. My heart is hammering so hard I am sure he can hear it. My breaths come in short, uneven pants. His scent wraps around me—pinewood and something darker, something wild and male that I cannot name but that makes my head spin—and I breathe it in like it might steady me even though it only makes everything worse.

His hands slide lower, over the curve of my waist, and then he palms my ass through the skirt of the dress, squeezing and kneading with a possessiveness that pulls another soft sound from my throat. His fingers dig into the soft flesh, spreading me slightly, and he lifts me a fraction so that the hard ridge of his arousal grinds against the apex of my thighs. The friction is deliberate, filthy, and I can feel how much he wants this. How much he wants me. The knowledge should terrify me. Instead it only feeds the restless ache building low in my belly, the growing wetness between my legs that I can already feel soaking through my panties.

Nothing prepares me for the moment he drops to his knees in front of me.

I look down, stunned, as he gathers the ruined red fabric in both hands and slowly, deliberately, lifts the skirt. Cool air kisses my bare thighs. He looks up at me then, and my breath hitches hard in my chest at the expression on his face. There is yearning there, raw and unguarded, mixed with a longing so intense it almost looks like pain. Whatever careful distance he usually keeps between us has been burned away. In this moment he is simply a man on his knees, staring up at me like I am the only thing in the world that matters.

He reaches for the edge of my panties. The thin material is already damp, the dark patch of wetness impossible to hide, and when his fingers brush over the soaked center of them a low, almost feral sound leaves his throat. He presses the pad of one finger against the fabric, rubbing slowly over the swollen, sensitive flesh beneath, and my hips jerk forward of their own accord.

“So f*****g soaked for me,” he mutters, voice rough and dark with approval, eyes never leaving mine as he continues that maddening, teasing stroke through the wet lace.

I swallow hard. My cheeks burn, but I do not stop him. When he finally hooks his fingers into the sides of my panties and tugs them down I raise one leg to help him, then the other, and the small act of cooperation feels more intimate than anything that has come before it. The cool air hits my bare, slick skin and I shiver, acutely aware of how exposed I am, how wet I am, how the evidence of my arousal is right there for him to see.

Every sense of reason has flown out the window. I know this is reckless. I know I should be putting distance between us instead of letting him strip me piece by piece in a side room while an entire gathering of his people is only a door away. But the way he looks at me—like he is starving and I am the only thing that can feed him—makes it impossible to care about anything else.

He slides the ruined underwear the rest of the way off my ankles, and then, still on his knees, still watching my face with that same devastating intensity, he tosses my soaked panties to the side.