Page 58 of Torment Me Knot
I blink open my eyes, surprised to find I’d had them clenched.
The flashback doesn't stay. It can't. Aubrey is here. Aubrey is real. Aubrey is warm and trembling and looking at my face like I'm the only thing in the world worth looking at, and the flash burns off in the steam.
“Okay?” he asks. “We can stop if you—”
“Don’t you dare!” I growl and his lips lift.
“As you wish.” He presses forward, his gaze holding mine as he eases into me.
I breathe through the stretch, my hands gripping his shoulders, my legs tightening around his waist. He pauses when he's fully seated, holding himself still, his whole body shaking.
“Talk to me,” he whispers. “Are you okay? Tell me. I can't do this if I'm hurting you.”
“You're not hurting me.” I cup his face in my hands, force him to look at me. “You're not hurting me. This is good. This is so good. I didn't know it could feel like this.”
His voice breaks on the words. “I didn't know anything could feel like this. Like you.”
He moves slow at first. Finding what works. I clench around him on his next stroke and a soft, broken groan tears out of him against my throat. He pulls back. Drives in deeper. His breath catches and stays caught for a second too long. His hands grip my hips and stay there, fingers pressing into the bone. Not pinning me. Holding me. Holding on.
I roll my hips up to meet him on the next thrust. He makes the sound again, louder this time, his forehead dropping to my collarbone. I do it again. He shudders against me. His breath comes apart at my ear.
“Espie.” My name, broken. “Slow. I need slow. Or I'm not going to last.”
The heat gathers low. Pulses where he's seated inside me, then climbs. He thrusts deeper, and I gasp against his mouth. The angle is perfect. He drags against a place high inside me I didn't know was there. White heat. Lightning. Sparks shoot up my spine. The heat radiates outward through my pelvis, my hips, the backs of my thighs.
“Right there, don't stop, please don't stop,” I breathe.
He shifts his grip on my hips, and drives in again, hitting that same spot. I cry out, the sound echoing off the tile, lost in the rush of water. My inner walls clench around him, pulling him deeper, and his answering groan vibrates through my whole body.
The wet sound of our bodies moving together fills the shower. Skin against skin. The slap of his hips meeting mine. Our combined slick coats us, easing every thrust, the musk of my arousal mixing with his cedar and chamomile. My gardenia risesto meet him, my clover threading through. Underneath both of us, a third note. Our bond, taking shape in scent before it takes shape in flesh.
“Espie. You feel... gods, you feel incredible.”
He bottoms out inside me and holds there, both of us trembling, both of us breathing hard. Our bond tugs. Hard. Behind my sternum, a tug so deep it pulls toward him. Toward the specific place where his neck meets his shoulder. My teeth ache.
I want him in me. Not just like this. Deeper. Permanent. Under my skin. In my blood.
“Aubrey. I want you to claim me. Please, claim me.”
He goes still. His breath stops against my throat. For one suspended heartbeat, neither of us moves.
“Espie.”
“Bond me.” My fingers clamp in his wet hair, pulling his face up. So he can see me. “I need it. Aubrey. I can't move forward without this. Please.”
His whole body trembles where he's pressed against me, inside me, surrounding me.
“I've never been more sure of anything. I want to be yours. I need it to be true.”
“Espie.” His forehead drops to mine. “Gods.Gods.”
“Tell me you don't want it. Tell me and I'll stop asking.”
His hands cradle my face like I'm something holy.
“I want it,” he whispers. “I want it so much I'm shaking. Can you feel me shaking? I've wanted it since the first moment I scented you. Since before I knew what wanting felt like again.”
“Then take it.” I tilt my head, baring my throat to him. My pulse offered up to him. “Take me. I'm yours. I'm yours.”
