Page 54 of Reaper's Desire

And oh, God, no woman has ever made me this hard from kissing me. Her hands are all over me, sliding up under my shirt, over my sweat-drenched skin and hard muscle, down to the waist of my pants, and I feel my abdomen flex as she licks across my lower lip, then sucks my tongue into her mouth, like…

I have never, not even when I was a fucking teenager, come in my pants just from making out. But in that instant, as Isabelle Montague drags my tongue into her mouth like it's my cock, her teeth grazing under my lip as she does, her nails digging into my abs, my abused cock starts to spurt helplessly.

The groan that escapes me is unstoppable, as heat races up my spine. I've been hard and soft and hard again too many times, all fucking morning, edged to the point of madness by the insatiable brat currently tangling my tongue around hers and clawing at my abs like she wants to climb me, and my control snaps. Spurt after spurt soaks my boxers and the front of my jeans, the pleasure over all too soon, shallow and not nearly enough.

And then reality crashes back in. I jerk away from her, turning sharply to hide what just happened.

The contract. The deadline. The fact that I was hired to kill her, and she doesn't know. The fact that I have to choose between murdering her or dying to protect her. "No. We can't." I bite out the words. "Isabelle, just…"

"Julian?" Her voice sounds confused, thick with her harsh breathing from her own arousal, and I can't look at her. Even though I just came, I could be hard for her again in seconds.

I could be almost anything for her. Except the man she deserves.

Without another word, I stalk away from her, toward the bathroom to clean up. I lock the door behind me, ignoring her sounds of frustrated huffing, and lean back against it, breathing hard.

Isabelle Montague will be my undoing. And God, she's both the worst and the sweetest way to die.

14

ISABELLE

I'm going insane.

That's the only explanation for why I'm lying in this narrow bed in our new safe house at three in the morning, staring at the ceiling and listening to Julian's breathing from the couch in the next room, feeling like I might actually lose my mind if he doesn't touch me soon.

It's been two days since the training session when I kissed him, when IthoughtI'd get him to give in, and it hasn't happened again. Two days of watching him look at me like he wants to devour me, only to turn away the moment I get too close.

I know he wants me. During training yesterday, when he was showing me how to break a chokehold, I felt his cock harden against my back. Felt his breathing change, his grip on my arms tighten just slightly before he pulled away and put three feet of distance between us.

He wants me. But he won't take me, and it's driving me absolutely fucking crazy. No matter what I do, the near-feral man who fucked me into oblivion in Ibiza has developed a sturdyrope of self-control when it comes to me, one that I can fray but never quite break.

I throw off the thin sheet and sit up, running my hands through my hair. The room is too hot, too small, too suffocating. I'm wearing a long t-shirt and nothing else, and even that feels like too much fabric against my overheated skin.

I've tried everything. Wearing less clothing around him. Touching him more. Making comments that border on explicit. Nothing works. He deflects every attempt with that infuriating control, maintaining his boundaries like they're carved in stone. It's only gotten worse since I kissed him, as if him getting that close to giving in just reinforced everything he's using to block me out instead of weakening it.

I even tried the towel trick again this morning. I walked right past him, where he was sitting at the small table with his laptop, close enough that water from my hair dripped onto his shoulder. He didn't even look up. Just kept typing, his jaw tight, his knuckles white where he gripped the edge of the table.

"Isabelle," he'd said, his voice strained. "Get dressed."

"Why?" I'd stopped right beside him, close enough to feel the heat radiating from his body. "Does it bother you?"

"Yes."

"Good."

His hand had shot out and pushed me forward at the small of my back. "This isn't a game."

"Then stop playing it." I'd leaned down, bringing my face close to his. "Stop pretending you don't want me. Stop acting like you're made of stone when I can see exactly how much you?—"

"Get. Dressed." He'd turned back to his laptop, dismissing me completely. I'd wanted to scream. Wanted to grab his face and force him to look at me. But I'd gone back into the bathroom and gotten dressed, feeling the rejection like a physical ache in my chest.

That was twelve hours ago, and I still feel it.

I stand up and move to the window, pulling back the thin curtain to look out at the dark street below. The small rental house we've been in since the night before last is in a quiet neighborhood on the outskirts of some Croatian town whose name I can't remember. Everything looks peaceful, like there aren't people hunting us, like we're not running for our lives, like the world isn't falling apart around us.

The constant danger makes everything feel more intense. Every day, Julian seems to find another threat getting too close. He spends hours on his laptop and phone, tracking leads and coordinating with contacts whose names I don't know. The stress is wearing on both of us—I can see it in the tight set of his shoulders and the dark circles under his eyes.

And the fear and the adrenaline and the knowledge that we could die at any moment make the wanting worse. If I could die anytime, I want tolive. I want as much pleasure as I can soak up between now and then.