Page 243 of Starside

I keep moving. When I reach him, I lift my chin, leaving any trace of emotion or anticipation out of my voice. “I hate you. This wouldn’t change anything.”

“Of course it wouldn’t,” he spits back at me.

Good.

He could leave, he could go to bed himself, he could do a thousand things, but here he is, looking at me, as if he’s waiting. As if he doesn’t think I’ll have the nerve to do something next.

I stare him down the same way I have every other time he’s challenged me. Instead of making for my sword, though, I move to unclasp my top, and his hand shoots out, grabbing my wrist. Stopping me.

At first, I think he’s going to snarl and reject my advances. Or order me to remain mostly clothed while he has me against a wall.

But then his hand drags down the wet fabric, and it’s the first time I’ve seen him truly lose control. Because he looks like he hates himself for touching me, but it also looks like he can’t stop.

His rough fingers slide down my breast, and I’m not breathing. His callused thumb rubs across my hardened nipple, and I pinch my lips together to keep from making any sound at all.

He doesn’t need to know how much I like this. He doesn’t need to feel how long I’ve wanted this.

Our encounter underground could be blamed on the fire demon. We were in the dark, with our eyes closed. This … this is different.

He removes his hand, and my body shivers at the loss of heat.

“We shouldn’t do this,” he says, and I think he’s going to leave me here, aching. Wanting. But then, in a flash, he reaches around and tears the buttons at my neck clean off. They bounce somewhere far away, clinking against stone. My dress slides down my body, onto the floor.

His eyes seem to go wholly black.

I shiver under his unrelenting gaze. It’s cold in here, and I’m wet, small droplets of water running down my heated skin, across the markings he can now see clear as day. Since I got them, it’s been instinct to hide, to shrink away from notice, but I don’t move to cover myself. I don’t do anything that would make him think of me as weak. Because even if we’re really doing this, he’s still my enemy.

The way he’s looking at me, taking in every inch as if I exist for him alone to study, shouldn’t send a jolt of need right to the core of me, but I am beyond shame. I am beyond reason.

His knuckles get even whiter as he stares and stares, gaze locked onto my chest, heavy with need and peaked from the cold. My thighs clench together, and that’s where his eyes drop next.

This is purely physical. Raker hasn’t ever let anyone kiss him, so I’m not expecting anything tender.

I’m not surprised when he says in a dark voice that seems ripped from the seams of his self-control, “Get on your hands and knees.”

Fuck. We’re really doing this.

I swallow. He traces the movement with his eyes. He’s focusing far too closely on my neck. Carefully, very carefully, gaze never leaving his, I lower myself onto the sheets. I turn my back to him.

For a moment, I wait for the sound of his sword scraping out of his scabbard. I wait for him to betray me and slay me while I’m at my most vulnerable.

There is a sound of metal—

His armor. He’s taking it off, piece by piece.

“I said your hands and knees,” he says, his voice a dark and brutal command.

I bend over. Do as he says. I really am desperate, aren’t I? Yes. Right now, yes. I’m desperate and aching. These weeks have been about survival, but right now, before my almost-guaranteed death, I want this. My back arches and a shiver licks down my spine. I’m more exposed than I’ve ever been in my life.

I swear I hear a barely restrained growl behind me, but his voice is cold and cruel as ever as he says, “Look at you. Already gleaming and ready for me.”

I clench my jaw, staring straight ahead. The sheets rustle with movement. My skin prickles at his approaching heat. “No one has touched me in weeks. Don’t flatter yourself.”

“Weeks?” he says, suddenly stilling behind me. If I didn’t know better, I would say he sounds jealous.

“Weeks,” I reply.

His fingers dig roughly into the sides of my hips as he drags me back toward him. His hands are burning hot.