Tessa Adams: Flamebound

Paying more attention to him than to anything in the room, I absently pick up one of the many athames lying on top of the credenza, then immediately wish I hadn’t as terror—bone-deep and vivid—rips through me. Not mine. Not Declan’s. I drop the magical dagger back onto the polished mahogany with a thunk.

I don’t want to know. What Declan did before me isn’t important. It’s what he does now, when we’re together, that matters. I grab onto the thought, repeat it like a mantra until I actually start to believe it. Until I forget the cloying taste of fear that ripped through my senses the moment I touched the ancient knife.

Making sure to give the rest of his stuff a wide berth—I’m not one to bury my head in the sand, but there are some things that even I’m aware I’m better off not knowing—I turn back just in time to see Declan stretch out his arms in a move that is all ancient warrior. I watch, fascinated, as his muscles stand out in stark relief and a bead of sweat drips slowly down his spine. Seconds later, fire explodes in a ring all around him, a blaze that starts out small but that grows to touch the ceiling in seconds.

Deep inside I recoil, my fear instinctive after I was nearly burned alive just days ago. But I work hard not to let my instant revulsion for the fire show. Declan is a fire element, the most powerful I’ve ever met, and I am afraid a rejection of the flame will somehow translate into a rejection of him. So I don’t move, don’t speak, barely even breathe, and watch with deliberately blank eyes as the fire winds itself around his chest and arms and legs.

He must sense my uneasiness, though, because with a flick of his hand he quenches the flames.

“You didn’t have to do that.”

He smiles—a slow, sexy curling of one corner of his mouth that melts my brain cells and my resolve.

“When you’re in the room, I can think of any number of things I’d rather do than play with fire.”

Dropping a quick kiss on my lips, he crosses to the minifridge and pulls out two bottles of water. Hands me one.

I watch him drink, mesmerized by the way his throat moves. By the way he— I shake my head sharply, determined to snap out of the sensual spell he casts without even trying.

It’s easier said than done, though. Except for the time I spend working at Beanz, the coffeehouse I own down on South Congress, we’ve spent much of the last week in bed. Which has been fun and intense and sexy as hell, not to mention a million other things, but it hasn’t exactly been conducive to talking. And today, I need to talk.

He leans forward to steal another kiss—a playful sweep of his lips across mine that quickly turns into something dark and dangerous and utterly mind-numbing. His arms link around my waist, pulling me closer, and before I go under completely, I slap a hand against his warm, bare chest and shove him away.

“We need to talk,” I tell him, putting some distance between us so my nerve endings can stop firing . . . and so my brain cells can start.

He quirks a brow. “Aren’t those the four most dreaded words in any relationship?”

“Only when they’re followed by, ‘It’s not you, it’s me.’”

He’s silent for a second, then—“So is it?”

“Is it what?” I’m baffled by the guarded look on his face and by his sudden reserve.

“You, not me?”

I laugh, certain he’s joking. But the look in his eyes is solemn. Though I only get a glimpse—Declan is a master at hiding his emotions—it occurs to me that the question might be real. That he’s just as confused about this strange relationship as I am. And maybe as uncertain.

This time I’m the one who wraps my arms around him. I press kisses over his warm, hard torso, starting at the base of his throat and working my way straight down the center of his body until I get to the spot where his heart thumps heavily beneath my lips. I kiss him there, then rest my head on his chest and pull him even closer.

His arms tighten convulsively around me. “You make me crazy.”

I look up at him through my lashes. “Believe me, the feeling is more than mutual.”

He kisses me again, and this time I savor every second of it. He tastes like cinnamon and magic—dark, spicy-sweet and delicious. It’s a flavor I’m quickly becoming addicted to.

His tongue sweeps out, traces my lower lip. Plays with the corners of my mouth. Dances across my top lip and the little indention right in the center of it. My arms tighten around him, and my mouth opens in a desperate need to get closer.

He nips at my lower lip, then sucks it softly to soothe the hurt away. I bite back, just enough to remind him that I have my own teeth, my own power. He groans deep in his chest, reaches for the bottom of my pajama top and whips it off. Then we’re standing there, bare skin to bare skin, and it feels so good I forget every word of the carefully rehearsed speech I came in here to deliver.

His hands slide up my back to cup my head, his fingers tangling in the chin-length strands of my hair. He pulls my head back, tilts my chin up. And then he devours me.

His mouth is ravenous on mine, stroking, sucking, biting, kissing. He explores every inch—every centimeter—of my mouth with his tongue, his lips, until I’m little more than a quivering mess of a woman. Only then, when my whole body is trembling with need and want and unchecked desperation, does he move on.

I moan a little in protest, try to hold his mouth to mine. But he has other plans. His lips skim across my cheek. He pauses for a moment to nibble at my earlobe—it sends shivers down my spine, like he knows it will—before kissing his way down my jaw and neck.

He stops at the hollow of my throat—his favorite spot—and licks and sucks until my knees go weak and my body feels like it will spontaneously combust at any moment.

Declan knows what he’s doing to me. He knows that he has me now. Knows that I’ll do anything to feel him inside me. Just like he knows that I’m seconds away from my legs no longer being able to support me.

Without raising his head, or his mouth, from the wicked, wonderful things he’s doing to me, he sweeps a leg out and gently knocks mine out from under me. He catches me against him with one strong arm, then boosts me up so that I can wrap my legs around his waist.

This is one of my favorite things about making love with Declan. How strong he is, how easily he’s able to manipulate my body into whatever position he wants me in. And how absolutely, ridiculously easy it is for him to pick me up as though I weigh almost nothing.

I sink down a little so that I’m resting against him, his erection hot and hard where it nestles against my sex. He groans a little, tilts his hips so that the tip of his cock is resting right against my clit and starts to move slowly, deliciously, against me.

Seconds later, his lips close over my nipple. I gasp, arch into him, and he bites down just hard enough to send pleasure shooting through every nerve ending in my body. He laves the little hurt with his tongue, then does it again. And again.

That’s all it takes to send me over the edge I’m never very far from when Declan’s around. My body trembles, convulses, and I cry out, hold on to him even more tightly. He kisses and soothes me through the surprisingly intense orgasm even as he shifts to find the spot that will take me higher. I come again, screaming, head thrown back and breasts thrust up like some ancient pagan sacrifice.

Declan accepts the offering, his mouth closing over first one nipple, then the other as he prolongs my climax until I’m a sweaty, shuddering mess. Only then does he let the primal need inside him loose.

Dropping to his knees, he slides me gently onto the exercise mat. Strips my pants from me. Does the same to his own. Then he’s rolling me over onto my knees.