When I started dating Bones over six years ago, I knew a relationship with him would break my heart. It had, more than once, and Bones wasn’t offering assurances that it wouldn’t this time, either. Yet just like back then, I couldn’t resist him.

“Playing it safe is for chickens,” I whispered.

He crouched on the bed, all curved sinews and pale hard flesh. Then he leaned forward, taking the time to drag his mouth from my stomach to my neck. My nipples hardened, need clenched in my belly, and I arched toward him.

His mouth slanted over mine as he gathered me in his arms. Feeling his naked body on top of me blew my control apart. My skin tingled everywhere his flesh made contact. I couldn’t get close enough to him, and I kicked the covers away. Bones kissed me like he was drowning, his tongue raking mine while he continued to rub sensually against me, stroking me without entering, touching me everywhere and all at once.

I ran my hands over him as well, moaning into his mouth. My need was almost painful when he pushed his fingers into me, finding my most sensitive spot and rubbing it intensely. I began to claw at his back. Tears leaked from my eyes. The ecstasy built to a tremendous level, straining against my skin, until I tore my mouth from his.

“God, Bones, yes!”

It was a sob and a scream combined. He responded by flipping me on top of him, lifting me in the same motion, and burying his mouth between my legs.

I convulsed at once, the spasms shaking me. His arms clamped around my waist while he tongued my flesh and sucked without fangs, as if he were drinking my pleasure into him. I clutched his head, shuddering, as the last remaining waves rippled over me.

Bones set me back against the mattress without breaking contact with his mouth. I was still panting from the orgasm and now half-sagged on the pillows. He lifted his head, his gaze pinning mine as he crawled upward toward me.

“Look at me,” he said, lowering his hips between mine.

I did, opening my thighs and arching to meet his first thrust. Oh God, I’d forgotten how Bones stretched me when I wasn’t used to him. His hardness pushed against my walls, filling me so deeply, I felt tears in my eyes. Yes. Yes. I’ve needed you like this.

“Harder.”

Moaned when he began to move gently in me, but I didn’t want gentleness. I wanted what I knew he had lurking past his concerns for being tender.

He moved with more force and kissed me, his eyes still open. I didn’t close mine, either. Seeing his face while he was inside me overwhelmed me. I grabbed his hair, locked my gaze to his, and kissed him until I had to break away to breathe.

“I can taste myself on your mouth,” I panted. “I want you to taste yourself on mine. I want to suck you, swallow you when you come—”

“Stop talking like that, or I’m going to come right now.” His hands flexed on my hips, holding me tighter. He was close. I could feel it in the way he held me and in those tempered, measured thrusts that devastated me with passion. His nearness to orgasm filled me with erotic purpose, making me want to bring him over the edge.

I ground myself against him, crying out at how good that felt. “More. Take me harder.”

He unleashed his restraint, leaving me gasping at the blinding concentration of sensations. It hurt in the sweetest way, causing me to strain toward him even as I cried out at his rough, rapid strokes. When he reached his climax, he threw me against the headboard and shouted with rapture, his whole body trembling. I clung to him, shaking also, my heart beating fast enough to explode.

After several seconds, Bones unglued me from himself—and the headboard—to lay me back on the bed. “Bloody hell, Kitten, are you all right?”

If I hadn’t still been gasping, his concern over my assumed injury would have made me laugh. “Come back here.”

I pulled him down from his hover until he was on top of me once more. He balanced his weight, his free hand sliding to my head as I moved lower to suck his nipple.

He tasted like salt, but that was probably from my sweat. His hand tangled in my hair as he pressed me closer, a deep groan coming from his throat.

“I’ll be gentler this time, but I need you again now.”

I bit him, feeling him shudder. Yeah, he liked that. So did I, and right now I couldn’t stop touching him or tasting him.

“Don’t be gentle. I love it when you lose control. I want you to lose it again.”

I slid lower, tasting the part of him that was salty with something other than sweat. My lips wrapped around him, taking him into my mouth until he overflowed it, then moaning as he twisted position to reciprocate.

Everything blurred into a haze of skin, lips, tongues, and hard flesh. My need grew the more he fed it, and he kept feeding it. After what seemed like an hour, I squinted over his shoulder at the light intruding into the room.

“Did you turn on a lamp?” I gasped, wondering when he would have done that.

Bones craned his neck, squinting also at the new shaft of light coming from the corner.

“That can’t be,” he muttered.

“What?” I asked as he jumped from the bed.

More light came in when Bones tugged back what I now noticed was a curtain. He turned to me and raised his brow.

“It’s the sun.”

It couldn’t be morning already. But the proof was there with those yellow rays illuminating the front of him.

Bones stared at me before closing the drapes with a snap. “I don’t care,” he said, getting back into bed. “Now then, where were we?”

TWENTY-SEVEN

YOU WHORE !”

The first punch rocked me back before I even registered who’d thrown it. Another one came, then another. I tried to defend myself, but my arms weren’t moving. Neither were my legs. It took me a second to realize why. They were bolted to the floor. Gregor knelt next to me, beating me without mercy.

“You’ll be sorry for this,” I got out as soon as he paused.

“You threaten me?” A brutal punch to my stomach doubled me over as much as the metal clamps would allow. Goddamn, who ever said you couldn’t feel pain in dreams? “I am your husband, even though you don’t deserve to call me that, you traitorous bitch!”

Suddenly the punches stopped, and Gregor caressed my cheek. “Chérie, why do you do this? Why do you persist in angering me? You know I must punish you for your adultery, but it pains me to do so.”

I managed to laugh even through the pain. “Oh sure. This hurts you more than me, huh? You are the world’s biggest asshole, Gregor.”

“You will do as I say!” That false sweetness was gone. He was back to whacking me with every other word. “You will return to me right now, or you will wish you had.”

“Go ahead. Show me everything you’ve got! I’ve been beaten and tortured before, but with you, it all goes away as soon as I open my eyes. You don’t scare me, Gregor.”

He seized my hair, yanking it so hard I felt clumps pull out. “If you let him turn you into a vampire,” he hissed, “I will make sure you suffer. Do you understand me?”

I stared at him. “When I was sixteen, I used to care about you. When I first got my memory back, a little part of me still did. Now, however, as God is my witness, I swear I will put you in the ground. Do you understand me?”

He hit me so hard everything went black, but his temper was to my advantage, because it knocked me right back into reality. I heard an anxious voice.

“Kitten, wake up!”

Bones was shaking me. My cheek stung faintly, and I knew it wasn’t residual pain from Gregor’s fists. Bones had been doing more than shaking me.

“Stop that, I’ve had enough of being beaten,” I muttered, trying to brush his hands away.

He didn’t let go, but he did stop shaking me. “He was beating you? You were crying out in your sleep because he was striking you?”