Ruthless Creatures (Queens & Monsters, #1)(35)

His eyes flare with heat. He grinds his back teeth together and says nothing.

I smile up at him, knowing exactly how my words have affected him, feeling a heady rush of power at the idea that something so small could make a man like him lose his grip.

“If I remember correctly, you said I’d have to ask you explicitly for what I want.”

His lashes lower. Very slowly, he exhales. It rumbles through his chest like a sound a bear might make. He growls, “Are you asking?”

I pretend to think for a moment, pursing my lips. “I don’t know. Am I?”

His eyes go black. Murderous black. Crazy-person black.

The only reaction that gets out of me is to make me smile wider.

Deadly soft, he says, “Careful, beautiful girl.”

I love it when he calls me that. It makes all my hollow spaces fill up with crackling white light and start singing.

Gazing up into his burning eyes, I whisper, “No. I think I’m done being careful. So I’d like you to kiss me n—”

Kage crushes his mouth to mine.

His kiss is savage, demanding, almost frightening in its intensity. It’s like he wants to crawl inside my soul through my mouth. He fists a hand in my hair and holds my head steady as he drinks deep, making little grunts of pleasure, his big hard body pressed against mine.

My pulse throbbing and my skin on fire, I sink my hands into his hair and let him take what he’s so greedy for.

The kiss goes on and on until I’m sure I won’t be able to remain standing.

Then he breaks away suddenly and stands holding me with his eyes closed and his chest heaving, the hand he’s got fisted in my hair not relaxing its tight grip even an inch.

When he exhales, it’s a groan.

I want to groan, too, but I’m incapable of coherent thought at the moment.

I’ve never, ever been kissed like that.

I had no idea what I’d been missing.

He slides a hand down my waist to my hip, which he squeezes. Then he slides the hand from my hip to my ass and takes a handful, squeezing that, too. He pulls me even closer, so our pelvises are pressed together, so I feel every inch of his arousal.

Breathing hard, he puts his mouth against my ear. “Fuck going out. I need to eat you for dinner tonight.”

Probably because I’m so dizzy, I start to laugh. “Oh, no, Romeo. You don’t get to skip the wining-and-dining part of this courtship. You’ll have to buy me an expensive dinner or two before you even get to second base. In case you haven’t noticed, I’m old-fashioned.”

He bites my neck.

It isn’t hard, but it makes me gasp anyway. Then he gentles the bite with a soft kiss, nuzzling my throat while making a rumbling noise very close to a purr.

His lips are like velvet. His tongue is exquisitely warm and soft. The scratch of his rough beard against my skin gives me goose bumps all over. I shiver, feeling burning hot and icy cold and so very alive.

He finds my mouth again, fitting his lips over mine. This time, the kiss is gentler, but no less passionate.

There’s a surprising depth of emotion in the way he kisses. In the way he holds me against his body, as if he doesn’t ever want to let me go.

I think he was telling the truth about not being with another woman since he met me.

He’s so hungry for me, he’s about to snap in two.

He’s the first to break the kiss again. When he does, he buries his face in my hair. He inhales deeply, then exhales with a sigh.

I whisper, “For a guy who claims to be such a bad scary criminal, you’re a big softie.”

“Only for you.”

His voice is thick and his hands are shaking, and holy hell, I’ve never felt this electric in my life. He makes me feel like I’m made of crack cocaine. Like I’ve got fire running through my veins instead of blood.

Like anything is possible.

“Kage?”

“Yes, baby?”

Baby. I’m dead. “Tell me your last name.”

“Porter.”

“Thank you. Look at us, making progress already. Pretty soon, I’ll know all your darkest secrets.”

He lifts his head and gazes at me. My smile is happy and wide.

Looking very serious, he brushes my hair off my cheek. He says in a husky voice, “I’ll have to make you fall in love with me before I tell you all my darkest secrets.”

“Make you fall in love with me.” He keeps upping the ante in this conversation. I thought I was dead ten seconds ago, but now I’m buried six feet underground.

“Oh yeah? Why’s that?”

“So you won’t leave me…even though you’ll want to.”

As I stare deeply into his eyes, my smile fades. A hot, prickling sensation, like a current of electricity, runs through me. The ground seems to be shifting underneath my feet.

I whisper, “So either don’t tell me your secrets or don’t make me fall in love with you. Because once I fall in, even death can’t make me fall out.”

He stares at me long and hard, his jaw working. When he finally speaks, his tone is curt.

“Two things.”

“Which are?”

“Number one: I’m gonna make you fall in love with me. It’s not even a question.”

I huff out a small, astonished laugh.

The nerve of this man. On behalf of feminists everywhere, I want to tell him to stick his arrogant assumptions up his ass.