A Court of Innocents

27: Desire

Azriel pressed his weight into me, trapping me against the bed. I wasn't getting out of here until he was thoroughly finished with me. My toes curled at the thought, and I moved my hips against him as he kissed me so deep that I felt it in my core.

The last time I had been this wholly intimate with a man, I'd nearly killed both of us. Tamlin's hands had felt good on my skin, yes, but I'd felt trapped and terrified beneath that pleasure. It wasn't Tamlin's fault. The fault belonged solely to me, because, though I'd been gifted plenty of time to deal with my demons, I'd failed to slay them. I had let my soul crack and break at the edges and hadn't bothered to repair it. And I'd be lying if I said that, as Azriel's hands brought me pleasure, a gaping chasm of dread didn't follow in its wake.

He slid down my body, his mouth hovering over the heat of my core, and he looked down at my pants like he wanted to rip them off my body with his teeth. But he hesitated. Looked back at me. And said in a voice that was soft and kind and belonged solely to a friend, "I can still stop. I don't want to push too far. You can tell me if it's too much for you."

I'd begun to crawl back inside my mind, to lose myself to my thoughts, but those words made me pause. That looming dread gathering in my stomach—it stopped. There was nothing but love and acceptance in those hazel eyes, blatant and obvious and powerful enough to wipe away any fear. I had no doubts that he would stop if I asked him to, even if we were halfway through the act. He would pull out, but he wouldn't pull away, and all that heat would instantly be replaced with warm, solid tenderness.

That alone gave me enough confidence to whisper, "You could never be too much for me, Azriel Shadowsinger."

He pressed on. That focus narrowed to the bare skin above my waistband. He left soft kisses there, and when he had me arching beneath him, trying to guide him towards where I needed him most, he only continued to tease. Those soft kisses were replaced with tempting licks and bites that set me on fire.

My hands dug into his locks—smoother than silk, smelling faintly of the pine trees that littered the mountains to the north.

"It's rude to tease." When I spoke again, my voice couldn't be described as soft. It was husky, sultry, heady. Powerful and sexy. I never felt that way, never even thought I was capable of it, but with the focus of the Night Court's Spymaster locked solely on me, that's who I became.

"Ask nicely." His warm breath fanned across my stomach, only adding to the heat between my legs.

They pressed together, desperate for any sort of friction, but he pried them apart with all the brutality and strength of a trained warrior.

Dark eyes flicked to mine. Ask. Nicely, that gaze seemed to say, and I swear a growl whispered in my ear.

Ask nicely, or put an end to this stolen moment. Ask nicely, or cut off my pleasure at the head. Ask nicely, or forget how beautiful the god of shadows looked between my legs.

"Please," I whispered.

The word—the simple act of obedience—earned me a thick, powerful finger inside my waistband, drawing circles into the skin just inside my hip. I jerked up at the touch. Just as quickly, his other hand pressed hard against my waist, holding me down until I couldn't draw him any closer to where I so desperately needed him.

"Please what?" He breathed against my skin, licking and sucking and biting at my navel like he would prefer to do nothing else for all eternity.

"Please touch me."

His chuckle was a cruel, dark thing. "What do you think I've been doing for the last five minutes?"

My desperation was quickly morphing into agitation. I reached for the narrow space between us, my fingers itching to discover how wet he was making me. "I'll just do it myself—"