Two girls. Two secrets.
Only one can survive.
Years before Nelle Wychthorn plans her escape, Tabitha Catt may unearth something in a Horned God's lair that is the key to freedom.
Desperate to save her beloved aunt from a dark curse, Tabitha is out t...
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There was a recklessness to Tabitha's kiss. A wild plea. Desperate fingers gripped my collar and she held tight. Every inch of my mouth was claimed as if she were starved for my taste. And my touch mirrored hers. My hands were too rough on her delicate skin. My lips, ravenous with savage anguish. Wanting more, more, more, always more. We grasped each other as if our world was coming to an end, and if it was we'd go together.
It is...it is...
The quiet of the bedroom was broken only by our labored breaths and whispered names. The rustle of silk against armor. The earlier panic in my bloodstream dissolved with her touch. A soothing balm. Tabitha kissed me until the world was gone and there was nothing but her branded behind my eyelids, sweetly willing. I was submerged in her ocean. Sinking, sinking, sinking into her sensual undertow. Torn away in a riptide of pleasure that spun me deeper into her warm depths, making it possible to let go and to forget. To stop myself from trying to make sense of the darkness, of what had happened before I'd awoken. I didn't want to go back any further than the last splash of oaky smokiness on my tongue, and the rattle of glass on wood before I fell back into oblivion. It was there, reality tearing at the edges of my mind, but it receded like the tide with every glide of her body against mine. There was only now and her.
I need her... I need her...
It was the hot sting of salt on my lips that had me yanking my mouth from hers, blinking into shimmering green. Tears glistened on her eyelashes and trickled down her cheeks.
Unbearable shame poured through my veins and ate at me like acid.
I cradled the side of her face and swept my thumb through the wetness beneath her eyes. A pang of guilt echoed through the bones of my forearm, the one I'd wedged brutally against her windpipe, denying her air.
Gods, what I'd almost done.
I'd startled awake, foggy and still adrift in that place between waking and dreaming. I'd reacted on instinct. A threatened animal attacking. A beast with no mercy.
Leaning upward and breathing Tabitha in, brine sharpening the scent of wild roses. I kissed the tears from her cheeks, licked them up, swallowed them down. My voice was thick and gruff, the spice of whiskey still on my tongue. "I'm sorry..."
Soft hands slid from my jacket collar to wind around the nape of my neck, her fingers knotting in the short cut of hair. "Shush," she murmured, pressing a tremulous smile against my lips to silence me. "I'm fine. Unnatural healing, remember?"
A wild thump of wrongfulness beat my heart. Her voice had been hoarse, her throat still raw. "I hurt—"
Tiny kisses were peppered across my face. "You could never hurt me."
I cupped the back of her head and arched her neck gently to trail my gaze down the delicate column of her throat, anxiously searching once more for purple bruises. Nothing was marring her throat, nothing except the rosy flush of arousal. I exhaled in relief. However, it was risky for Tabitha to be even near my room, let alone inside it. "What are you doing here?"
