Briony
My fingers twist in my lap as the Jeep comes to a stop in front of my house.
Saint taps his fingers on the steering wheel, looking down. He opens his mouth as if he’s about to say something when he turns to look at me. I gaze at his lips. His perfectly pink lips encasing that sparkling white smile.
Everything about his mouth is attractive. There are no scars, no riddles, no words of humiliation or hurt that leave them… No, none of that. His smile warms me, and his nervousness at this moment is endearing. We both grin and begin talking.
“I had—”
“Tonight was—”
We both pause, laughing lightly, but the tension I’m feeling is still in the pit of my stomach. It has nothing to do with Saint and everything to do with Aero.
We’re not alone. I’m never alone anymore.
“Thank you,” Saint says, his voice breaking through my thoughts. “For joining me tonight. That dance…” He chuckles softly, his tongue running along his teeth as he smiles while looking down at his lap. “That dance was the best part of the night for me.”
“Really?” I ask, somewhat surprised.
I wouldn’t consider that the best part of the night, but my night was far from normal. The realization of which part has stuck with me as my unfortunate favorite terrifies me.
“Yeah, I mean…” He leans forward in his seat, swallowing as his smile fades. He grabs my hand from my lap, laying it on the console between us. With my palm facing up, the tips of his fingers trace my fingers until they meet my wrist. At my wrist, the other fingers fall away as only the middle finger softly trails up my arm, the soft sensation tickling me and running a direct line to the place between my legs. “Until this part.”
He gives me a little side-eyed glance, and I can hear his heart pounding in the shell of this Jeep.
He knows he shouldn’t do this. His reputation. His father. His future. But, he can’t stop, and secretly, I love that. Saint is letting the root of who he is as a man take over the constructs of his mind. I’m owning that, honing in on it, and controlling it with the powers of sexuality inside me, and I’m finding it nothing short of thrilling.
“Do you want to come inside?” I ask, breaking the tension with the confidence of someone I’ve never known. “I can make us some tea.”
I smile shyly at him, arching a brow. His lips part as he stares back at me. The offer is on the table, one that speaks volumes, and he knows the answer should be no, but I’m pushing, testing my abilities because of the thrill of the danger it may cause me.
“Tea?” he asks softly.
“Yeah.” I bite my lower lip, peering directly at his mouth. “Tea.”
I know I’m giving off flirtatious energy, but it feels good. It feels natural. Empowering. It makes me feel something I’ve never felt before.
Raw power over a man.
I’m stirring the cauldron before me, knowing the jealousy my magic is producing somewhere in the darkness where he waits.
“Tea sounds amazing,” Saint whispers, still peering at my bottom lip as it springs free.
Once inside, I get the teapot out, filling it with water as he stands near me against the counter. I set it on the stove, waiting for the coil beneath it to heat. I feel him walk up behind me. My nerves light on fire as reality hits me. I brought him here under these pretenses, and now he’s here, behind me, craving this in his own desirable way.
I become fully aware of his body as he leans up against me, silently pressing his front to my back. I feel his chest heaving behind me, feeling the warm air of his breath against my neck. He’s losing control.
Turning, I face his chest before trailing my gaze up to his. I flutter my lashes as our eyes meet.
“Briony.”
My name slips from his lips so painfully. His brows are knit, his forehead wrinkled with an agony I’ve never seen from him. He’s fighting internally, but the war is crumbling before him as he drops his forehead down against mine.
I want to make his pain go away. To ease his discomfort. To take away his war because I now know that I can.
Reaching up, my hands softly surround the sides of his neck, my fingers grazing the soft, velvety skin beneath his ears. His throat bobs, his eyes closing tightly before they open again to find mine. His pupils are blown wide and I see the need behind his gaze.
That inherent need. That primal want. Even at our best, we try to fight it. Push it away, pretend it doesn’t exist. But we are humans, run by those hormones that beg for reproduction, that taunt us with the demand to rupture and bleed into something so natural before us. A connection of mind and body, more powerful than the sins they tell us to deny.
Our minds turn off as our bodies awaken in this new world of excited wonder. Senses become heightened as touch becomes the new language we translate.
Sudden clarity falls upon me. I’m doing to Saint what Aero so easily does to me.
Without a second thought, I do what feels natural in the moment, tilting my chin up and closing my eyes. Saint leans forwards, his hands falling to the edge of the stove behind me as his lips softly graze mine. I make the final move, pressing my mouth to his. His soft lips press back, and before I know it, his hands are on my hips, gripping my flesh tightly beneath the silk of my dress as our mouths open up and our tongues touch.
Sparks of electricity shoot throughout my stomach, landing deep in that place that aches for friction.
I grab the back of his neck, opening my mouth for a kiss I’ve never experienced before. My stomach twists in pleasure at the gentle sensation of his tongue gliding against mine. But it’s not even the kiss that has me bound so tight. It’s the fact that he’s watching. It’s the knowledge of the wrath I’ll soon face for pushing the limits that makes my thighs clench together and my insides ignite with that indescribable pleasure.
I want to push more. I want to witness the effects of him breaking again.
Saint pulls back from the kiss, breathless as his grip on my hips loosens.
“I…Briony, I’m so sorry…” He shakes his head against mine. “I shouldn’t have done that.”
Licking my lips, I try to calm my breathing when Saint surprises me by grabbing my hips again, pulling me away from the stove. I fall into him, and his hold tightens as he leans back against the opposing counter. Arms wrap around my body, one hand sliding down to cup my ass in his palm. His tongue licks my bottom lip once again, finding its way inside my mouth.
This kiss is wild. More reckless than the first. It’s filled with an uncontrolled passion that stems from that place inside us we deny. I feel him pushing his hips forward, his cock hard beneath his dress pants, seeking some sort of intervention.
I slide my palm down between us, cupping him, and he groans into my mouth. He rubs himself against my hold, and I note just how big he also feels as his tongue tangles with mine. His hand cups the side of my neck, and I ache to feel the firm grip of his grasp, stripping me of my air.
Aero would choke me. He’d watch as the oxygen left my body, making me beg for release before handing my life back to me. He’d give me the gift of sucking his tongue rather than kiss me in his own twisted form of affection.
Saint is kissing the lips that were just coated in Aero.
I snap out of the lust-driven haze at the reminder, pushing my hands against Saint’s chest until I can back away from him, parting our connection.
His eyes are wide and panicked at my reaction, but he has no idea of the truth behind it.
“Oh no,” he whispers, his hand coming up to rub his forehead. “No. Briony…I…”
I can’t believe it actually happened. I’m not this girl. I can’t be.
“I shouldn’t be here. I need to go,” he rushes, running a hand over the back of his neck. “I shouldn’t have done that to you.”
He rakes the same hand over his face, the torment already present.
But it’s not the kiss itself that has me flustered. It’s what I did before it, and what I’ve done after it. Some sick part of me enjoyed playing into Aero’s disgusting game.
“Saint,” I say, reaching out and pulling his hand from his face. “It’s…it’s fine. It wasn’t your fault.”
He sighs and gazes at me again.
“And, to be honest,” I continue softly. “It…it was my favorite part of the night.”
His eyes laced with worry melt into an easy smile again at my lie. The reaction to this will be my favorite part of the night.
He straightens himself, and I squeeze his hand in mine.
“This is such a bad idea,” he whispers, looking at our hands. “We would get in so much trouble if they knew I came over here and practically attacked a fellow Magnus Princeps.”
A scoff threatens to leave me, but I swallow it down. Saint is worried about the trouble of a kiss when I’ve literally almost witnessed a man of God abuse a child in the most horrific way. The irony of The Covenant Academy and our diocese as a whole is dawning on me and the need to uncover the truth, my new mission.
“Rain check on the tea?” he asks with remorse, insinuating his need to leave the temptations before him.
Grinning, I hold up my hand suggestively. I want him to kiss the back of it and say goodnight. I want his lips all over me, but not in the way I should.
He does exactly what I’d hoped, kissing the back of my hand gingerly, before he says his goodbyes, slipping through the door and taking off in his Jeep for the evening.
I watch from the window as his taillights fade into the dark night. A satisfied grin creeps across my face as I wait in the foyer of my house. I’m not even surprised when I smell the familiar leather and notable sulfur creeping up behind me.
I’ve embraced my masked man. Ready to play his games along with him.
Just as I prepare to turn and face Aero, I feel a cloth quickly cover my nose and mouth. An arm slips around my chest, holding me tightly to his hard body as I attempt to breathe through the chemical that assaults my nostrils.
“Easy, my little slut,” he whispers into my ear. “I’d hate to hurt you while you aren’t awake enough to feel it.”
My legs kick out from under me as I attempt to fight him off while he drags me backwards, but my vision becomes cloudy, and my fight becomes weaker as my muscles turn to liquid and I melt into him.
And then, black.
