She called out to catch the man’s attention, but he didn’t pause his swaying progress. Taking two unstable steps to the left, he lifted his arms to balance himself. His silhouette was a stark, black picture in the dying light of the day. A bottle in his hand caught the twilight, reflecting the amber glow of liquor.
The man ventured off the main road onto the footpath that led to the stone alignments. Vandalism wasn’t unknown in the historical site. Teenagers often sneaked in after dark to drink or perform silly witchcraft rituals, some of them smashing their empty bottles against the ancient stones and carving their initials into the rock.
Grabbing her backpack, she ran up the road. “Hey, you! The site is closed.”
He disappeared behind a cluster of trees. When she reached the path, she was just in time to see him jump over the gate that gave access to the site. A trench coat floated behind him, trailing over the mesh. His long hair was tied back with a leather string.
Her step faltered. She knocked her toe against a rock and lost her balance. Going down, she stopped her fall with her hands. Thorns and pebbles dug into her skin. With her blood rushing in her ears, she stayed on her burning hands and knees for a second while she gathered herself.
It wasn’t like the dream, but it was him. The longer she stared at the dark figure, the surer she felt.
Joss staggered through the stones toward the backend of the fenced site. What was he doing here? She got to her feet and followed him over the gate. In the descending darkness, she caught the shine of his coat before he moved behind the flat dolmen tombstones. When she got him back in sight, he was sitting on the ground with his back resting against a megalith.
Her flip-flops weren’t suitable footwear for the fields. Nettles and sharp polls of wild grass stung her feet, but she ignored the burn as she trot closer. Joss hadn’t noticed her. He took his phone from his pocket and checked the screen. The light illuminated his features. There was no longer any question about his identity. His face looked the same, but the lines framing his mouth ran deeper.
He darkened the screen and dropped the phone, carelessly discarding it on the ground. Bringing the bottle to his lips, he took a long drink. His Adam’s apple moved as he swallowed. He wiped his mouth with the back of the hand and leaned his head against the stone.
The danger he emitted was a strange mixture of fury and pain. It was palpable in the dark. It should’ve made her back away, but she wanted answers. She was desperate to understand. Why was she dreaming of him? Why had he come back? Why did her mind scream at her to run?
Instead of heeding that voice in her head, she inched forward. Her heart had always won over logic. It still beat for him, stronger than ever. Time hadn’t diminished his spell. The knowledge was devastating. No matter what, she’d always be chained to him. She’d always carry the heavy weight of falling in love too young and too irreversibly. Joss was more than a dream. He was the very thread with which she’d woven her soul. Cutting it would mean letting everything she was unravel.
A twig cracked under the thin sole of her flip-flop. Joss’s hand stilled with the bottle halfway to his mouth, his body coiled and tense. He jerked his face in her direction. Their eyes locked. A shiver ran over her, delicious and frightening. She felt fourteen again, like that day in the woods.
Too late for changing her mind and running away, she steeled her spine. Her words sounded like an accusation. “What are you doing here?”
He traced her movement with disturbing intensity until she stood in front of him.
Speaking to her in English instead of his native French, he said with a strong accent and slurring tongue, “Getting hammered.”
Only half of the alcohol was left in the bottle. She hoped for his sake it wasn’t hard liquor, although the fact that the bottle didn’t have a label indicated it was home-brewed, and that stuff was always the strongest. “What are you drinking?”
His deep timbre held a seductive tone. “Come closer and find out.” Tilting his head, he studied her with a challenge in his unfocussed eyes. “Or are you scared?”
Yes, she was, more than he’d ever know, as she should be. If she was clever, she’d run, but she couldn’t leave him here like this. He’d saved her once. This was the least she owed him.
“Where are you staying?” she asked. “Can I call someone to come get you?”
He chuckled as if she’d made a joke.
When he tipped back the bottle again, she grabbed his arm to stop him. He struck as fast as a snake, locking his fingers around her wrist. With a single tug, he yanked her onto his lap. She shrieked, trying to get up, but he restrained her with an arm around her waist.
“Shh,” he said against her ear, smelling of apple brandy and a faint scent of soap. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
She stopped struggling. Her heart believed him. How could she not? To her, he was still the no-longer-boy, not-yet-man who’d saved her from Iwig.
When she relaxed marginally, he held the bottle to her lips. Goosebumps raced over her arms. Letting her drink from his bottle felt intimate. Time had had a field trip with her resolve. Years of longing had long since chiseled away her restraint where Joss was concerned.
Tilting back her head, she took a sip. The apple brandy burned down her throat and heated her stomach. She was no stranger to Calvados. It was part of the staple diet around here. The women rubbed it on the gums of babies for teething aches. But with a fifty percent alcohol content, no one drank more than a couple of shots.
“Ouch,” she said. “That’s going to hurt.” Meaning his head in the morning.
“It won’t be the worst hurt I’ve had.”
“Why are you here?” she asked again.
He dragged a hand to her waist, rubbing a thumb over the strip of naked skin above the waistband of her shorts. “Why are you?”
The calloused pad tightened her skin. A thrill ran up her spine.
His gaze sharpened. Awareness darkened his eyes. Like that day in the woods, he saw her. He saw right through her to the secrets she carried in her heart.
The bottle fell on the ground with a thump, the liquor making a sloshing sound. He fastened both hands around her waist and lifted her to straddle him. Her pulse spiked. He seemed to take in every blink of her eyelashes and every whisper of air she dragged through her lips, reading her like a book. When he smoothed his palms over her sides under her T-shirt, he carefully turned a page, and found another shiver written on it.
Satisfaction heated his gaze. For a man who was drunk, he watched her with cunning attention.
He was drunk.
“I should go,” she whispered.
He tightened his hold. “Not yet.”
Almost innocently, he flicked a thumb over her nipple. The touch was light, but it sent a jolt through her body. The tip hardened under the cotton of her bra. Heat bloomed under her skin.
“You’re jumpy,” he said in a raspy voice. “Are you frightened or excited?”
Both, but she wasn’t going to admit that. Pushing on his shoulders, she fought to get up. “I really should go.”
With one arm wrapped around her waist, he held her in place while he covered her breast with his palm. The broadness of his hand swallowed her curve. Her breath caught. Heat spread through her belly to her core. She opened her mouth on a protest, but thoughts and words vanished when he flipped up the cup of her bra, exposing her breast under the T-shirt. She could help the moan that fell from her lips as little as the perverse expectation that built in the pit of her stomach, silently begging to feel the calloused pads of his fingers on her naked skin. Just a little, then she’d pull away.
“Still want to run away?” he asked in a seductive tone.
She barely summoned the willpower to give the right answer. “Yes.”
“That’s not what your body is saying,” he said, finally giving her what she wanted by squeezing her nipple between a forefinger and thumb. “Not if this is anything to go by.”
An echoing ache
throbbed between her thighs. If he still had any doubts about how aroused she was, the sharp intake of her breath when he rubbed his thigh against the seam of her shorts gave him the answer.
At the sound, his nostrils flared. He kept her grounded with his unwavering attention, holding her gaze as he stroked a palm up her thigh under the hem of her shorts. She gasped when he brushed a finger over her groin, tracing the elastic of her panties.
“I think we’re going—” She was going to say too fast, but he’d pushed away the elastic. “What are you—”
Another gasp, louder this time, strangled her words when he ran a pad over her slit. Her skin contracted under his touch, her inner muscles clenching around emptiness. Her folds turned slick.
When he discovered her deepest secret, he uttered a sound close to a growl. “You’re wet for me.”
His voice was raw and primal, another cue for her to run, but she was a rabbit and he the headlights.
Gripping her hair in a ponytail, he pulled back her head and, before she could find her bearings, pressed their mouths together. His lips were warm and soft. They tasted like caramelized brandy apples, the bitter of burned sugar mixed with the sweet. The kiss was so gentle she didn’t put up her defenses, and when his tongue stole inside her mouth it was too late. She was lost.
After years of hiding and watching, imagining what it would feel like, she finally knew. The visuals from her memories made the experience double as powerful. She knew his cheeks hollowed when he sucked her tongue into his mouth. She knew his left cheek dimpled when he tasted the outline of her lips with unconcealed hunger. She knew the square line of his jaw hardened when he nipped her bottom lip before dragging it out.
Oh, God, this was hot. Threading her fingers through his hair, she held him close. The strands were surprisingly soft. The moment she touched him, he deepened the kiss, infusing it with an urgency that had alarm bells go off in her mind, but his gentle hands on her hips gave her unspoken assurance.
She returned the kiss with matching wildness. It was like falling from heaven into the lap of a dark angel. The searing heat melted her reason. It was only when he popped the button of her shorts with effortless precision that she came to her senses.
Panting, she pulled away.
He folded a hand around her nape and dragged her back. “Shh. Let me touch you. I only want to make you come.”
Flames leapt in her stomach. He was her first love, her first kiss—Iwig excluded, but that didn’t count—and it only seemed right that he’d be her first orgasm.
“Joss.” She rubbed against him.
“Fuck, yeah. Say it just like that, sweet girl.”
Claiming her mouth again, he slipped a hand inside her shorts, under the elastic of her underwear. Lightly, like a reverent touch, he traced the seam of her folds. When he reached her clit, she jerked.
“You’re sensitive,” he said, making it sound like the sweetest praise.
Gathering her wetness, he rubbed a circle around the bundle of nerves. The pleasure that shot through her body arched her hips. She’d never touched herself like this, couldn’t make herself do it, not even in the darkness of her room alone in her bed, not when she’d be forced to come out of hiding and face herself. Hiding was safer, easier. There was no hiding from the raw sensation that strangled her insides as he dipped a finger inside and pushed the pad of his thumb on her clit.
She gripped his shoulders, leaning back to give him better access. “Oh, my God.”
“Feel it,” he said against her neck. “I’m going to make it good for you.”
Reason dissipated as her mind splintered into a thousand shooting stars. Only need remained, locking her in the physical moment.
Boldness she’d never feel in daylight made her say, “Make me come.”
He kissed her neck, sucking her skin hard enough to leave a hickey. “You can count on that.”
It only took one more flick of his thumb before the orgasm crashed through her. It was liberating and scary, exactly how she’d imagined it would be with him. It left her feeling both vulnerable and strong, a beautiful duality of completion.
He gave her control, letting her ride his fingers until she collapsed against his chest, and then he took it back with a fist in her hair and his lips on hers.
The kiss was different. It didn’t feel like giving any longer. This was taking. She could barely keep up, her jaw hurting from the strain and her lungs begging for air.
Desperate for a breath, she pushed on his chest. He broke the kiss to lift her to her feet with his hands around her middle. She looked down in confusion as he gripped her shorts and pulled them down her thighs.
“Wait,” she said, grabbing his hands.
He stilled. “I just want to feel you. Nothing you don’t want is going to happen.”
His voice was less slurry, as if desire had cleared his head. She trusted him. She’d never forgotten what he’d said to Iwig, but then Erwan’s words slammed into her mind, and her lust shriveled in shame.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“You’re with someone.”
He chuckled. “Yeah. I’m with you.”
“I mean another woman.”
His lush lips tilted. “Are you the jealous type?”
She wasn’t going to admit to something she had no right feeling. “Are you?”
“I don’t share,” he said with a dark glint in his eyes, “so you have nothing to worry about.”
“But—”
“Take off your shorts.”
The command had been spoken with enough dominance to make it easy for her to obey. Just this once. She wanted to own this secret.
When she’d shimmied out of her shorts and underwear, he took her hands. “Now come back here.”
He pulled her down to straddle him again. Her back arched when her naked folds touched his jean-clad thigh. “Ah, Joss.”
“Feel good?” he murmured, pressing a kiss against the shell of her ear.
“God, yes.”
Dragging her up over his groin with his hands under her arms, he said in a husky voice, “Ride my cock.”
The hard rod between his legs parted her folds, the rough edge of the zipper seam adding friction as she glided her body over his length. It felt better than anything, even more so when he flicked down the other cup of her bra and palmed her breasts.
Another orgasm started to build. She angled her body, trying to hit the right spot, but then his touch disappeared and she felt him fumbling with the button of his jeans.
“What are you doing?” she asked in a panicked whisper.
“Let me feel you,” he said. “Skin on skin.”
This was dangerous, her mind screamed, but her body was past caring. In this, her mind had never stood a chance. She leaned back, giving him space to pull down the zipper. He freed his cock, heavy and thick, so hard with desire. For her.
He dragged her closer. “Do it again, just like before.”
Cradling her face, he stared into her eyes as if he might find answers to riddles as she slid back up his thighs. The minute their naked skins touched, her eyes drifted closed. Desire was sharp, a gemstone with rough, shining edges cutting through her defenses. His skin felt like velvet against hers, hot and hard. Her arousal made her slick, aiding her movement when she dragged her folds over his length to the head of his cock.
He hissed when her clit touched the crest. She opened her eyes to look at him. His features were distorted, his face pulled into a grimace, but with something different than pain.
“Put me inside,” he said.
Her lips parted.
“Only the tip,” he coaxed. “Just give me a taste of how tight you are.”
The thought made her burn. There was no way she couldn’t obey. There was no way she could walk away without feeling just the tip of what could never be. Or maybe what could, her hopeful heart whispered.
“Wait,” he said when she lifted herself.
He spread out his coat on eit
her side of him so her knees had someplace soft to land. Stradling him on her knees, she folded her fingers around his cock.
He let out a groan. “You’re going to make me shoot fast.”
Nervous with uncertainty, she fumbled a little. As if sensing her need for him to take control, he stilled her hands and placed them on his shoulders. His eyes rested reassuringly on hers, burning with heat but offering a smile. She held onto the anchors he offered as he gripped the base of his cock in one hand and her hip in the other. He brushed the crest from the bottom of her slit to the top, ending on her clit.
“Christ,” he said, his shoulders going rigid under her palms.
She shivered with need, but when he positioned the head at her entrance, she turned crazy with want. He parted her carefully, pushing the head gently inside.
Fire consumed her from the inside out. A primal need demanded one thing only, that she consummated this.
“Deeper,” she said, tightening her fingers on his shoulders.
“You sure about that?” he asked against her lips.
It was too late to back out. She couldn’t return to being nothing, to exist unnoticed. She wanted to own this piece of him. Tomorrow didn’t matter. Tomorrow, she’d go back to living her life through others, a spectator looking through a window, but tonight she was here. Tonight, he saw her. Tonight, she could have this stolen moment.
“Yes,” she said, the word a sigh.
He crushed their mouths together, kissing her hard as he angled his hips and slipped another inch inside. She gasped into his mouth. The stretch burned. The insatiable desire wasn’t enough to eliminate the discomfort, but somehow it seemed fitting. What was happening between them was too big for only sweet pleasure. Without the duality added by the pain, the sweetness couldn’t exist. The moment needed the razor-edged side of the spectrum to be the complex, intense, and perfectly beautiful experience it was.
Pyromancist SECOND EDITION: Art of Fire (7 Forbidden Arts Book 1) Page 3
