Shadowbound (The Dark Arts Book 1)

by Bec McMaster

  "Not for his sake." It was a confession that shook the both of them, judging by the look in her eyes.

  Something changed in the air between them. Ianthe looked away, as though she couldn't bear to see it.

  "Oh," she said softly, and plucked at a key. "Oh."

  Lucien cleared his throat. "What are you doing down here?"

  Ianthe's head fell forward. She struck the C key. "I think you know why I'm here." It was the faintest whisper, as though she barely dared admit it. She tugged something from the pocket of her robe and placed it on the top of the piano.

  A small packeted sheath.

  Hell. Lucien pressed another kiss to her silk-clad shoulder. She wouldn't have dared before, but this was an affirmation of her desires. Ianthe was slowly spreading her wings, learning to take what she wanted.

  Turning her, he set her on the keys with a discordant jar of noise.

  Their eyes met. A sad smile touched her mouth. "Mrs. Hastings won't know what to think about all of this noise."

  "I daresay."

  One hand inside each of her knees, he pushed them open, the robe slithering over her skin and revealing a hint of her plain cotton nightgown beneath, as he dragged his chair closer. Ianthe hesitated, then reached up and brushed a loose strand of hair behind her ear. A faint blush stirred her cheeks.

  "Perhaps we can help each other to sleep?"

  "I don't think what you have planned has anything to do with sleep."

  "True." Lucien pressed a kiss to the inside of her wrist and looked up. "But it's not what I want that matters. Not here. Not tonight."

  Ianthe's breath caught. There was sadness there in her eyes. He realized it had been lingering there for some time now. It arrested him, but then she blinked and the expression was gone, dust in the wind.

  "Why did you come down?"

  "I... I couldn't sleep, but I could hear the music. There was something so hungry about it. A longing. It drew me down here."

  Had she come searching specifically for him? Ianthe's hand cupped his face, sliding down his cheek until her thumb caught his lip.

  Lucien turned his face into her palm, biting at the fleshy mound at the base of her thumb. A shiver ran through the both of them. Lightning flashed in the distance. "And what did you long for, Ianthe?"

  "You."

  How well he knew that feeling. "This is growing dangerous."

  And she understood. Every touch, every moment between them, only intensified the bond. It wasn't just the sex, but the intimacy—and he hadn't expected that when he'd agreed to this. If they continued in this vein, one day soon, the bond would be unbreakable.

  "Would it be so very bad?" Her eyes were enormous pools of shadow as she gently asked the question. "It's only been a few days, and yet the very thought of losing you, or our bond, sends a shiver down my spine. It's become... a part of me."

  Lucien bowed his head, pressing it into her palm as she stroked his face. "I don't know anymore. I want you."

  She swallowed. "I want you."

  "I know," he told her, shutting his eyes. "I can feel it." He felt the certainty along the bond they shared, but with that certainty came another. "You're keeping secrets from me."

  Ianthe froze.

  "You don't have to tell me. I know you are."

  "Do you not have any secrets from me?" Her voice was roughened honey.

  Lucien looked up. Of course he did. "I keep wondering how far I can trust you."

  Those dark lashes covered her eyes. "So do I. But you must know: I would never seek to harm you, Lucien."

  "No?"

  "No." She wet her lips. "You have become... important to me. I don't know if it's the bond, or if it's simply because of what we've shared. Sometimes it feels inevitable." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "You. Me. Sometimes it feels like fate. No matter what I do, I somehow always keep coming back to you."

  "You mean the way you were the one who brought me in a year ago?"

  "Yes," she said, dropping her gaze, and yet it was not the complete truth. "I ache," Ianthe told him, her eyes sad. "And it's all you. Always you."

  "An ache? Here?" His palm spread flatly over her middle.

  Those brilliant eyes flashed as she looked up.

  "Or here?" he whispered, sliding his hand lower until his palm cupped her between her thighs.

  Licking her lower lip, she closed her eyes and nodded. The aching sense of yearning in her expression made his heart beat a little faster. Perhaps they were both still too wary to meet each other in the middle, yet here, only here, was it easy. This was easy. To want. To take.

  "You want me," he said. "Say it."

  A roll of her hips brought her heated flesh closer to him. "I want you."

  "And what part of me did you want?"

  But she slid her hand behind his nape and drew him closer. Lucien leaned his knuckles on the piano keys, obeying her with another discordant wash of noise. Their faces were but an inch apart, her breath caressing his mouth. His gaze lowered to those sweet lips. How he wanted to taste them... It ached within him, like a hard fist curling around his cock. His hands slid over her thighs, dragging silk and cotton with them, until he could feel heated flesh.

  Kiss me, he dared.

  Kiss me, came the reply.

  But he was not yet ready to lose.

  And neither was she.

  Thwarted need flashed across that pretty face, and then she turned it into his neck, her small teeth sinking into his flesh with a faint, teasing nip that spoke of her frustration. Lucien's mouth parted, and he tilted his face up, allowing her access as she soothed that slight pain with a heated lash of her tongue. A trembling psychic touch brushed along the back of his thighs, making him flinch. It came again, higher, stronger, more sure of itself, until it felt like a feather dragged over his balls.

  Lucien caught her wrists. They stared at each other. Her psychic touch vanished as he slowly set both her hands behind her on the piano, a silent admonition in his gaze. This was not her moment to command. It was his.

  One finger traced the smooth skin between her clavicles and headed south to her full breasts. Ianthe swallowed.

  "You were made for a man's touch," he whispered.

  Haunting vulnerability flashed across her face, and she turned it aside. "That's what my father said to me once."

  And not kindly, he guessed. Lucien examined her half-turned away expression. "I did not mean it as an insult, but a compliment. You are beautiful. Passionate. Like a storm on the horizon, not quite unleashed. There's an untamed sensuality brewing within you." He traced her throat. "It is nothing to be ashamed of."

  Ianthe's lashes fluttered closed. "I know I should not feel the sting of shame, but I still hear his words even now. Especially now."

  "Why now of all times?"

  Ianthe inhaled slowly and looked away, a hint of red dawning like a sunrise in her cheeks. "Because of you." The words were barely a whisper, but they struck him right through the heart. "Because I did not dare, before you. Because I did not... want... before you. Not like this." She looked up helplessly. "It was easy to accept your challenge to own my nights. Easy because then I did not have to put it into words that I wanted you, that I wanted to be in your bed, beneath you..." She turned her face away again with a harsh exhale. "I missed you tonight. I wanted you to come. That's the truth of it. I couldn't sleep because you weren't there. I could hear you down here, and that's where I wanted to be."

  Every muscle in his body tensed. This was as close to a declaration as either of them had come—an admittance that there was something between them, something dark and thrilling, something dangerous, something... more. That she was the one who voiced it did not surprise him. She had always been braver than he in so many ways.

  Thunder rumbled, vibrating the casements. Lucien hovered, torn by indecision.

  "I'm scared," she whispered, "and I'm alone, and I don't want to be alone, not anymore. Not tonight."

  It shook him. His own thoughts reflect
ed back at him. He'd have never guessed that she felt this way. His demons were vast, but she hid hers so well. With a shudder, he pressed a kiss to her forehead, breathing in the scent of her hair. "I don't want to be alone either. I wasn't supposed to like you." He brushed his thumbs lightly back and forth between her thighs. Then again. Each stroke lighter than the last. Brushing higher up her thigh, then away, as she shivered.

  "Are you saying that you do?" It was said breathlessly, and there was a faint tremor there that belied the ease with which she asked.

  He could have said: Sometimes. When I'm not fit to throttle you. Or, Especially when you're like this, molten beneath me. But Lucien bowed his head beneath the weight of the feeling. "Yes, Ianthe. Yes, I find myself liking you."

  "Oh."

  Just that. But he saw the arrow hit its target, saw the faint bewilderment within her give way to a vicious joy that was swiftly muted by something else, something that scared her.

  He understood it, because it scared him too. The ground beneath his feet was rapidly giving way, leaving him in a foreign land, a land he'd never been in before.

  "And here we are," he mocked, "at an impasse which neither of us expected." "Where do we go from here?" Ianthe whispered.

  "Anywhere. I don't— I'm as at sea as you are."

  A hush fell between them.

  "I... don't think I can." A brutal blush speared her cheeks.

  Lucien absorbed the impact and graced her with a smile. It was not rejection, but a safeguard, a means of mitigating the risk. That he understood. His thumbs resumed their heated stroking. "Then let this just remain this. Uncomplicated."

  "This was never uncomplicated." Ianthe said it with a faint laugh, but there was no humor there.

  "Then we make it uncomplicated." Lucien leaned closer, his mouth hovering but a half-inch from her ear. "What do you want? Right now?"

  "You," she whispered against the corner of his mouth, lips almost pressing to his, but not quite tasting them, "inside me." A decision had been made. She was brave now with his confession. Her face turned toward his, breath caressing his sensitive lips. "No more talk."

  "Very well." Reaching past her, Lucien gently closed the lid on the grand piano. That dark curl sprang from behind her ear, and suddenly he could not bear to see it controlled anymore. Reaching behind her, he plucked first one pin, then another from her hair, and another... Until it cascaded down her back in a series of loose waves. Curling his fingers through her hair, he slowly fanned it out across her shoulders. A wave of midnight silk, gleaming in the candlelight. "There. That's better. Not perfect, but better."

  "What would be perfect?"

  "This." Sliding his hands up inside her robe, he pushed it off her shoulders, uncovering the thin-capped sleeves of her nightgown. The curve of her shoulder slipped loose from one sleeve, revealing the sharp etching of her collarbone. Lucien tugged at the ties on her robe, and Ianthe sucked in a sharp breath, but she surrendered it to him, leaning back on the piano.

  "This," he said, drawing the tie free of its loops and discarding it behind him. Her robe sagged, falling open to reveal the hem of her nightgown riding up around her hips. Those thighs, like white satin... He slid his palm up one, absorbing every inch of soft skin, wanting it to be his mouth on her skin, not his hand...

  "This?" With trembling hands, Ianthe watched his face as she began to undo the string that held her nightgown together. Rosy nipples darkened the fabric, and the cotton draped over them, caressing every one of her curves like a lover.

  Lucien's breathing raced as she gave a willful shrug of her shoulders. Each sleeve slipped free, captured on her upper arms, as Ianthe stared at him with a dare in her eyes.

  "Yes," he said, reaching out with one finger to brush the cotton from where it caught on the upper slope of her breast. Heat pulsed in his cock. Every touch of her skin sent electric shocks to his brain, which seemed to communicate themselves everywhere. He was heat and need and the fierce clench of anticipation.

  But a part of him wanted this to be good for her, better than it had ever been before, which was incendiary. Before had always been about control, about slating his desire and she hers. It had been nothing more than physical want. This... This was different.

  Lucien kissed her throat, her cheek, her ear... Everything but her mouth, that sweet, treacherous mouth that consumed his thoughts. Curling his fists in her hair, he dragged her head back and bit her chin. Every thought he owned was broken down to its base equation.

  I need...

  I want...

  Her...

  I want her...

  "Lucien." His name was raw on her sweet tongue.

  "What do you want?"

  "This." Hands caught his, dragging them lower until they filled with soft flesh.

  Her magnificent breasts. So lush and full... as if they'd been made for a man's attention. Cotton rumpled under his touch as he stroked her nightgown out of the way. Ianthe shuddered, and something that sounded almost animalistic burst from her throat. "Yes. Please, yes."

  Lucien's mouth dipped, his deft hands parting the cotton. A darkened nipple sprang into view, taut and quivering with her hastened breath. His hot mouth closed over it.

  Delicious.

  It was his turn to make that rough, raw sound in his throat. Tongue swirling in teasing little circles, he looked up at her flushed, abandoned expression. The sight of it made him bold. Grabbing hold of her nightgown, he tore it in two, halfway to her thighs.

  Ianthe gasped, capturing his upper arms in surprise. Then her gaze softened, growing heavy-lidded, as she arched back, offering him her body. Passion filled her gaze as he ripped again with slow, heated jerks, until she lay revealed, the flush of candlelight painting her skin with a golden glow. A Botticelli in all its glory. Soft curves, ebony hair, and the faint shell-pink flush of sweetness gleaming wetly between her thighs.

  Lucien traced trembling fingers down between her breasts and lower, trailing off as he reached the thatch of dark curls between her thighs. "You are... breathtakingly beautiful." On the return, his hands slid up her sides, parting the cotton, even as her faint, quivering breaths made her breasts lift and fall. "You feel like silk beneath my touch."

  He lowered his face, tracing his tongue around her navel. "Like a feast for a starving man."

  One that he ached to partake of. But first... her. Her pleasure. His ruin.

  A tremor ran over her skin as he slowly tipped her backward until she lay on top of the piano. The leash of his control slipped away from him, his fingers sinking into her hips with slightly less care than he should have owned when touching something so precious.

  Dragging her to the edge, he hooked her bare feet up on his shoulders and leaned over her. Glistening pink flesh teased him from behind those dark curls. He drank her in, breath teasing her.

  "Lucien." It obviously unnerved her to be so on display before him.

  "No shyness, love. Not between us." Thumbs spreading those tender pink folds, he took his time, licking her from end to end. A slow taunting movement. One to drive her out of her mind.

  Ianthe arched her back, her heels digging into his shoulders. "Lucien!"

  She tasted divine. Lucien nuzzled in again, tasting her and teasing her. Hands cupping her rounded bottom, he laid waste to her, drowning himself in that heated flesh until she was crying out softly, her fingers curling through his hair.

  A strangled sound burst from her throat as he slid a finger deep inside her, curling it up to stroke her there. Then she was tensing around him, her head thrown back with a gasp, as sweet tension exploded within her.

  "Yes. Yes, oh please, Lucien..." Ianthe writhed on the piano through her release. "Please. More."

  Biting at the soft flesh of her breast, he fumbled with his trousers. His erection sprang to hand, hard and aching, and Lucien tore the packet of the sheath open with his teeth. Ianthe reached between them, tugging the oiled sheath from his hands and sliding it over his engorged length. That invisible ti
ckle of touch explored the length of his hard shaft, earning a hiss from his throat. God. He groaned, his balls drawn up tight. It wasn't going to take much tonight.

  "Now," she whispered, as he dragged his cock over her lush, wet opening. "Take me now."

  "As you wish." Lucien sank forward, into her tight, wet, satiny heat. "Oh God." He made a strangled sound in his throat. This was bliss. Heaven on earth. Everything.

  The first thrust spilled noise from the piano, but the storm drowned it out. Slow and steady, a soft sinking into of flesh. Ianthe was having none of that however.

  "Faster," she whispered, her fingers closing in his hair and her legs wrapping around his hips. "More."

  Lucien bit his lip as he thrust home. The room vanished as his attention turned inward. The storm, the noise of the piano, all gone as he fucked his way into her... All he could feel was her. This. Pressure danced its way up the base of his spine, and he curled his face into her throat as he lost himself to the sweet pleasure-pain of release.

  "Yes," he hissed.

  It was an eternity of bliss. No more concerns, no more fears. Just her hands slowly stroking up his back as he came back to himself. Every inch of his body felt more alive than it had ever felt; the intense rush of his blood through his veins, his racing heartbeat, the sweat slick on his skin, and his cock softening as he slid from her body...

  But more than that, he could somehow sense her. It felt as though he existed in two skins. His ears rang with the beat of two hearts, both achingly in sync. Their bond. He would never be the same after this night, and it filled him with both dread and hope, which was something he hadn't thought he would ever find again.

  Ianthe lifted her face, her hand pressing over his heart in wonder, as if she could feel the same thing he could. "The bond strengthens."

  "Faster than expected." He nuzzled her forehead, kissing her there. Perspiration clung to them as he curled her into his arms. Uncomplicated, he had promised, and he knew the words now for a lie.

  For, out of all the problems he faced, this was the greatest complication he knew.