Fallen by Suzanne Wright

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

As they stood at the hostess station of the Underground restaurant a week later, Raini found herself torn. Should she be the bigger person and ignore how the hostess ogled Maddox, or should she do as her demon wanted and quite simply set the woman’s shoes on fire?

It wasn’t like the burns and blisters would take more than an hour or so to heal. There’d be no permanent scarring or anything. It would be a not-so-friendly warning, that’s all. A life lesson, even. Life lessons were important. It would stop the hostess from making the same mistake with another couple, and that could only be a positive thing, couldn’t it? Raini would be doing her a favor, really.

Maddox slid his arm around Raini’s waist and settled it on her hip. “You all right?”

“Just a little tired.” Of people who’d bat their eyelids at a man right in front of his date.

Okay, so Raini wasn’t really his date for the evening. They were only on an anchor outing. But the hostess didn’t know that, did she?

Maddox often took Raini places these days. Harper had switched from being annoyed by how he tried monopolizing Raini’s time to approving of it. It was as if he’d passed some sort of test in the sphinx’s estimation. Harper probably just liked that he wasn’t doing a half-assed job at this anchor business.

Whenever he and Raini spent time together, they’d talk, share, learn more about each other. And, of course, he’d repeatedly hint at her joining his lair. If she couldn’t even handle watching a hostess ogle him, she’d hardly handle seeing him jump from one relationship to another. It would be easier if they were part of separate lairs. She’d know of his flings and relationships, but it wouldn’t be in her face all the time.

“I like a good dessert as much as the next person,” said Carmen. “But a dessert restaurant? No. No, this ain’t my thing.”

Hector snickered. “What you mean is … you can’t bring yourself to eat here because you know you’d stuff your face with all different kinds of cake.”

“Yes, that is what I mean,” Carmen admitted with no shame.

“Well, I’m gonna order something,” he told her.

Carmen frowned. “We’re here on guard duty, Hector.”

“Doesn’t mean we can’t eat while we’re here.”

Raini smiled. The Underground was jampacked with cafes, diners, and restaurants. But this was a favorite of hers. And yes, it had everything to do with the fact that it served purely desserts.

Carmen leaned into Raini. “Who the fuck is that bitch, and what is her problem with you?”

Raini tracked the sentinel’s gaze and sighed at the woman sitting at a table scowling. That scowl vanished in an instant when Maddox’s cold gaze landed on her.

“That’s Risa,” said Raini. “She’s my sister’s friend. She’s also one of the people who aren’t so comfortable with the recent news that circulated around my lair,” she added vaguely, not wanting to mention the psychic hellfire out loud.

Maddox didn’t move his glare from Risa. “Is she now?”

“I don’t get why they reacted that badly,” said Hector. “Lots of abilities can be positively lethal.”

“But nothing other than you-know-what can destroy a you-know-what-else without killing a person,” Raini quietly pointed out. “It’s natural that some would have reservations. Be honest, you’re not terribly comfortable with it either.”

“But I trust that you wouldn’t betray Maddox by harming one of his demons,” said Hector, to which his mate nodded.

Raini blinked. “Oh. Well. Thank you. You don’t know me, so I wouldn’t have expected that.”

“We don’t know you well,” began Hector, “but we know that you made a deal with Maddox that couldn’t have been easy for you to make. You never complained. Never went back on it. You kept your word because it means something to you. I know it couldn’t have been an easy ride, because I know Maddox. He’s a control freak.”

“You’re kidding,” Raini said dryly.

Her anchor only smiled.

“Your tables are ready,” the hostess announced. She guided Maddox and Raini to a cushioned booth, being sure to wiggle that ass of hers as she walked. Ugh. Flashing him a sultry grin, she said, “Here we are.” Whatever she saw on Raini’s face made her dial down that smile. Wise girl. She placed two menus on the table. “Your waitress will be with you shortly.” With that, she guided Hector and Carmen to a nearby booth, where they could keep watch on Maddox and Raini yet also give them privacy.

Scanning the menu, Raini bit her lip. “There are too many choices. Which is not a complaint.”

“Why not get the combo platter,” Maddox suggested. “It has miniature desserts—Red Velvet cupcake, Pavlova, Chocolate Pudding, Mango Meringue, and Angel Food Cake.”

“That does sound like a plan I can get behind.” Raini snapped the menu closed. “What are you having?”

“These.”

She looked at the picture of the three small glasses of beautifully presented chocolate mousses. “Good choice.”

“Drink?”

“Hmm, vanilla milkshake.” Raini glanced around, admiring the décor. Framed paintings of cakes, puddings, mousses, custards, and frozen desserts adorned the bright walls. So many delicious smells laced the air—dark chocolate, cinnamon, vanilla, caramel.

It was relatively busy. Waiters and waitresses weaved around the tables, serving food or collecting dirty dishware. Talking and laughter came from the couples, groups, and families that were scattered around the large space.

Catching sight of Hector scanning a menu while Carmen shook her head in disgust, Raini smiled. “I like your sentinels more than I thought I would,” she told Maddox.

“And they like you,” he said. “But then, you make it impossible for people to dislike you.” He paused as their waitress appeared. After she’d taken their orders and left, he went on, “I’m quite sure that most of my demons were determined to dislike you so that they wouldn’t have felt guilty about not being welcoming toward you. But they didn’t manage it. You won them over.”

“Marcella and Euan still aren’t my fans, but they’ve stopped giving me grief.” Probably because they wouldn’t hesitate to ask me to free them from a haze, and they don’t want me to not feel inclined to help them, she added telepathically.

Most likely, he agreed. “The others have accepted you. They often ask when you’re going to transfer to our lair.”

Raini almost rolled her eyes. “We’re back to this again, huh?”

“It would seem so.” He drummed his fingers on the table. “I think you’ve learned by now that I like to get my way.”

“It’s pretty easy to sense, yeah.”

“So then you know I won’t let this go. You’ll be safer in my lair.”

“Yeah, you keep saying that. But I’m not unsafe in my current lair.”

His brow hiked up. “I didn’t say you were unsafe there. I said you’d be safer in mine.”

“I don’t see how. What I do see is that you’d feel better if I was under your rule.”

“I would, yes. Because I don’t believe anyone will protect you more vehemently than I would. Jolene loves you—I see that. She even seems to view you as family in a sense. But you don’t come first to her the way you do me. You’re my priority. Your safety and well-being matters to me on a level it can’t matter to Jolene because you’re not her anchor, you’re mine. So of course I’d feel better if you were part of my lair.”

He paused again as the waitress brought over their drinks and then left, clearly rushed off her feet. “I understand that you’d prefer to be part of the same lair as your family,” he continued. “Especially since, with the exception of your missing sister, you’re close to them. I get that you’d feel like you were leaving them behind. But they’d understand, Raini. I think they’d even prefer for you to be living among demons who accept your gift.”

Raini drank some of her milkshake through her straw, silently wishing that the reason he felt so strongly about all this was that he cared about her as more than his anchor. She also silently berated herself for being so dumb as to think it could happen. Maddox wasn’t a man who bonded with people.

He took responsibility for her, he enjoyed having her in his bed, but that was as far as it would ever go. If she hadn’t been his psi-mate, he’d have kicked her to the curb by now and found another bed-partner. The thought made her stomach churn and her demon snarl. The entity had grown to be highly possessive of him—and not just on an anchor-level.

Raini set down her glass. “So you wouldn’t only want me to switch to your lair, you’d want me to give up my home and live at the monastery?”

He gave a small shrug. “It would make sense for you to live there. Most demons live among their lair members.”

“Khloë and Keenan don’t.”

“Probably because the sentinel knows she’d be better off having her family close so that she’s not alone when he’s on duty.”

Probably. Khloë tended to get into all kinds of shit when lonely or bored.

Just then, “Happy Birthday” began to play and a bunch of people gathered near a corner table to clap and sing along for the birthday boy/girl.

Raini cringed. “I would be mortified if that happened to me.” She smiled as the waitress returned and set their desserts in front of them. “Wow.” Raini pulled out her phone and snapped a picture of the combo platter, fully intending to send it to her girls.

“Make sure you eat it all,” said Maddox, spooning some mousse. “You’ll need your energy for what I’m planning to do to you once we’re alone.”

Oh, that made her tingle in all the best places. Which wasn’t fair, because he couldn’t do anything about the tingling right here. “That was cruel.” Scooping up some of her chocolate pudding, she sensually sucked it from the spoon and licked the utensil clean.

A muscle in his cheek jumped. “That was equally cruel.”

“I know.”

Why that devious smile of hers made his cock hard, Maddox didn’t know. His body reacted to her far too easily. Almost as if it instinctively reached for what belonged to it.

They talked about general things as they ate. He wanted to push her on joining his lair, but he knew better. For one thing, he’d learned where his anchor’s tolerance level sat, and he was close to hitting it. For another, he didn’t want her to agree to his request purely because she felt pressured. He wanted her to want to be part of his lair. So he kept the conversation light and easy.

His demon wasn’t so content to let the subject lie—it didn’t see why she couldn’t simply make the transfer. The entity didn’t view anyone else as having any real importance to her. But it didn’t urge Maddox to push her, because it liked seeing her this way. Relaxed. Happy. Open. At ease with them.

She often seemed so edgy and lost. Not many people wouldn’t be, in her shoes. She had someone looking to ruin her life, her sister was not only missing but the possible culprit, and some of her lair had turned away from her. In Maddox’s opinion, she was better off away from them, but he suspected she already knew that. She just needed time to accept it.

Once they were both done with their food, he dabbed his mouth with a soft napkin. “I need to use the bathroom. I’ll be back soon.” He signaled for Carmen to keep a close watch on Raini and then headed for the men’s restroom, knowing Hector was close behind him.

As per usual, Hector waited at the exit, on guard. Inside, Maddox did his business and then washed his hands, not all too keen on the clinical scent of the soap. Crossing to the dryer, he placed his palms beneath the sensor. The loud whirring sound of the machinery filled the air.

In the mirror, he caught sight of a figure materializing behind him. Halo-bearer.

Two others appeared near the row of sinks. The one at his back moved fast and grabbed Maddox’s arm before he’d even had the chance to properly process the situation.

Maddox felt a shift in the air and knew the angel meant to waver him out of there. Fuck that. He struck out, releasing a blast of cold energy that sent all three of them zooming backwards. One crashed into a urinal, breaking the porcelain, and dropped to the tiled floor. The other two slammed into the far wall and then slid to the floor.

His blood boiling with both his fury and that of his demon, Maddox conjured a ball of arctic energy just as the door to the restroom rammed into the wall. Hector rushed inside and took in the scene with a single glance. Without hesitation, he launched a series of hellfire orbs at the angel near the broken urinal and—

Pain exploded inside Maddox’s skull. His vision grayed, his ears rang, and the energy ball in his hand fizzled out. One of the three halo-bearers wavered to the spot in front of him and grabbed his shoulder.

Still recovering from the psychic hit, Maddox slammed his fist into the angel’s jaw and followed it up with a hellfire orb to the face. The fucker jerked back with a growled cry of pain, his skin sizzling.

A telekinetic force whipped Maddox off his feet and sent him soaring across the room and crashing into Hector, causing him to knock down his sentinel like he was a damn skittle.

Jumping to his feet, Maddox tossed a ball of cold energy. It burst in the air and hit the angels like a scatter of bullets. The slivers sank deep under their skin, too deep to be worked out.

Maddox’s demon watched with grim satisfaction as the angels jerked, shuddered, and struggled to take in a breath as the arctic energy circulated through their bodies and killed them from the inside out.

Two collapsed on the tiled floor, dead, and their halos winked out, but the third was fighting to hold on. He’d only been hit by a single splinter, so his time hadn’t yet run out. His form was flickering as he tried to gather enough power to waver away.

Maddox’s demon wanted the piece of shit dead and urged Maddox to end him. He could’ve, but he instead taunted, “Yes, run back to your master like a good little puppy and tell him he failed again. I guess he’s just not ‘Seven’ material, is he?”

The halo-bearer shot him a hateful glare, spared his dead companions a quick look, and then abruptly disappeared.

Rolling back his shoulders, Maddox turned to his sentinel and frowned. “They got you good,” he said, the ringing in his ears dimming.

Sporting several holy fire burns, Hector flicked his hand. “Pain’s not that bad.”

Ignoring that comment, Maddox joined his palm to Hector’s and sent a burst of power into him to heal the wounds.

“Thanks.” Hector sighed at the rapidly decomposing corpses. “I guess Castiel wasn’t yet ready to personally rise to your challenge.”

“They didn’t try to wound or kill me,” Maddox mused. “Not really. They wanted me weak, if possible, but not dead. They kept trying to waver me out of here.”

“Waver you to Castiel, maybe?”

“That would be my guess.”

“Can we come inside now?” Carmen called from outside the room.

Maddox stilled. “Where’s Raini?”

“Right here with me, obviously,” replied Carmen. “I wasn’t gonna leave her alone for even a second.”

Not trusting that a halo-bearer wouldn’t make a grab for her, Maddox stalked out of the restroom and crossed straight to Raini, who was biting her lip.

“What happened in there?” she asked.

Maddox looked at his sentinels. “Home.” He teleported Raini to the monastery’s communal seating area and then replied, “Three halo-bearers paid me a visit. Seemed like they wanted to take me somewhere.”

“Say what?” asked Gunther, rising from the sofa.

The other demons in the room all straightened in their seats, and Maddox saw that most of his lair was present. Just as the sentinels appeared, Maddox began to relay what had happened. And Raini, well, she blew a fuse. He’d never actually seen her lose her temper before. But as she paced up and down, cursing and ranting and swearing she’d make Castiel suffer in several creative ways, it was a thing of beauty. Every descendant in the room watched her, seeming rather fascinated by this delightfully vicious side of her.

Maddox tagged her by looping an arm around her waist. He drew her close. “I’m fine, they didn’t take me anywhere.”

Her cheeks flushed, she glared up at him through eyes that sparkled with anger. “Not the point.”

“She’s right on that,” said Celia. “I don’t know about anyone else, but I’ve had it with these fuckers and their puppet master.”

“That was a suicide mission,” said Gunther. “No halo-bearers were ever going to come out of a busy restaurant in the Underground alive unless they wavered in and out of it in the blink of an eye. They had to know it wouldn’t be that simple when dealing with Maddox, given how hard it’s been for them to take him out.”

“What choice did they have but to try?” asked Carmen. “They tried attacking him here and at the club—neither attempt was successful. The only public places he frequents are at the Underground.”

Feeling the echo of a telepathic conversation, Maddox looked down at his anchor and noted the faraway look in her eyes. He squeezed her hand. “I take it people are checking on you.”

Raini nodded. “Yes. And you. They wanted to make sure we’re both fine. They’re all pissed as hell that halo-bearers would dare go to the Underground, let alone launch an attack there. I think pretty much every demon out there will be mad about it.”

He agreed. For demons, that was their place. Their playground. Their territory. Angels had no business being there.

Once he’d finished talking with his lair, Maddox took Raini up to his room, where she promptly kicked off her high heels. He’d just opened the top few buttons of his shirt when his cell phone rang. He checked the screen. Viper. Maddox answered, “I take it you heard.”

“I heard,” said Viper. “The news traveled fast. It’s not every day that angels take the chance those three took.”

“They didn’t try to kill me,” Maddox told him, watching as Raini sat on the bed, her thumbs tapping crazily fast on the screen of her cell. She’d calmed down for the most part, so it seemed that her anger ran hot and fast. “They tried to take me.”

“Castiel probably sent them to nab you,” Viper theorized. “Your last taunt must have worked.”

“But not enough to make him come to me, which is what I ultimately want.”

“I’d say you’ll get what you want. Now that you’ve killed his minions for the third time, it will reflect badly on him if he doesn’t take control of the situation and deal with you directly. He can’t afford to be seen as someone who won’t avenge his own people—an archangel like that would never make one of the Seven. Plus, I doubt many more halo-bearers will be prepared to essentially sacrifice themselves unless he shows some decent leadership. So there’s a high chance you’ll be facing him soon.”

His demon hummed in satisfaction. “Good.”

“Don’t underestimate him, Maddox. Don’t mistake his failure to face you as fear on his part. Castiel is powerful and ballsy. The only reason he hasn’t deigned to face you himself so far is that he’s so supremely arrogant, he sees this realm and everyone in it as beneath his notice. If wiping out descendants wouldn’t gain him favor, he wouldn’t have even spared you a thought.”

“That sort of arrogance can be a weakness.” One Maddox intended to exploit.

“That it can,” Viper agreed. “I’m only saying you need to be ready, because dealing with an archangel is a lot different to dealing with the halo-bearers he’s been sending your way. His power far exceeds theirs. He won’t make an easy opponent.”

“Why would I want an easy opponent?”

Viper chuckled. “I feel like we have so much in common. You know, it surprised me that they didn’t make a try for your anchor. They mustn’t have gotten word that you and her are now bonded, or they’d have killed her to weaken you. Watch her closely, Maddox. Castiel doesn’t fight fair. It would be just like the sly bastard to kill her as part of punishing you for eliminating so many of his minions.”

Maddox had already considered that, which was why he’d brought her straight here. “She’ll be watched closely.” Probably more closely than she’d like.

Viper spoke to someone in the background and then sighed. “Got to go, Maddox. Don’t forget to call on me if you need to.”

“I won’t.” Maddox ended the call and stalked over to his anchor, who was now scowling at her phone. “Something wrong?”

Raini looked up at him. “It shouldn’t be so hard to convince a person not to work off their anger by burning the property of random people.”

“I take it you’re referring to your father.”

“Yes. He doesn’t see why it’s a big deal, because ‘objects can be replaced; material things aren’t what’s really important in life.’ Oh, and ‘crime keeps the economy going.’”

Despite its anger, Maddox’s demon chuckled. It liked Lachlan Campbell. So did Maddox. The imp was a man who, like Maddox, saw the beauty in revenge.

She tossed her cell on the mattress beside her. “Hopefully my mom will get through to him, because I can’t.” She puffed out a breath. “Sorry I got so mad and went on a rant.”

“You don’t need to apologize. It was actually quite entertaining to watch. And it calmed my demon down a little, because you had most of its attention.”

She snorted. “Glad I could be of service, I guess. What about you? Are you okay?”

“No. I had a nice evening planned, and those angels ruined it.”

“Hmm, what did your plans entail?”

“I wanted to relax you. Feed you. Fuck you.”

Her pupils dilated. “You did relax me. You did feed me. And I certainly hope you still have every intention of fucking me.”

“Oh, I do. After we’ve gotten something straight.”

She groaned. “I’m not gonna like this, am I?”

“I’d like to think it won’t bother you too much. You spend most of your time here with me anyway.”

She poked the inside of her cheek with her tongue. “You want me to temporarily move here, don’t you?”

Maddox really had no intention of it being temporary, but she didn’t need to know that. For now. “There’s a strong possibility that Castiel will come for me himself. There’s an equally strong possibility that he’ll decide to kill you to weaken me. I don’t know if an archangel is powerful enough to break through the penthouse’s security, but I’d prefer not—no, I refuse—to risk it. To risk you.”

“He can’t enter this building?”

“No, or I wouldn’t ask you to stay here.”

“Where exactly would I sleep?”

“In here with me, obviously.”

Raini twisted her mouth. Her pride was firmly against the idea. She could take on an archangel—no matter his power, he surely couldn’t combat psychic hellfire, right? But that wasn’t to say he couldn’t hurt her before she’d had the chance to act, much like the first halo-bearer who came after her. Hell, a full-on blast of holy fire could severely hurt her.

Raini wasn’t a fan of pain. Or of holy fire. Or of letting her ego get in the way of good sense.

If Castiel did come for her, she’d stand a far better chance of surviving the encounter if she wasn’t alone in a damn penthouse. Yes, Maddox could teleport to her in an instant. But then she’d have drawn him into danger. It would be far better for her to be out of the archangel’s reach, so that she couldn’t be used against Maddox.

“All right, since I figure this whole thing will have blown over soon,” she said. “But don’t expect me to stay permanently. Don’t think of this as you easing me into joining your lair.” She raised a hand to hold off any argument he might have made. “Yes, I know you think I’d be better off transferring here. And you make a lot of good points whenever you start jabbering on about it. But it wouldn’t be a good idea.”

“Why not?”

“How will you feel when I start dating someone? Or when I take a mate?”

Something dark flashed in his eyes. “Where the fuck did that come from?”

“Anchors can be possessive of each other, as I’m sure you’ve already noticed. It might be a little bit worse for us because we’ve been … intimate. A lot of anchored pairs live in separate lairs because then their relationships aren’t shoved in each other’s faces. If I was part of your lair and dating other guys, you’d have a front-row seat to the show, and vice versa. Maybe that wouldn’t bother you, but … ”

“But?” he prodded.

God, she didn’t want to say it. Didn’t want to admit it, because that would probably put an end to what little they had. He wouldn’t want to continue a fling with a woman who wanted more than he did.

Maybe it was better to just cut her losses and walk away now, though. Dragging the whole thing out would only make her hurt worse in the long run.

She pulled up her big girl pants, rose to her feet, and confessed, “But it would bother me to see you with other women, which annoys the absolute shit out of me. I thought we could cross lines without things becoming complicated. I was wrong. In light of that, it isn’t a good idea for us to keep sleeping together, is it?”

He took a single step closer, eating up the small space between them. “I like what we have. My demon likes it. Neither me nor the entity have any particular interest in letting it end, and it would seem that neither do you. So why should we?”

“Because the possessiveness will only intensify if we don’t.”

“And why is that a bad thing?”

Feeling her brow crease, Raini stared at him. “I can’t tell if you’re being deliberately obtuse or you’re just not seeing the bigger picture.”

“You’re the one who’s not looking at the bigger picture.” Maddox lifted some of her hair and held the blonde and pink strands up to the light streaming in through the window. “I’ve never had a woman in my bed before, not even in my room. Not once. I’ve never taken one without a condom. Never invited them to eat with my lair. Never wanted their time or attention outside of sex.”

“You’ve only been different with me because I’m your anchor.”

Maddox’s eyes drifted over her face. “You fascinate my demon, you know. It loves that you’re a devious, vengeful, lethal package wrapped up in sweetness and sensuality. It likes that it’s one of the few who really sees you.”

Pausing, he dipped his head. “I see you. You know that. It scares you. The men in your past only saw one dimension of you. Having someone walk away doesn’t hurt as much when they never really knew you, does it? But if I was to walk away, I’d have walked away from the real you, and that would hurt you. The thing is, Raini … I have no plans to go anywhere. You should have known better than to think otherwise.”

She felt her lips part. “You’re serious?”

“Originally, my possessiveness stemmed from you being my anchor; I won’t deny it. But the more time I spent around you and the more facets of you I saw, the more that sense of possessiveness … shifted. It became different. It became about you. It became more. This, what we have, is more. And you know it. I have no intention of losing it; of losing you.”

Raini swallowed. The guy was a master at deception, but she knew he wouldn’t lie about something like this. Knew he wouldn’t have said such things to her unless he was certain that he meant them. Even so, it was hard to simply accept his declaration, because she would never have expected to hear it. “You once told me you had no interest in relationships.”

“That was then. This is now. I felt things changing, I could have ended this at any time to put a chokehold on that. I didn’t. I let it happen. So did you. There’s no sense in backing out now. I don’t want to, and neither do you. I doubt our demons would stand for it if we tried.”

Her inner entity would put up a resistance for sure, but … “If we don’t pull back, my demon will develop a true attachment to you.” The entities couldn’t love, but they occasionally formed attachments to people. They weren’t sweet or romantic, no, demonic attachments were dark and obsessive and incredibly intense. Because the entities honed every bit of their laser-sharp focus and sheer intensity into those bonds. “If that happens, it’ll want to keep you, Maddox. You know that.”

He gently tucked her hair behind her ear. “I do know that. Just as I know that my demon is fast developing an attachment to you. I haven’t got an issue with either of those things.”

“There’d be no going back,” she warned him.

Maddox dipped his head so that their lips brushed. “Why would I want to go back, baby?” He took her mouth. Not softly, not slowly. No, this wasn’t a casual kiss. It was a statement. A claim. A demand for surrender. And her body roared to life.

Raini kissed him back, deftly tackling the buttons of his shirt. He shrugged it off, and she planted her hands on his broad shoulders, loving how solid they were. She snaked her hands down his warm, sleek chest; feeling the hard male muscle beneath; tracing the dips and lines of his abs. She dropped her hands to his fly—

He spun her around. “Not so fast, baby.”

“Fast is good.”

“It is,” he agreed, slowly pulling down the zipper of her dress. “We’ll get to that part. But not yet.”

“Why not?”

Maddox felt his mouth curve at the sulky note to her voice. “Because I don’t want to.” He dragged the thin straps of her dress over her shoulders and let the devil’s creation drop to the floor. If his cock hadn’t already been full and hard, it would have thickened at the sight of her phenomenal ass clad only in lacy, barely-there panties.

Pressing his front to her back, Maddox put his mouth to her ear. “Panties off. That’s it, good girl. Now open your bra for me.” Once she’d flicked open the front catch, he filled his hands with her breasts. Firm and high and petal soft, they were fucking perfect.

He squeezed and kneaded, occasionally thumbing or pinching her taut nipples. “Remember when I pumped my come all over these pretty breasts? I’ll be doing that again sometime soon.”

Keeping her back pressed to his front, he spun them both and then sank onto the bed with her sat between his legs. “Hook your thighs over mine. Very good.” He slowly parted his thighs, forcing her own to spread wide open. “Yes, that’s how I want you.”

“Maddox—”

“Shh,” he began, snaking his hand over her breast and down her stomach, “have a little patience.” He slid one finger between her folds and then sank it into her pussy as deep as it would go. Humming at the feel of all that liquid heat, he nipped her ear-lobe. “You know what I think?”

“No, and I don’t care,” she snapped. “All I want is for you to fuck me. I don’t think it’s too much to ask. I let you borrow my pussy, like, all the time.”

He smiled. “I don’t borrow it.” He swirled his finger and then slid it out of her, dragging all that slickness up to her clit. “I don’t need to, because I own it.”

Maddox used his fingertip to work her clit—tracing circles, rubbing back and forth, sliding up and down, alternating with speed and pressure—until she was trembling, arching, and digging her nails into his arms. “You’re close, aren’t you? Good.” He shoved two fingers inside her and pumped hard, using the heel of his palm to rub her clit; lapping up every hoarse moan, every squeeze of her inner muscles, every rush of dampness that coated his fingers. “Come on, baby, let … yes, that’s it.”

She imploded, her head thrown back over his shoulder, her pussy rippling, her thighs tremoring. And his demon surged to the surface.