And from where Emmery stood, from what she could make out, the man stared down at the woman with, of all things,lovein his hooded eyes. A look Destonne wasn’t capable of.
Emmery swallowed hard. Her heart stung like it’d been punctured, but still pounded, leaking blood, and spilling inside her, pooling in the wrong places, and sure to kill her.
“We look …goodtogether,” Destonne said, his voice hesitant, and impossibly rough. “Don’t you think?”
On the bed, the man shifted and came down on top of the woman, her head pinned between his hands. He kissed her with such passion, Emmery’s own lips tingled and an untethered longing swelled in her chest.
“The labyrinth is trying to torment us, andthat’swhat you have to say?” she whispered. Her heart splintered and she wrapped her arms around herself. “This isn’t real.”
Destonne’s body heat bled into her back, and his familiar scent of icy mint swept over her as his breath grazed her neck. Oh gods, why did she want to lean into him? To let her head fall on his shoulder. To feel the strength of his arms and the hardness of his muscled chest.
It was insane. Ludicrous. Wrong. And so damn dangerous.
“It doesn’t have to be real to acknowledge the truth.” He brushed up against her and his fingertips grazed her hip in a questioning touch, a test if she would pull away. “Come now, you’re surely not afraid of me.”
“Of course not.”
“Then, what are you afraid of? Is this—” He nodded to the scene.“Isthistruly what frightens you? Is this what you classify as torment?”
She declined to answer. Declined to acknowledge what they both knew.
So with nowhere else to go, they stood there and watched, Destonne’s breath ragged like hers. Emmery tried to dissociate, but the longer she kept her attention on the couple, the more she could almost feel herself on that bed. That Destonne gently bit down on the junction ofherneck, and his fingers circled the throbbing spot betweenherlegs. And although he stood motionless behind her, the lines of reality and dream muddled as she became entranced, ensnared by a siren song, caught in the scene as the couple’s bodies moved together.
Flawlessly. Almost beautifully.
If it was only lust, two people finding release with one another, that would have been easier. But this was something else. Something that hurt her heart. Tore open her chest. The undiluted urgency, passion, and intimacy, like their souls touched each time their bodies met—
That sort of love didn’t exist. At least not for her.
Besides, she was promised to another. Had Shade ever looked at her that way? She searched the hazy fog of her memory and found herself more lost. She’d even begun to forget the green hue of Shade’s eyes and that, in itself, stirred a hollow pang in her chest. The closer she grew to her memories, the further away Shade seemed to be.
The scene drew Emmery from her thoughts as the woman cried out and raked her nails down the man’s back. In one broad hand, the man snagged her wrists and pinned them above her head just as golden sparks leapt from her fingertips like some fucked up fireworks show.
Feeling completely exposed, Emmery’s cheeks burned and she turned away from the couple to finally face Destonne. As she lifted her gaze to his, fervour glowed in his eyes.
She opened her mouth to say something. Anything. To assure him this was some asinine delusion, but she couldn’t reach her words.
Destonne leaned down, closing that gap between them. Emmery’s breath hitched, but she didn’t pull away. She couldn’t, or maybe she simply didn’t want to. He skimmed a finger along the curve of her jaw, and with his touch the longing inside her spread, as if it lived inside him too, and his loneliness and desire reached out and held hers.
“You can’t tell me you haven’t thought about it. About us,” he breathed. His voice was sin incarnate and claimed every fragment of her attention. “Tell me, angel, what is it you think of when you read that filthy book? When you have those pretty little fingers between your legs?”
Emmery gasped. She should shove him away, put as much distance between them as possible, but she couldn’t move. She was tangled in Destonne’s web and no hope remained of freeing herself now. So she laid her hand on his chest and fisted his shirt, unsure if she intended to kill him or kiss him.
Quietly, he continued, “Because I lie awake thinking of you. Every night. And nothing brings relief.Nothing.” Destonne teased the column of her neck with the softest brush of his lips. “It’s driving me mad.”
A delicious tingle shot down Emmery’s spine, swelled in her belly, and as he traced the tip of his nose back up the path his lips had followed, she bit back a tiny moan. “Don’t blame your instability on me,” she said, her voice quivering like her insides.
“How can I not? You are…” He sighed against her skin. “You’re complicating everything, Emmery.”
Her heart inflated as he placed a kiss on the delicate skin beneath her ear and waited for her to pull away. When she didn’t, he pressed another under her jaw, and another, leaving behind a string of heat, and her skin flushed, burning for him,until merely a sliver of space remained between them and temptation saturated the air. His brow rested against hers, and his lips lingered so close all she would have to do is lean in to claim them. And he smelled of mint, and chilled night breezes, and everything she couldn’t have.
It’s not real, Emmery told herself. This couldn’t be. In this place her skin felt clean, her hair fell loose down her back, and both her and Destonne wore fresh clothes. This had to be some hallucination. This couldn’t actually be him. Besides, he wouldn't hold her like this. Touch her this way.
And yet, itfeltreal.
“What if I said I wanted you?” he breathed, his air becoming hers. “What if I begged? What if I got on my knees? Would you even look at me, Emmery? Would you actually see me? Because sometimes …sometimesI swear, you do.”
“Destonne—”