Filed To Story: Spit or Swallow: Kiss Of The Basilisk
He rubbed the back of his hand over his mouth, smearing the lipstick even more. “Nothing worth having.”
“Oh, please.”
“Sixty seconds with you is worth an hour with Vera,” he said quietly.
Tem shrugged with an indifference she did not feel.
Leo stood unsteadily, grasping the table for balance.
Tem had never seen him drunk like this before, and she hated the sight. She jerked her head at the hourglass. “Are you going to turn that over?”
Leo tapped a single finger on the sculpted metal. “If I turn it over, will you take off that dress?”
Maybe it was her anger at Vera. Maybe it was the way Caspen had cut off their connection without consulting her. Or maybe it was the realization that she couldn’t control even the smallest thing in her life right now. Either way, Tem had had enough.
“You can’t just have whatever you want,” she snapped.
Leo’s face slid into a smile as he saw he had finally forced a reaction from her. “Maybe not,” he said quietly. “But I can certainly imagine whatever I want.” His eyes traveled slowly down her body as he stepped toward her. “Whenever I want it.”
By the look on Leo’s face, Tem knew exactly what he was imagining. She felt herself blushing and forced herself to suppress it. Why shouldn’t he picture what he’d never have?
“Imagine all you want,” she said. “I’m not taking off this dress.”
The corner of his mouth twitched. “Yet,” he whispered.
He was standing so close, Tem could count his eyelashes. He had a tiny scar on the bottom of his chin. She could smell his cologne, which was rich and musky, like cigars smoked outside during summer.
She expected him to try to kiss her, but he didn’t. Instead he just stood there, far too close, watching her.
“You know,” he said, his voice barely a murmur. “You can imagine whatever you want too.”
She should punch him in the face. But Tem was finding it hard to think straight, finding it hard to remember why she was resisting him in the first place. “I don’t want anything from you,” she said.
Leo smiled, as if he knew it was not quite the truth. “So, so difficult.”
“You like it.”
Leo looked her straight in the eye. “I do. But that doesn’t mean I’ll tolerate it forever.”
“Excuse me?”
“I have to eliminate two girls tonight, Tem. Why shouldn’t I eliminate you?”
“Because you’d never see me again.”
He shrugged. “Maybe that’s not such a bad thing. I’m getting a little tired of my cock being permanently hard whenever you’re around.”
Tem’s mouth fell open.
Leo chuckled softly. “Don’t tell me that surprises you.”
Tem didn’t know what to say.
Leo placed one hand on the door behind her head. He leaned in, whispering his next words right into her ear. “The real question is whether you’re wet whenever I’m around.”
Tem’s heart felt like it was about to leap from her chest.
Leo’s lips were just brushing her skin, the sensation impossible to ignore. His teeth nipped her earlobe. “Are you wet, Tem?” he whispered.
Tem was.
She couldn’t help it. She knew it was the last thing Leo deserved from her. But his mouth was near her neck. And he smelled good. And the way his body looked under his shirt was making her want things she had absolutely no business wanting. So she said, “You tell me.”
At her words, Leo’s entire demeanor changed. Where before he’d been pointedly detached, now his eyes narrowed with determined focus. Without a moment’s hesitation, Leo slid his hand through the slit of her dress. She hadn’t worn any underclothing-the tight fabric hadn’t allowed for it. Leo’s jaw clenched when he realized this.
“Fuck, Tem.”
Tem’s lungs seemed to contract as his hand dove between her legs to feel exactly how wet she was for him. She gasped as he slipped one, then two, then three fingers inside her. When he went for the fourth, Tem pushed his hand away.
Leo smirked. “That’s all I get?”
“We only have sixty seconds.”
His smirk deepened. “I never turned the hourglass.”
He had a point there.
“Besides,” he continued, “I’m in charge. If I want to keep you longer, I will.”
“Could you get any more entitled?”
“Yes. I could. I could argue that I’m entitled to your cunt, whether you want to give it to me or not.”
Tem raised her chin in defiance. “You’re not entitled to any part of me.”
Her response seemed to amuse Leo. “Always such a fucking tease, Tem.”
Tem grit her teeth. “If I’m such a tease, why bother keeping me around?”
To her surprise, Leo laughed.
“If you think being a tease would turn me off, you don’t know me at all.”
He always wants what he can’t have.
Tem looked up at Leo, who held her gaze calmly. It was unnerving how nothing seemed to faze him, especially considering how many whiskeys he’d had since the start of the evening. Tem felt as if she could say anything at all and he wouldn’t even blink. She decided to test that theory.
“What if I never let you fuck me?”
He tilted his head, considering her. “Is that a threat?”
“It’s a question. A simple one actually.”
He laughed again. “Actually, it’s not simple at all. The entire point of this process is for me to find a wife I want to fuck. If you’re not willing to fuck me, then I don’t see the point of keeping you here.”
“Don’t you?” Tem said. She felt nothing but power in that moment.
“No.” Leo glanced lazily over at the hourglass. “I don’t.”
Now Tem was the one to move closer. She sidled up to him, draping her body against his in the same way she’d seen Vera do to Jonathan-in the same way any woman could do to a man. Despite Leo’s best efforts to remain indifferent, she felt his breath hitch when her hips pressed against his cock. He made it so easy.
New Book: Returned To Make Them Pay
On her wedding anniversary, Alicia is drugged and stumbles into the wrong room—straight into the arms of the powerful Caden Ward, a man rumored never to touch women. Their night of passion shocks even him, especially when he discovers she’s still a virgin after two years of marriage to Joshua Yates.