Total pages in book: 122
Estimated words: 120475 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 602(@200wpm)___ 482(@250wpm)___ 402(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 120475 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 602(@200wpm)___ 482(@250wpm)___ 402(@300wpm)
The golden warmth paints her skin in liquid gold hues that cascade over the slope of her shoulders and catch in the delicate hollow of her throat.
Her dress—fuck, her dress—is a dark, fluid thing that hugs every curve like it was designed with just her in mind. It drapes. It clings. It bares.
My knees are weak, and all pretense at control evaporates as my eyes continue to trace her, incapable in this moment of doing anything else.
The truth is laid bare: I’m as under her spell now as I ever was.
Her hair is swept up, leaving her neck bare and vulnerable, the elegant curve of it leading down to a thin, silver chain resting against her collarbone—a chain I want to trace with my tongue. I want to taste where the cool metal meets her warm skin.
She laughs at something, her head tilted back just enough for me to see the curve of her throat, the faint pulse beating there like a siren’s call. Her mouth—Christ—her mouth is a perfect, wicked thing, soft and plush, curved in a way that makes me remember every filthy, sacred thing it’s ever done to me.
I feel it like a punch.
Low. Sharp. Hot.
A hunger buried so deep it’s practically in my bones, clawing its way to the surface.
But it’s more than that.
And I’m faced with the stark truth that this is more than just want—it’s need. The kind that doesn’t fade. The kind that doesn’t get sated, no matter how many times I’ve had her. No matter how many times I’ve told myself it’s enough.
She’s the wild wood, and I’ve been a goddamned idiot to think I could ever… what? Tame her? Tether her?
She unravels the threads I’ve knotted so tightly around myself.
I thought I was here to keep control, to be the one who dictates the terms.
But that was a lie.
I’m here because she exists.
I’m here because, without her, there’s nothing else.
I’ve been a lost man, thinking I was found. The man who hates lies was living buried under so many I can’t tell one from another. I’m no shepherd. I’m a fraud.
Her laughter fades, her gaze drifting across the crowd, indifferent—until it lands on me.
Her smile falters just slightly, but it’s enough.
I watch her breath catch. I see it. Feel it. Like we’re connected by some invisible thread pulled taut between us.
Her eyes—those impossible, beautiful green eyes—widen with surprise, then something darker flickers behind them.
Recognition. Heat. That sharp, electric awareness that’s always been there, thrumming beneath every word we’ve ever spoken, every look we’ve ever shared.
Our gazes lock, and the world collapses.
There’s no gala. No music. No crowd.
It’s just her.
Just me.
I start moving toward her, my steps automatic, pulled by a force older than logic and stronger than reason. My heartbeat drowns out everything else. It pounds in my chest and my throat and my skull.
She doesn’t look away.
Neither do I.
Each step feels like falling.
Because in this sea of people, beneath the glittering lights, surrounded by noise and artifice—
It’s just us.
It’s always been just us.
“You came.” Her voice trembles.
“I’ll always come for you.”
“I—I didn’t mean to—” She cuts off. “I just—” She cuts off again, looking up at me helplessly.
I hold out a hand, desperate to touch her. “Would you like to dance?”
TWENTY-FOUR
MOIRA
I blink up at him like he just asked if I wanted to wrestle a tiger. A very sexy, broody tiger in a tailored black suit with eyes that say, I’ll ruin you, and you’ll thank me.
“Dance?” I repeat because, apparently, I’ve been reduced to an echo.
Bane doesn’t answer. He just stands there with his hand outstretched, like he’s carved from dark marble. Except marble doesn’t make your stomach do somersaults or send a heatwave directly to your undies. No, that’s all him.
My brain scrambles like eggs on high heat.
This is fine. Totally fine.
Normal people get asked to dance all the time. I can do this. I can be graceful and mysterious and definitely not like I’ve mainlined three energy drinks and made a questionable amount of bad decisions today.
I slip my palm into his like I’m about to seal a deal with the devil. Which, knowing me and knowing him, feels about right.
His hand is warm and big and dominating.
Of course, it is.
He pulls me in gently, but not too gently, because he’s Bane, and subtlety isn’t really his brand. My body crashes into his, and I lose the breath in my lungs.
I was sure he wouldn’t come. I was sure I’d ruined things like I always do.
But here he is. Solid. Holding me. Here for me. Even when I was a little shit.
The music shifts. Something low and slow with a beat that crawls under your skin like it belongs there. Figures. Even the DJ is conspiring against me.
Bane slides his hand to my waist, and oh god, how does that feel like both an electric shock and a security blanket at the same time? His other hand keeps mine, fingers entwined, like we’re in some old-timey romance.