She stood toe-to-toe with him, her chest brushing his as her angry breaths heaved in and out. “I know the only reason you came after me in the first place was because of that ridiculous prophecy. I know every time I reach out to touch you, you freeze. Whenever I’m close to you, you’re always clenching your fists, and you get stiff as a two-by-four whenever—”
“My ability to touch you doesn’t have a damned thing to do with it. I’ve wanted you from the moment I first laid eyes on you,” Gideon growled, his control snapping like dried twigs and rapidly going up in flames. “I stiffen up to keep from grabbing you up in my arms and holding you so tight I’d probably break you. I clench my fists to keep from reaching for you. Not your powers or visions, not your damned bloodlines. Christ on a crutch! If anything, your bloodlines, your father and the damned prophecy are prime reasons why I should stay as far the hell away from you as possible!”
He dragged in a breath, too irate to comprehend that she was staring up at him in open-mouthed shock.
“And I force myself to be still to keep myself from seizing you and dragging you to the ground beneath me,” he added. “To keep myself from tearing your clothes off and devouring every inch of you. Because once I do, once I lose control, there’s no going back. I’ll claim you as my female. In every way possible. And no matter how badly I want you, no matter how much I might cherish you, I will always be a threat to you. I’ll always be dangerous because a part of me will always be Temptation.”
He paused, giving her a less than gentle shake. “Do you get it now? If I claim you, despite the fact that I’d be putting you at risk on every front, I will never, never be able to let you go, never be able to stay away from you. I won’t be able to help myself.”
His chest was heaving now, the air in the hallway made thin by the tension between the two of them. He stared down into her startled blue-green eyes, and then lower to her softly parted lips.
Gideon was riding the razor’s edge now, close to tipping over that treacherous point of no return. He could feel every pulse of his heart, the rushing of his blood through his veins. He’d never felt so alive. And everything inside him was yearning for her. He’d never been this ready, this eager to lose control. Normally that realization would have been enough to make him nervous, but right now there wasn’t an ounce of rage in his system.
Nothing but pure, raw desire.
She placed her free hand upon his chest. “Would that be such a bad thing?”
Gideon sucked in a sharp breath. That moment, the invitation in her eyes, the weight of her hand upon his chest would forever be burned into his memory. “Woman, you have no idea the beast you tempt.”
Becoming color flooded her cheeks. She glanced down and to the side for a moment before she looked back up at him. She opened her mouth to say something, but suddenly, her gaze swerved back, just to the side of his head. Her mouth fell open and her eyes went wide.
When she looked back at him, she had the strangest expression on her face. And then she gasped softly, one of those aha looks suddenly lighting her face. Was she having one of the visions she’d told him about? Frowning, he glanced over his shoulder, over hers. There was nothing there but bare wall.
“What?” he asked. “What are you looking at?”
She slowly turned to him, and a bemused smile lit her features. And then she began to laugh. The tinkling sound washed over him in waves, soothing his soul, pouring fuel on the flames of his need, confusing the living hell out of him.
“Wallpaper.”
Chapter Twelve
In that moment, it all became clear to Maggie. Life was about choices. She’d been so tied up in the choices that other people made, in the chaos that other people created, that she’d forgotten her choices mattered just as much. She was standing at a crossroads, the wallpaper a sign. The very same wallpaper from her vision.
And although, once she’d had a vision about a specific event, she’d never been able to change the outcome, surely she could change this one. If she wanted to.
If she really wanted to…
Would she choose the path that led to her going into that bedroom all alone and miserable? Or would she choose the path that led to a stolen moment of passion and hunger right here in this hallway, no matter where that path might end?
This was her moment.
This was her choice, vision be damned.
Maggie stared up into Gideon’s golden eyes. She might need him.
But he needed her as well.