He slid his hands along her sleek outer thighs until he came to the tight curve of her ass. He took hold, filling his palms with her, and pulled her to the edge of the seat. Her hands dropped to his head, fi ngers lacing his hair, sending a lightning bolt of desire through his system, washing him in wild fire.
He buried his face briefly in the hollow of her hips, just above the waves of her curls—she’d showered and smelled sweet, like spring rain. She’d be damp there, too.
“Just no fighting this,” he said against her skin, mouth searing a trail up her belly to her breast.
“Then don’t,” she whispered back, aching to feel his body on her, skin to skin.
Talia gripped the shoulders of his T-shirt and pulled it off him, his hands and arms lifting momentarily from his business of simultaneously removing his pants.
In one heat-slick movement, he was inside her.
Sudden shadow flooded out of Talia’s pleasure, seething between them like dark steam born of water and fire. For once she didn’t fight her instinctive response. She let the dark fill the room as Adam filled her, body and soul.
A wave of his lust burned her senses, a need so thick and insistent that her body arched in response. She wrapped her legs around him and drew him closer to her, to give him everything she was to slake his thirst.
He’d needed her like this before. That first kiss they’d shared at Segue had been ruled by it, and she’d run away. Now, she didn’t close herself off or pull away. He drove into her to obliterate himself, his cares, his worries, and she answered with her own need. Adam, only Adam could she trust to see her like this, her faery and human halves utterly undone. At last.
Adam pressed Talia back onto the cushions, covered her body with his, and submerged himself in her darkness with a kiss. His teeth grazed her bottom lip. His tongue tasted her mouth, her neck, her breast. The tight bliss of their connected bodies permitted no thought, no argument. Just him and her, rocking on waves of fire.
She was glowing again—her shadows revealed her as much as they concealed her—impossibly beautiful, magical, and a woman just the same. His woman.
He slid a hand around her hip, reaching deeply between her legs to open her more fully, and drove into her again. And again. The carnal friction was like a match on flint. They ignited.
Talia sensed it coming like a flash on the horizon, a transformative explosion that altered her perception forever. Adam’s layers of self-recrimination, regrets, and grief became transparent, and Talia perceived the reason behind Adam’s unfaltering will.
It was her. He’d do anything for her.
When Adam got out of the shower, Talia was gone. He dressed quickly in black jeans and a long-sleeve tee he’d picked up at a used clothing store outside Grand Central. Time to get going.
His mind was clear, his purpose defined. He hadn’t felt this centered in a long time. Bone tired, yes, but strangely better prepared for having woken Talia.
Talia.
He retrieved the flash drive and note and put them back on the side table, where she would see it. Her future was as secure as he could make it.
Exiting the room, he stuffed the vial of L-pills deeper in his pocket. He peeked into Abigail’s room as he passed her open door, but she wasn’t there. At the bottom of the stairs, he grabbed a kid with jet hair, accented with candy purple streaks.
“Where’s Talia?” Adam demanded.
The dressing room door opened and Zoe emerged. She held a tuxedo jacket out to him by the collar.
“Just in time,” she said. “But then again, I knew you would be.”
“I can’t. I’ve got to go out for a little while.” He pushed past Zoe to have a last word with Talia.
Talia turned at his entrance. All follow-up questions, all his plans, disintegrated as Adam’s heart arrested.
Her hair was a wild spill of white, curling gold over pale, bare shoulders. A black corset cinched her already trim waist to near nothing and did things to her breasts that made him want to drag her back up the stairs again. The long black skirt she wore seemed simple until she angled to check herself nervously in the mirror, and he got a peek at a Victorian bustle in the back. His fingers itched to get under the material and rediscover the satiny texture of the ass it concealed. The pointy toes of her shoes peeking out from the hem were slightly witchy, but all sex.
Talia brought a hand to her narrowed waist. “I shouldn’t have let Zoe talk me into this. She told me that it was appropriate, but I should change. It’s clearly not me.”
Adam’s mouth went dry. “—lovely.” He swallowed deeply and tried again. “You look lovely.”
“She fought me over the hair, but I won,” Zoe said, coming at him again with the damn jacket.
“I like her hair down, too,” Adam murmured. Her ponytails had all but driven him crazy at Segue.