by Sadie Moss
If that’s the case, I should probably consider my words more carefully and make sure they’re worthy of being held on to like that. But now that the word vomit has started, I can’t seem to find the switch to turn it off.
“The thing is,” I say quickly, “angels aren’t forbidden from—doing things like this. We’re allowed to, um, have sex and all that. Most angels see it as beneath them, at least with non-angels, so it’s not something that’s really done that often. Which I guess is why in my entire thirty years on Earth, I haven’t done it.”
My cheeks are on fire. If I blush any harder, I’ll literally burst into flame.
“But it doesn’t mean I don’t want to,” I finish.
My voice seems to fill the quiet room, as if I shouted the words instead of whispered them. But that’s what it always feels like when you speak a secret out loud, isn’t it?
Knight finally reacts at that. He steps toward me, closing the small space between us. There’s a more determined look on his face now, and he doesn’t box me in the way that Beckett did, but I find myself pressed against the door all the same, Knight only an inch from me.
He cocks his head, and even though he doesn’t speak a word, I can feel the question in the gesture.
“I want… more,” I confess, my voice hardly more than a breath now. “I want more of Beckett, Remi, Nix. Even Ford. I want—I want Sawyer. I want to see if he’s as good as he brags about, if he could make me feel all the things he promises. I want—so many things—”
Knight reaches up, his fingertips sliding along the side of my face, the curve of my cheek, my chin, down my throat, stroking there, and I shiver. I’m still keyed up from Beckett, and it’s not taking much to make me feel wet and aching again.
“I wish I could just take what I want. I wish I was brave enough. That’s envy, isn’t it?” I whisper. “Wanting, like this? Is this how you feel all the time?”
His fingertips trail down from my throat to my collarbone, then slowly down even more, between my breasts. My chest rises and falls faster as my breath picks up. His touch is light, and it’s driving me crazy. I want him to touch me firmly, to grasp me, but he doesn’t. He just keeps teasing.
Knight’s fingers move to the side, to my breast. His thumb brushes softly over my peaked nipple, and I moan. “Please—”
To my extreme embarrassment, my wings pop out.
Well, as if I wasn’t humiliating myself already. Might as well go all out, I suppose.
Knight pauses, his eyes going a bit wide like he wasn’t expecting that. But when he looks at my wings, it’s the same way he was just looking at the rest of me—with fascination and yearning.
He moves his hands away from my body, burying them in my feathers, grasping, stroking—and oh, oh, it feels so good, so unbelievably good that I nearly slide to the floor.
The closer to the base of my wings he gets, the more turned on I feel. The harder it gets to breathe. To think straight.
“Knight, if you—oh, oh please—”
I’m shuddering helplessly, certain that I could actually come from this. Pleasure will detonate in my body if he just keeps stroking my wings like this.
He’s standing even closer to me now, and when did he move closer? The heat of his body warms my skin, making me burn even hotter. His mouth is only an inch or so from mine, sweet almond overtaking my senses as his scent surrounds me.
I want to kiss him.
I want him to kiss me.
But just before our lips meet, his hands leave my wings, and he steps back so suddenly that I nearly fall over. What?
Knight moves away, not saying anything, but then, he doesn’t need to. I can see the bulge in his pants, can see that he wants this as badly as I do, but he won’t let himself have it.
He won’t let himself have me.
The room suddenly feels too small. He can’t tell me to get out with words, but I know that’s what he wants. Or at least, it’s what he would say if he could speak.
Fumbling, my breath still uneven, I find the door handle and open it, stumbling out. Then I practically sprint down the hallway.
I have to get back to my room before I run into another brother. If I run into Sawyer right now, I’ll spread my legs and beg him to fuck me before I even know what’s hit me. Probably the same for Remington or Phoenix. Even Ford. I’d be a mess for Ford right now too, pressing up against him and begging for him to take me like he did last time, all animal heat and hard, rough movements and—
Oh, geez, Trin. Get it together.
I stumble into my room, just barely remembering to close the door behind me. Ryland’s secretary somehow arranged for clothes to be dropped off too, and I slip into the silk pajamas I find in the closet before crawling quickly into bed. I’m not even tired, but there’s no freaking way I’m going to leave this room again tonight.
Not because I don’t trust the men in this house, but because I don’t trust myself.
Heat still burns through me, making my skin feel flushed and sensitive. Beck made me come hard with his fingers, but even though I can still feel the effects of the orgasm lingering in my body, it hasn’t tamed the fresh wave of arousal that’s building inside me.
If anything, it’s only made it worse.
My chest rises and falls fast as I stare up at the ceiling, barely even seeing it in the darkness of the room. I can still remember what it felt like to have Knight so close to me, and thoughts of what might’ve happened if he hadn’t stepped away run rampant through my mind.
I wanted those things to happen.
I still do.
My hips shift restlessly on the bed, and I bite my lip as I let my eyes drift closed. Images of Knight’s rich brown eyes flit through my imagination, followed by thoughts of Remington’s soft green eyes and Sawyer’s beautiful amber irises.
Holding those images close, I slowly slide my hand under the covers, trailing my fingers between my breasts and over the plane of my stomach before they delve beneath the waistband of my pajama bottoms and panties. I’ve never done this before, never felt such a blinding need to do it.
But as my fingers strum my clit, mimicking the paths that Beck’s fingertips traced earlier, I realize that’s exactly what this feels like.
Something far beyond want or simple desire.
It’s need.
Chapter Fourteen
SAWYER
Lust.
I can feel it permeating this house like a thick fog, creeping into places that should be closed off, filling every available inch of space.
As I lie in bed, the covers thrown casually off my body, I close my eyes and inhale the charged air. It sends little prickles of pleasure down my spine and through my veins, and I can feel my eyes glowing slightly behind my eyelids.
Ever since I showed up in Beckett’s living room, I’ve been able to sense the lust that hovers between the beautiful angel and my brothers. But tonight…
Tonight it spiked.
It’s roiling through the house like a thundercloud now, threatening to crack the atmosphere with electric heat.
I’m sure she was trying to be quiet, but I heard the soft footsteps as Trinity made her way down the hall and slipped into her bedroom next to mine. I heard the quiet click of the door closing. And now I hear the suppressed moans of pleasure she’s trying so hard to keep inside.
My cock is hard as steel, tenting the boxer briefs that are the only thing I wore to bed.
Fuck.
She’s in there by herself, touching herself, pleasuring herself, because she’s too frightened to ask for what she really wants. To be fair, my brothers are frightened too, and I’m beginning to think they’re right to be.
Because something about this angel is different.
I may be the personification of lust, but none of my brothers are monks themselves. We’ve existed for thousands of years, and in that time, we have had countless women. We’ve shared women between us, had long dalliances and short affairs.
But we
’ve never had… this.
The way Trinity affects my brothers is something I’ve never seen before. It goes much deeper than desire, much deeper than infatuation. They care about her.
And that’s more dangerous than any kind of carnal cravings they might have.
From the room next door, Trinity moans something softly—a name?—and my balls tighten. My eyelids drift open, and I stare up at the ceiling as I reach into my boxers and wrap my hand around myself, running my thumb over the head of my cock to spread the precum that’s gathered there. When another quiet noise penetrates the wall between our rooms, I have to work hard not to give an answering groan as I slide my fist up and down my hard length.
Her eyes.
That’s what I picture as I stroke myself, allowing lust to flow freely through my body, feeding off of Trinity’s desperate desire and sending my own right back toward her.
Her eyes are the most beautiful shade of brown, always alight with optimism and innocent curiosity. What would they look like gazing up at me as she ran her tongue up the length of my cock? As she formed a perfect O with her lips and took me inside her mouth?
Fuck, that’s hot.
My fist works faster, my hips lifting off the bed as I drive myself closer toward the edge. I’m not sure she’s ever put her mouth on a man before, and I feel a sudden powerful desire to be her first. To show her what kind of pleasure is possible. To come on those gorgeous tits and then lick her until she screams out her release. Until she forgets to try to be quiet or restrained and rides my face with complete abandon.
I could show her so many things.
Fuck, I want to.
My grip tightens, my ass clenching as I fuck my hand, and I imagine that my tight fist is the angel’s pussy. What would her eyes, those beautiful windows to her soul, look like then? As I slid inside her? As I claimed her as fully and completely as possible?
I would watch her face, taking my direction from every small change in her expression, until I made her come on my cock. Then I would make her come again and again until she was sweaty and sated with pleasure.
“Oh…”
The soft voice from the next room sounds so sweetly broken that it nearly sends me over the edge.
She’s close. I can hear it. I can feel it in the lust that swirls through the air, caressing my bare skin like soft fingers. Or feathers.
Come for me, angel, I think as my cock swells and pulses in my hand. Come for me.
I know she can’t hear me. And I know it’s not the power of my sin that makes her let out one last shuddering moan as she falls over the edge. It’s her own desire, her own pent up need finally spilling over.
And it’s that thought that does me in.
My hips jerk upward one last time as sticky, hot cum spills over my hand, coating my fingers and the inside of my boxers. I stroke myself through the release, feeling both relief and a strange sense of dissatisfaction.
Because as good as that was, it wasn’t what I really wanted.
I want more.
I want the sweet sounds Trinity makes when she comes to pour directly into my ear as she wraps her arms around me, our sweaty skin plastered together. I want to let my cock go soft inside her, sated and spent, then kiss her and run my hands over her skin until we find ourselves fucking again.
I want…
Dangerous things.
Just like my brothers. Because in the end, I’m no wiser or smarter than them.
You conflated love and lust once before, I remind myself, loosening my grip on my slowly softening dick as my other hand reaches up to brush over the scars on my upper chest, the ones on my face. And look where that got you. Don’t make that mistake again.
Lust has been responsible for heinous actions throughout humanity’s long history.
But it’s nothing compared to the horrors that have been wrought in the name of love.
When I walk into the kitchen the next morning and see Trinity, her dark complexion grows slightly flushed as she looks down quickly.
My footsteps slow.
Is it possible that she overheard me last night just as I heard her? Does she know how insane her muffled little noises drove me?
But as her furtive gaze darts around the kitchen, I realize that her flush is only growing deeper.
Ah. It’s not me, then. It’s all of us.
Whatever happened to drive the lust in this house so high last night, it’s making the tips of Trinity’s ears redden as her gaze shifts from Beckett to Knight, then to Remi, Nix, Ford, and Ryland.
Finally, her brown eyes peer up at me through her thick lashes. She looks so flustered that my first impulse is to push a wave of lust toward her, to see if I can get the thin thread of her control to break.
But to my surprise, I find myself reigning in my power, drawing some of the wild arousal out of the air and making the atmosphere slightly less thick. Trinity blinks, then draws in a deep breath and shakes her head slightly as if she’s reorganizing her thoughts.
“So, any volunteers to help me with the first challenge?” she asks, glancing around at me and my brothers again.
“I’ll go with you.”
The words are out of my mouth before I can stop them, and the angel looks up at me in surprise.
“Really?”
“Of course, really.” I cock an eyebrow, the one with the scar that cuts through it. That scar is one I’ve always particularly hated, but I showcase it now, knowing it makes me look dangerous and vicious. “Why? Don’t you think I can hold my own in a fight?”
“I—” She wrinkles her nose, something I’m starting to realize is a habit. “No, it’s not that. I just didn’t think you’d want to.”
“Of course I want to, beautiful. We all want to win this thing.”
I grab a plate and start filling it with the delicious-smelling array of food Remi has prepared. I don’t even want to know how early he got up to make all of this. Let’s just say I’m glad my sin is sex, not food.
“Um, okay.” Trinity’s gaze latches on to me as I return to the table and slide into a seat. “We won’t even know what the challenge is until we show up for today’s match, so let’s hope it has something to do with sex.”
As soon as the words are past her lips, she claps both hands over her mouth, her eyes going wide.
Nix belts out a laugh. “Shit. If it does, we’re all gonna be jealous as fuck that Sawyer was the one who volunteered first.”
Trinity’s eyes go even wider, and she looks like she wants to sink into the floor beneath her, but now Remi’s chuckling too. Knight cracks a smile, and the angel lets out a small giggle that’s muffled by her palms.
“Trust me, beautiful,” I tell her with a roguish smile, letting laughter dissipate the tension in the room. “Whatever the challenge is, I can make it about sex.”
“That’s the fuckin’ truth.” Ford grunts, shooting me an amused look. “He showed up to one of my fights a few years ago and it almost turned into a bareknuckle orgy instead of a boxing match.”
Trinity giggles again, and I shrug. “There’s a fine line between fucking and fighting. That night, everyone just realized how very fine that line is.”
There’s more laughter around the table, but then Ryland sets his coffee mug down and stands up, his back stiff. “We need to focus and get ready to head out.”
A new kind of tension settles over the room as we all finish eating quickly. Trinity looks a little queasy as she takes her last bite, and now, instead of lust I just feel nerves radiating from her. Her delicate features are set in a determined mask, and when we all congregate in the entry room fifteen minutes later, she looks like she’s prepared to march into battle.
The change in her is palpable, and I’m tempted to throw a little lust her way just to get her to relax—but once again, I hold myself back.
We head out as a united force, all seven of us gathered around the angel, as the inhabitants of the village and those who’ve traveled to watch the Blackfire Tournam
ent in person shoot us curious glances.
A large arena sits on the southern edge of the town, and I don’t know if it’s been erected specifically for this competition or if it’s a permanent fixture. Not that it matters. According to the organizer, Myron, it will serve as the starting point for all the challenges, although not all of them will remain within the confines of the stadium.
The event is well-staffed and well-organized, and once we arrive at the arena, we’re quickly split into two groups—me and Trinity in one, as competitors, and the rest of my brothers in another, as spectators.
“Be safe,” Beckett orders the angel before he and Ryland lead the others into the stands.
She stares after him with her brows slightly raised, as if she didn’t expect him to care about her safety one way or another.
I could tell her how wrong she is. Could tell her exactly how much he does care. But I keep my mouth shut as we file into the arena’s playing area with all of the other contestants. Most competitors have brought a second as the rules allow, but I see some walking into the large space alone, clearly blinded enough by overconfidence to think they don’t need backup.
I’m alert and focused, ready for battle, so I’m not sending out any tendrils of lust into the surrounding crowd—but it doesn’t matter. Heads turn as we walk, men and women alike drawn to me even though they don’t even know quite why.
Trinity notices it too, and a little line appears between her eyebrows as her gaze darts from a redheaded woman with hair that hangs past her ass to a muscular woman with tattoos and a nose ring.
“Does that happen to you everywhere you go?” Trinity asks, lifting her head to look at me. “People staring at you like… like they want to eat you?”
Her inadvertently dirty words send heat trickling down my spine. Or maybe it’s the way she seems to have puffed up a little, straightening up and glaring around us as if she’s daring anyone to get too close to me.
I shrug. “Yes. Although if I activate my powers fully, most of them will lose interest in me. They’ll be too busy trying to fuck the person nearest to them.”