Lexine, this is very, very bad.
Chapter Fifteen
Jett wandered around the winery building. The place wasn’t the best choice for Lexine, away from the rest of the colony and so near the woods humans could sneak through. Granted, the archangels were just as isolated, but they had twenty-four-hour protection. Lexine did not.
He suppressed a growl. The place made her smile and lightened her step. Her excitement as she’d spoken about winemaking had been infectious. Instead of dragging her back to a safer place, he’d find a way to make the location more secure.
A hundred security cameras, a twenty-foot wall, and a moat would be a good start.
As Lexine rushed up the stairs, the paper around the bundle in her arms shifted, revealing black lace that, if worn, wouldn’t conceal a damned thing. She paused, met his gaze, and grinned before disappearing. He stared after her, frozen in place.
Suddenly, the last thing he wanted to do was go out. He didn’t want to dive any deeper into his past for now. He wanted Lexine his arms.
Would she be willing to go further than they had yes-terday?
He climbed the stairs, but before the room above came into view, he tapped his knuckles against the wall. “May I see?”
Part of him meant the room. Most of him meant the black lace.
“One second.”
He stood on the stairs, listening as her footsteps padded across the floor, then silence. What was she doing? Agonizing seconds turned into minutes of torture, until finally she called out again. “Okay.”
He climbed the remaining stairs. Light from a golden sunrise invaded through the picture window and spilled across the floor. Lexine stood in the middle of the room, her near-black hair loose from her usual braid, brushed to a shine, and pulled forward over her right shoulder, leaving a view of the tantalizing curve of her neck. Thin black lace veiled her body, revealing more than it concealed, tinged with gold from the sunrise.
“What do you think?” Though her fingers curled in nervous fists, she twisted at the waist, making the lace ripple around her hips.
“I’m afraid I can’t think at all.”
“That sounds like a good thing.”
“Debatable.” He halved the distance between them and circled her. Taking in the view from behind, which featured the bare skin of her back and only the thinnest scrap of lace over her bottom, he said, his voice thick, “I think it’s a very bad thing. I’m not going to be able to behave myself.”
“Well, I didn’t put this on to encourage you to behave.”
He strode forward and kissed her nape, his hands closing over her hips. The heat of her skin through the thin veil seared his hands, driving him to get closer. He reached around and touched her belly, molding himself to her back.
Her head tipped to rest on his shoulder, and he kissed the exposed side of her neck. He squeezed her body, needing her closer, needing to have her the way he’d envisioned when Minnie had taken away all his worries, all his baggage. He wanted to love her until the world faded away with his own actions.
She turned around in his arms, unzipped his jacket, and stripped him down to his skintight black shirt. Her face paled as her gaze wandered over him. Unlike when they’d hiked out to his camp in the woods, when he’d only taken a few items, his full arsenal of weaponry clung to his body. Blades on his arms and hips. Throwing knives sheathed around his chest and his middle. A gun strapped to his back.
A protector and a killer. She knew that, but what did she really think, seeing him this way? Her pulse ticked at a rapid pace at the base of her throat. Did she fear him? He shut his eyes, seeking out the place in his mind that he so often tried to ignore.
There. The intrusive sense of emotions in his head that weren’t his own. Not as strong as with the archangels, but discernible.
No fear, not even a hint of it. Instead, a thrill. A shadow of guilt.
“You like seeing me decked out like this.” He opened his eyes and studied her face. “But you don’t think you should.”
A blush rose to her cheeks, and she dropped her gaze.
“Too late to be shy.”
She lifted her chin. “I respect what you do.”
“I appreciate that, but tell me all of it, Lex.”
Her lips compressed into a scowl. He lowered his head and kissed her, forcing those lips open again with his tongue. “Tell me.”
“You make me feel safe.”
“And?”
She squirmed. “And it’s an insane turn-on, okay?”
He chuckled. “Good.”
“That doesn’t bother you?”
“It would bother me if I had to worry about frightening you. This is what I’m trying to become, after all.”
She put her hands on him then, her fingers making hot trails down his chest, between the throwing blades to the hem of his pants. “It’s not the weapons. It’s the wielder.”
He lifted her at the waist and set her down on the edge of the bed. Kneeling before her, he unfastened the throwing blades first, then the gun, then the fighting knives, and set them all on the floor. He removed the smaller blades from his arms last.
“That all of it?” Her voice held false shock as she smiled at him.
He scratched his chin in mock consideration, stood, and pulled the additional set of throwing blades from his boots. “I think that about covers it.”
She laughed.
He pulled off his shirt, watching her watch him. Leaning back on her elbows, she rubbed her legs together and fidgeted with the blanket. Her large amber eyes dominated her face and wisps of her black hair fell across her cheek. He couldn’t imagine a more beautiful female.
Plenty of striking women lived in the colony. None of them drew him in as Lexine did.
Flames coating her hands, she sat up and pulled him forward to stand between her knees. The additional heat from the fire sank into his skin as she touched him. She added her lips to the caress as she worked over his chest and stomach.
He’d been touched a hell of a lot in his life. Never before Lex had he enjoyed it. A light growl filled his throat as her hands traveled lower.
She got to her feet, one hand at the button of his pants, the other at the small of his back.
A belated thought invaded the moment. “I don’t have any protection.”
“There are no diseases in the demon population, and I can’t get pregnant unless you bite me. A male’s venom in the bloodstream is needed to make a female fertile.” She arched an eyebrow. “And you can’t bite me, anyway, remember?”
“I see.” The words escaped his lips in a heavy sigh as she released the button and the zipper.
Her lips curved in a wicked smile. “I might bite you, however.”
He kicked off his boots, shoved his pants and boxers off. Pulling the black lace over her head and seeing her body fully revealed, he could barely breathe. He guided her down onto the bed with him.
…
Lexine’s back hit the cool quilt as Jett straddled her. He bent, licking and kissing her throat, working his way down to her breasts. When he covered her left nipple with his mouth, she cried out.
He’d admitted yesterday that he was a virgin, but he certainly didn’t fumble around like one. No surprise. He wasn’t the fumbling sort, not in any aspect of his life that she’d seen.
He switched to the other breast and his fingers found her most sensitive flesh. She arched against him when he found the right spot, and he teased her until she struggled. He chuckled, a deep, husky sound, but otherwise ignored her protests and continued with his ministrations. With his knees on either side of her hips and his free hand on her shoulder, he held her down without effort.
Well, he’d asked for it. She lifted her head. Kissing him halfway between his wrist and his elbow, she scraped her fangs over the tender underside of his arm. She increased the pressure, piercing the skin the slightest bit. Pausing, she waited a moment for the venom to numb the spot. Then, she bit down, delivering what she knew to be a heady buzz, like the glow after doing shots of fine alcohol.