All air leaves my lungs as he sinks inside me, stretching me to the point of pain. And I want more. I want him inside me all the way.

His strong hands hold me up easily, lowering me slowly, ever so slowly on top of his cock. Delicious friction makes me pant. His piercings, I realize, the small metal balls stroking me deep inside.

He pushes in deeper, and the pressure in my core ratchets up so fast I cry out. It’s like a wildfire is spilling in my veins, setting me on fire. Another push, and I’m hovering on the razor-sharp edge of pain-pleasure. Too big. Too much. He’s too much.

Then he rolls his hips, sliding out a little, sliding back inside, and suddenly it’s perfect. He’s just what I need. Pleasure wins out, and I whimper as it blazes through me in a hot wave.

He bends his head, licking my nipple, then the other. He sucks on it, and small explosions start inside me. I can’t think.

After a moment, he draws back. His eyes are thin slits as he watches me, a focused expression on his face. Ropey muscles shift in his arms as he lifts and lowers me again, his breath coming out in a hiss. A vein thrums in his jaw. I put my hands on his chest, a safe place, then decide to lift his T-shirt and touch his bare skin.

Heat shoots through me at the sight of his hard chest, the defined six pack and, oh God, his small pierced nipples. I tug on one, and he groans, his head falling back, his cock flexing inside me.

I gasp and steady myself with my other hand on his chest, because I feel as if the world is tilting. God, pleasure spreads through me, spears me like a blade, and I can’t remember anything like it ever before. Can’t remember moaning like that, moving as if I can’t stop if my life depended on it, chasing my orgasm—and I can feel it starting deep inside me, so deep I know I’ll scream when it hits.

Oh shit.

He’s lifting and lowering me faster now, but he falters when I tweak his piercing again. He’s panting harshly, and I move my hand to the other small nipple. I hit the ball at the end of the bar, making it vibrate, and Zane chokes on a cry, his cock swelling and jerking inside me.

I do scream then, as I come, and the world goes white.

Zane grunts and slams me down harder, triggering more pleasure, and then he tenses, his hips lifting me up. He curses, teeth gritted, and lets out a loud groan as he rocks into me. I can feel him come, his cock pulsing inside me, and I clench again.

Wow. Can someone die of pleasure?

Zane rocks his hips a few more times, his face scrunched up, and then sprawls back onto the pillows, gulping air into his lungs. My hand is still on his chest, and I flick his piercing once more, just to hear him moan.

It’s strangled, and his cock twitches inside me. I gasp.

“Damn, girl.” Zane mutters and slaps my hand away from his nipple. A crooked grin lifts one side of his mouth, though, and his face looks more peaceful than it has in a while. “You trying to kill me?”

“I could ask you the same,” I breathe.

He slides his hands up my ribcage, then around my back and pulls me to him. “Stay,” he whispers, and I begin to nod, because it’s turning into yet another ritual between us, when he clarifies. “Stay here, until you find a place.”

My heart hammers in my chest. I want to ask him if he’s sure, if he’s thought this through, but instead I snap my mouth shut. Am I crazy? This is what I want.

He holds me close, and I lie on his chest, listening to his heartbeat, my hands resting on his shoulders, and I smile. I feel content. I feel happy. So happy I can’t even remember what scared me so much earlier tonight.

* * *

I’m in Zane’s bed. He’s propped up on his elbow, his hand stroking my back, and I can feel his body heat, so close. Close, but not quite touching. It lulls me to sleep, and I drift off, feeling safe and strangely at ease.

Next time I open my eyes, the sky is lightening outside the window, and I’m alone in bed. I roll onto my back, checking, just in case I missed a six-foot-tall guy lying next to me.

Nope. Zane isn’t here. I wonder if he even slept in the bed with me…

Good God, I’m in his bed!

The thought hits me like a snowball out of hell, and I sit up, suddenly wide awake. Frigging hell, I’ve slept in Zane’s bed, at his side—after some of the hottest sex of my life. Zane Madden, who doesn’t kiss and doesn’t bring chicks home, has done plenty of both with me.

And he asked me to stay.

This last thought is sweet and makes me close my eyes and smile. There’s a warm feeling in my chest, in my mind, when I think about him. Bad boy, melt-your-panties hot Zane wants me to stay. The combination of scorching sex, bad attitude and his softer, troubled side are driving me to my knees.

I’m still naked. My clothes are strewn on the floor, my skirt and blouse where I dropped them last night before crawling into bed. I grab my clothes and pull them on, but when I look for my underwear, I don’t see it anywhere.

Frowning, I glance around one more time. Nope, can’t see my panties or my bra.

However, I’m in Zane’s bedroom, and I just have to snoop around a little. I walk to the shelves by the window and trail my fingers over the few books stacked there. They are big, coffee table books. Tattoo Design, Drawing, Art over the Centuries, The Art of Dreaming.

Dreaming? I pull it out carefully. It’s a small book, a paperback, unlike the others. ‘What Dreams Mean’ the front cover declares, and I thumb through the pages. Symbolism of dreams. Recurrent dreams. Nightmares and the subconscious. Dreams and memories.

This chapter has a bookmark clip. ‘Is it just a dream or a real memory?’ the chapter starts, and I frown.

I remember hands on me, he said. Does he dream about them, too, I wonder?

Suddenly ashamed for going through his stuff, I put the book back. I’m about to turn around and go look for Zane, when a couple of photos taped to the wall catch my attention.

They’re actually print-outs on glossy paper, the image kind of grainy. One of them is a group photo taken at a party. It takes me a moment to recognize Zane in it. Younger, his hair falling in his eyes, a bright green, an arm around a boy scowling at the camera. I think I recognize those pale wolf’s eyes: Asher. Best friends forever, huh?

The blond girl next to him has to be Tessa, and she’s not looking at the camera at all. She’s staring at a broad-shouldered boy with a drink in his hand and a grin on his handsome face. Dylan. He’s leaning on the shoulder of a blond, slender boy, who must be Rafe.

Tyler is missing and so is Audrey. I wonder why.

The other pictures are harder to figure out. It’s a boy and a girl, holding hands. I’m pretty sure the boy is Zane, but he’s young and skinny, his hair closely cropped, his gaze wide and dark. I lean closer, studying him. Hard to reconcile that fragile boy with the strong man he is today, but the tilt of his eyes gives him away. The girl is taller than him, obviously older by a few years. She’s smiling.

In the next photo it’s them again, only this time the girl has her arms around the young Zane, and this time he’s smiling, too. Something tells me this must be his sister.

I hear a noise from somewhere inside the apartment and freeze. I wouldn’t want Zane catching me staring at his things, so I pad out of the bedroom. The divine smell of coffee leads me to the kitchen, and I stand at the door, peering inside.

The kitchen window faces east, and sunlight illuminates a patch on the floor, bathing the room in golden light. The cupboards are old-fashioned, white with curling handles, the table round and small, littered with dirty glasses and mugs.

Zane is sitting with his back to me, reading something on a tablet at the table. He’s only dressed in a pair of khaki shorts, his back bare and beautiful, his ribcage flaring from narrow hips into those broad shoulders.

Well, bare in a manner of speaking. Most of his skin is covered in vibrant color and bold lines.

Oh my. Another dragon, a black serpentine monster covering his back, clawing at his ribs. Its long tongue and curling horns mesh with colorful flowers and insects that spill onto his arms and wrap around them in those striking sleeves I noticed on him from the start.

My naked feet are silent as I stalk closer, examining the designs. Then I really see them for the first time.

The scars.

I mean, I’ve touched them briefly, though in the moment, I barely felt them. Burn scars, Zane said. White round shapes, scattered all over his broad back, barely visible among the swirls of color. One of them is the dragon’s eye, the other a pearl held in wicked claws. So many burns. Some are clustered together, like fairy circles.

Something else catches my eye, and I bend closer. Artfully hidden in the swirling tattoos of spiders and red flowers, I see long, thin scars, as if done by a knife.

“What the hell?” Zane twists around and grabs me, hauling me back, so I smash into the table edge. “Dakota?”

Ow. I rub my hip where it collided with the table and prop my ass on the edge. “Sorry.”

He pushes his tablet away. A muscle twitches in his jaw. His mouth is pressed in a thin line.

This is a guy who doesn’t like surprises, I remember. Who likes being in control, because it keeps his demons at bay. I think again of the scars and his space-out moments and realize again how very little I know about his past—or his present.

“I read about your tattoo.” He observes me under lowered lashes, his dark eyes sharp and intent.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. The Death’s Head Hawkmoth, or deathmoth for short. Like your group. It’s supposed to bring bad luck and death. Why the hell did you choose it?”

I say nothing.

He leans closer, his eyes narrowed to slits. “What aren’t you telling me?”

“It’s just a tattoo,” I mutter. “Why do you have spiders and dragons all over you?”

He shrugs. “Good luck charms. They protect me.”

“And my deathmoth protects me from death.”

“Seriously?”

“Sort of sympathetic magic, you see? Wear death on your skin, and death can’t touch you.”

And I don’t know why I’m telling him this, only that I should stop, right now.

His dark brows draw together. “Had any close encounters with death lately?”

“No.” And that’s the truth. It wasn’t lately. It was a long time ago. I see his shoulders relax. “Why so interested in my back all of a sudden?”

“I spent a good part of the night looking at your back.”

Warmth seeps into my cheeks. “Is that so? Why?”

“Couldn’t sleep.”

Bad dreams? I want to ask.

But then his hand lands on my leg, above the knee, and slides upward. His palm is warm and callused, and it feels good, so good I forget my question.

That’s when I remember one small detail and try to slap his hand away. “Wait.”

His palm presses inside my thigh. His lips lift in a grin. “What?”

“It’s just that, I couldn’t find…” My panties. He’s holding them in his other hand. My panties and my bra. “Zane…”

“Uh-uh. The first rule in this apartment is no underwear.” He winks, the silver hoops in his brow glinting.

“What are you talking about? Did your other roommates go around without underwear?”

“You’re a guest, not a roommate. For guests, the rules are different.”

My breath hitches when his hand moves upward. “So you steal the underwear off every girl you bring here?”

“I don’t bring girls here,” he whispers, his eyes half-lidded. He licks those dangerously sexy lips. “Just you.”

His hand inches up and up between my legs, and my brain is shutting down. “So you made this rule just for me?”

“Damn right.” He nudges my leg, and his voice goes huskier. “Open up for me.”

He leaves me no option as he pulls his chair closer and places his hands on my thighs, pushing them apart, exposing me. My skirt rides high up, bunching around my legs, and I shiver as the cool air hits me where I’m already hot and aching for him.

His dark eyes hooded, he stares at my exposed core and gives me a wicked smile. He passes his tongue over his lips in a slow slide that makes me catch my breath. God, this boy is sexy as sin.

“Beautiful,” he rasps, his voice smoky with desire, and tingles rush through me, prickling my skin and tightening my nipples to painful points. “Perfect.”

Nobody has done this to me before—stared at me like that. I try to close my legs, but he won’t let me.

“I want to ink an arrow here,” he strokes the inside of my thigh, making me dizzy with want. “Pointing to your sweet pussy with the words ‘eat me.’” He gives me a lazy grin, and I can feel myself clenching just from his voice.

“That’s from Alice,” I gasp as he leans in and blows, making me clench harder. “Alice in Wonderland.”

“I’ll show you wonderland,” he mutters.

Pulling my legs over his shoulders, he buries his face between my legs and gives a long, deep lick. His pierced tongue strokes me like a living flame, the barbell dragging along my seam. He plays with my clit, licking and sucking, until I explode in pleasure, delicious spasms shaking me from head to toe.

Holy shit.

He gives me one last, lingering lick that makes me moan helplessly and pulls back. He’s breathing hard, and the lazy grin is back, the one that says he’s enjoying himself and is ready to up the stakes.

Letting my legs down, he stands up, towering over me. Even in my brain’s short-circuited state, I feel my mouth going dry.

Christ, the boy is a god. Must be. Those abs are just divine. Muscles ripple across his chest as he reaches for his fly to undo his shorts. He pushes them down, and whoa. He’s rock hard, and although I’ve seen him once before, somehow his cock looks larger this time as he leans over me.

His hands trap mine against the table top. The controlled power in those corded arms and muscled chest takes my breath away.

“Today we do this my way,” he says and releases me to take out a condom and pull it on.

I want to tell him I’m back on the pill—because I want him to come inside me, I want to feel him one hundred percent. But I can’t speak, too enthralled by his voice, his handsome face, his powerful body. His cock.

Besides, it sounds fair. Anything sounds fair right now, just as long as he doesn’t stop.

And he doesn’t. He presses himself between my legs, stroking me with his thumb until I think I’ll come again, and then he replaces his thumb with his hard-on, pushing into me all the way.

I arch off the table, struggling to swallow a moan and failing. He feels so good. His hands are back on mine, trapping them on either side of my head, and he starts to move, long, steady strokes that make my senses spin.

Wrapping my legs around his slim hips, I lift myself, and the angle changes, catapulting me into such pleasure I want to weep. My body is moving of its own volition, lifting and grinding against him.

So much pleasure. I need… need to hold on to him, kiss him. I struggle to free my hands, but he doesn’t let go. He seems to sense my need, though, and bends his head, finding my lips.

“It’s me,” he whispers, before he plunges his tongue into my mouth. It occurs to me then that we aren’t doing it his way, not really. We’re face-to-face, and he’s kissing the hell out of me. Yet he’s holding me down. He’s in charge. It’s a compromise, I realize, and I bet he knows it, too.

It makes me want to smile, but then he moves again, thrusting deep inside me, bringing on a new onslaught of pleasure that makes my toes curl.

Oh God, dammit. I can’t… can’t remember what I was thinking.

He licks at my lips, thrusts faster, fastens his mouth back on mine and does something with his hips that sends me tumbling head over heels into a world-shattering orgasm. He stops my cries with his mouth as my body bows off the table. I come again, seizing around his length, my whole body going off like a firework.

Holy crap, Batman. Holy shit. This is unreal, this… I’ve read about girls having orgasms like this, where your mind goes boom, and your body shakes, and it’s like a rollercoaster going off the rails, but I always figured it was just fiction. Aftershocks rush through me, and I writhe as he plunges into me again. He bites on my lower lip, and I feel my eyes roll up in my head.

He releases my lips and bows his head, his arms trembling. A great shudder runs through his frame, and his eyes scrunch shut as he drives into me hard and deep and stills for a long moment.

“Fuck,” he hisses, then, “Dakota, I’m…” His mouth falls open, and he comes hard, his cock jerking inside me, triggering more aftershocks.

Hot damn.

I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from moaning as he thrusts again, once, twice, his face twisting with pleasure. He buries his face in my neck, breathing heavily, his hips still moving. He sinks his teeth lightly in the juncture between my neck and shoulder, and damn if I don’t I clench around him again so that we both groan.

“Goddamn.” He’s still sprawled over me, still pulsing inside me, his hands still on mine, his lips pressed to my neck. “Holy fucking shit.”

I feel him grin on my skin. The world is perfect right now. His hold on me relaxes, and I lift my arms, lacing them around his neck.

Oh shit, I have the time to think right before he jerks back, pulling out of me, and takes a stumbling step away. His eyes are wide.

“Fuck,” he whispers. “Fuck.”

I want to beat myself upside the head for my carelessness. I promised him. No touching his back during sex. I promised I wouldn’t, and I just did.

“Zane…”

He shakes his head, pulls up his shorts and strides out of the kitchen.

What have I done?