I know.” The two words ghosted against the skin of her neck, sending goose bumps down her spine. “But I want to touch you. I want to put my hands all over you. I want to kiss every inch of you and taste you as you come apart in my arms. I want to feel you wrapped around me with nothing but my name on your lips and the sheets a tangled mess beneath us. I want…” He exhaled heavily into her ear. “I want. I want. I want!

The fiery tickle of outrage burned up her throat. “How the hell would you know that when you never gave me a chance?”Something dark and scorching flickered behind his eyes. “Because no other girl has ever made me want to forget all my own rules for them.

A soft mist blew around them. Raindrops glistened in his hair, shimmering under the pale glow of the light post. His eyes were shadowed beneath wispy fringes, but the silver in them glinted like pools of liquid mercury. Her breath caught. It must have made a sound because his fingers tightened. His shaky exhale whispered across her face.“This,” he whispered so quietly she almost didn’t hear him. “Is why you are so bad for me.

His eyes were twin flakes of ember floating into the night from a roaring inferno. “I won’t let anything happen to you. No matter what I have to do, I will keep you safe.

I didn't ask to be born!""No, but I asked." He was breathing hard. His eyes hard and glinting with a fire that burned straight through me. "I asked for you every day of my life!