Still staring into those fathomless blue depths, she reached for his ankle piece and disconnected it, lowering it softly to the floor beside the bed.
‘Now what?’ he growled, the undercurrent of anger palpable in his tone.
But she was beginning to recognise Zeke again. Finally. And she knew it was more anger at himself, at the discomfort and uncertainty he was feeling right at this moment, than it was directed at her. So it was her job to eradicate it.
He had trusted her this far, anyway, and that was all the encouragement she needed.
‘Now...’ a seductive smile pulled at the corners of her mouth ‘...we play.’
Before he could say anything more, Tia moved back up his body, and unhooked the towel, letting it fall either side of his hips, her breath catching in her chest as she finally broke eye contact and let her eyes skim down his incredible body to where he stood, so powerfully male.
She swallowed once. Twice. He was every bit as magnificent as she remembered.
Better.
And he was all hers.
It was all she could do not to claim him immediately.
Pressing her lips to his inner thighs, she worked her way, higher and higher, determined not to rush, however much she wanted otherwise. However much she had to taste him, needed to.
She jolted when he caught her upper arms with his strong hands, stopping her.
‘Tia.’ His voice was clipped, raw. ‘You don’t have to do this.’
‘This is exactly your problem, Zeke,’ she managed, her husky voice alien even to her. ‘You refuse to believe how much I want to. Even when the evidence to the contrary is right in front of you.’
And then, before he could object any further, she lowered her head and took him into her mouth.
* * *
He was dying.
There was no other way to describe it. This unparalleled pleasure that crashed over him, and all around him.
Her mouth even hotter, cleverer, wickeder than he remembered. And even more urgent than it had been in every one of the futile fantasies he’d harboured in the years since they’d been apart, even whilst he’d thought they would never be together again. As if she, too, had been waiting for this moment. As if she couldn’t get enough of him.
She licked him, tasted him, sucked him. The sweetest torture he had ever known. And he could do nothing but lie back and let her, watching her head move over him, letting his fingers tangle in that glorious mass of silken hair of hers. Letting her have her way. Letting her do what she wanted to him.
Tia. His Tia.
Claiming him as though she had every right to do so. Turning him inside out. He was building fast. Maybe too fast. Rolling through him like a tornado, a vortex that he couldn’t hope to control.
Without warning, she moved her hands to circle his base, her teeth grazing him with the exact amount of pressure before taking him deeper again into her mouth, and Zeke couldn’t curb it any longer.
It was like being strapped to a slingshot ride that Tia had suddenly released, leaving him catapulting into space. Crying out her name and who knew what else, as he was shot into a million glorious pieces.
When he came back to himself she was still astride him, watching him. Undisguised victory in those stunning, sparkling eyes. A smirk tugging at one side of her mouth.
‘Witch,’ he breathed when he could finally speak.
‘Why? Because I’ve just exposed your claims that you have no feelings for the lies they are?’
He could have hurt her. He could have told her that sex and feelings weren’t the same thing at all. But suddenly, he didn’t want to. He didn’t want to dance this power tango any more. He didn’t want to fight. He just wanted her.
His Tia.
‘Because you have me under your spell,’ he muttered, snaking his hands out to hold her as he twisted on the bed so that she was on her back and he was over her. ‘Just like you always did.’