He hadn’t pushed her into obeying him, but she wanted to. She had that weird proclivity she couldn’t quite overcome. She found it strange that she didn’t have the same thing in other areas of her life, only when it came to sex, and especially when it came to Absinthe, a thousand times stronger when it came to him.
“You have a problem with what I just asked of you?” The question came low, no judgment, no animosity or anger, just a simple query.
She shook her head. She didn’t. She stood uncertainly in the middle of the room, waiting, but he just walked to the door that he’d told her earlier led to the closet. He leaned one hip against it and folded his arms across his chest, his eyes on her. Her mouth went dry. Her heart did that strange acceleration she found promoted a thundering through her body that led straight to her sex.
Her hands shook as she shimmied out of her jeans and underwear. His eyes drifted over her body as she removed her top and bra. She looked around a little helplessly as if she didn’t know what to do with her clothes.
“There’s a hamper in the other room. I like the bathwater very hot, miledi.”
She lifted her gaze to his and her entire body flushed with heat. The lines in his face were carved with pure carnal desire, all for her. He was completely focused on her. He had a way of looking at her she’d never experienced with any other man and she couldn’t quite explain. It was as if when his crystal eyes moved over her body, dwelling on her breasts and drifting farther down, brushing her skin with those strange blue wicked flames, she felt them licking at her skin. He seemed to see right through her, branding her bones, claiming her, until she felt so completely his, she didn’t know how she could explain it to herself let alone to someone else. He was in her mind, moving there, stroking and caressing, whispering even, until she wanted to please him and do anything he asked of her.
Absinthe had power in him. So much it shocked her. She’d witnessed that power when he spoke to Adrik and yet she’d put herself in his hands. She should be afraid of him. She was intimidated. She was standing in the middle of the room naked, without a single weapon, knowing he was a trained assassin and had a voice that could command someone to do his bidding, yet she was putting herself in his hands. She began trembling, her entire body shaking almost to the point she could barely stand. What was wrong with her?
Absinthe straightened slowly, walked over to her with his easy, measured step and stopped right in front of her. He leaned down, framed her face in both hands and took her mouth. Instantly there was an explosion low and wicked. Flames leapt. Fire rushed through her veins like some terrible drug. She wound her arms around his neck, needing to hang on to something solid when he was transporting her to a place she hadn’t known existed.
He lifted his head. “You’re safe with me, Scarlet. You’re always safe with me. We’re going to make good partners.”
She could get lost in his eyes. They were so strange, really, like two crystals that could see inward, not outward. She liked that he used the word partner. She wanted to be considered a partner. She was more than a plaything in a bedroom. If she gave herself to him of her own free will and did as he asked sexually, that was one kind of partnership. Outside of that, she wanted to be considered on equal footing at all times, otherwise they would never work.
“Keep giving me your trust.”
“You haven’t said what you need from me sexually other than you want to be able to tell me what to do and that sometimes your club might be around us when you do that.” She felt the breath he took and that gave her pause. He was worried she wouldn’t like what he would ask of her.
He took another deep breath. “I know, baby. Some things, in our bedroom, might be difficult for you, and I’ll understand if you can’t do them for me.”
But he would still need them. That was unspoken between them. She got that. He dropped his arms and turned away from her, but she caught the expression on his face and for the first time, the real concern in his mind. He was definitely worried that she would leave him over his sexual needs, whatever they were. Absinthe was reluctant to disclose them to her until he had pulled her in deeper.
She contemplated that while she ran the bathwater. His hesitancy gave her more confidence than ever. That glimpse into his mind actually let her see just how much he really wanted her. All along she had been certain a man like him couldn’t possibly really want her or fall in love with her because—well—she wasn’t that lovable. In spite of what he’d told her about grief, she still was that seventeen-year-old in an adult prison hearing that her beloved sister had committed suicide and her mother and stepfather had followed suit, leaving her alone. She’d been grief stricken, horrified, terrified of being alone. And she’d wondered why she hadn’t been enough for her mother to live for. Now, it seemed, she was enough for Absinthe. More than enough. For him, she was everything.