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  He tweaked the nub, tugged and pulled and pressed it. She exploded, spasms bursting inside her body and rocking her with shudders.

  For a long moment after, she hung limp, the ropes digging into her wrists as she let the weight of her body rest there. She whimpered when he slowly withdrew the scepter, her body mourning its loss. She could hear her own pants, each breath more strained than the last, and stared at the floor when she spoke next.

  “I want you, Gabriel,” she whispered, so softly she might have only thought it. “So much it scares me.”

  Time stood at a standstill as her words hung in the air between them. He moved a step back, seeking to put space between them while all she longed for was nearness. As she dragged her gaze upward, she saw him set his scepter down on the ground, noticed a spot of moistness in his pants, and the wild, tortured look in his eyes.

  “Where did you hear that name?”

  She couldn’t answer him, and she was too breathless to even try. His hands curled tightly at his sides, and she felt the heavy ropes loosen around her, then slither down to the floor.

  Her arms fell limp at her sides, and when her body sagged, he quickly caught her. He seemed to want only to steady and push her away, but then he made a strange, choking sound, and an arm went around her waist; she found herself pressed so firmly against him there wasn’t a single inch of her front which wasn’t touching his. It felt so heavenly her hands quickly fisted around his shirt, locking her in position.

  She could feel his heart beat fast against her breast, and when he rested his jaw on top of her head, she felt his rapid, haggard breaths stirring a few tendrils of her hair. His body felt so very hot and real against hers; she didn’t remember ever being this close to anyone. Being held like this.

  She didn’t notice when his hands fell to his sides, she only felt his touch as he took her wrists in each of his hands and slowly began to massage them. She watched him dazedly, an inexplicable emotion crowding her heart.

  “Gabriel,” she uttered, luxuriating in the taste of his name on her lips, her tongue. His dark head was bent as he smoothed his thumbs over the red marks. Just seeing him debilitated her, filled her body with a need so fierce it was overpowering. “Gabriel, please.”

  “Fuck!” he cried as he jerked her, shoved her back against the rocky wall, pinning her hands at her sides. “I tremble at the sight of you,” he whispered savagely, his face ravaged with need, his eyes glowing with an unholy light. “I cannot think of anything except…taking you, your body.” He was ravenous as his mouth crashed down on hers. His tongue plundered inside her, greedily thrusting through her parted lips.

  He devoured her with his mouth, nipping and sucking her lips, then the skin on her jaw, her ear, her neck, her shoulder. Had she not been as desperate, to be kissed and touched and felt, his bold hunger might have scared her. But she welcomed it, felt it inside her, that same unbearable need to know all of him, every secret part, every tiny detail.

  Except for the visions and the time with Kevin, Stella had never been touched by a man. Not like this. Not in her life.

  All her senses were attuned to him, and she felt as if all the life in the universe were gathering inside her.

  She trembled, suddenly wanting to rip his clothes off and feel every scorching part of his body. Her hands tugged at his shirt as his mouth came up to hers, lapping at her lips. She latched onto his mouth, sucking his tongue deeper into her warmth, hungry and starved for him in a way she could not comprehend. His fingers brushed over her hands as he pulled away, grabbed his shirt and yanked it off, and then quickly worked to remove his trousers.

  She didn’t have time to see him, for the instant he was naked, his bare flesh was flattened to her own, her nipples knowing the little hairs on his chest, his throbbing sex tightly pressing against hers. She undulated against him, coaxing him to take her hot, wanton body.

  His hands squeezed her ass, holding her still as he ground his rigid length into her pelvis, his lips skimming up her jaw and to her ear.

  “Let me eat you,” he said roughly. “I’m starved for a taste of you.”

  He was between her thighs in a second, draping her legs over his shoulders, bracing her back against the wall.

  His fingers pried through the little hairs, opening her lips to him, making her gasp when he bent his head and used his tongue to eat her.

  She screamed and sank her fingers in his hair, hearing the loud echo of her cries come back to her as his tongue drifted lower and speared into her pussy, his fingers keeping her wide open.

  His hungered groan caressed her sex muscles as he drew her cream into his mouth, and he seemed to savor each lick, each taste, each whimper he coaxed out of her.

  She rolled her hips against his face but found no comfort, only more ache, more desperation, and more need to be stroked there.

  Disentwining her legs from his shoulders, he came up, cupping the back of her knees and guiding her legs around him.

  “Take me inside you.” Gabriel’s head dipped, his mouth open, moving down her neck as he twirled his tongue over her skin. His hands gripped the sides of her thighs, holding her legs around him as he pressed the head of his shaft to her cleft.

  She gripped him by the hair and pulled him back to meet her gaze. “I want you in my mouth…”

  “Later.” He nipped her lower lip. “Fuck me now. Milk me. Now.”

  His hips pushed, and she gasped, his penetration fast and complete as his cock lodged itself deeply in her sheath. Her head fell forward, and she latched her teeth onto the skin between his neck and shoulder. She bit him, her hands spreading on his back before she dug her nails into his flesh.

  “Gabriel.”

  “I said fuck me,” he told her. “You wanted my body. You have it. Now fuck me.”

  He clutched her face with his hands and forced her head back, his thumbs pressing her lower lip, pulling it open before he lowered his mouth to hers.

  She moaned into his mouth, welcoming the plundering thrusts of his tongue. He took his fill and drew back to look at her, dipping his thumb inside her mouth. She sucked on it, ran her tongue along the salty pad while she pushed her hips against his. His penis pulsed inside her, thick and long and powerful.

  Stella rode him, gliding her hands along his shoulders, down to the muscled pecs and the tiny dots of his nipples.

  He hissed when she rubbed the tiny peaks under her thumbs, and he began to fuck her in earnest, a harsh, rampant pounding of his hips that made her head bob and her cries tear from her chest. She felt the pinnacle in her womb, closed her eyes, and focused on taking him in, taking him deeper, clenching around him and squeezing him until he exploded inside her. He arched his neck with a roar, plunging up to the brim. His dick pulsated inside her, blasting a string of warm semen and flooding her with her own release. She clutched him when it came, her eyes blinded but open, her lips parting in a mute cry as her body shuddered.

  Undone, she sagged against him, breathing hard. Gabriel held her for a minute, then pulled back to look at her, a spark of yearning flickering in his eyes before he groaned and pulled away, avoiding her gaze.

  Stella froze, startled by his abrupt leaving, her stomach suddenly caving in on itself as she stared at his broad back.

  “Is something wrong?” she asked with a tinge of dread.

  His head turned, only partway, but she could make out his profile, and he appeared devastated.

  She reached out to touch his shoulder, settling her hand on top of it. “I don’t understand.”

  He stared off into the darkness. “I’ve just damned myself to a lifetime of hell.”

  The words were a puzzle to her, but felt like daggers to her heart. Why would he have damned himself to hell because of sharing this moment with her? Stella thought it had been wonderful, the best thing to happen in her boring, uneventful life.

  As if he read her thoughts, he turned to face her, and for the first time ever, she thought he looked vulnerable. Neither his size, nor the
empowering, palpable strength in him could conceal the hurt in his face, in the depths of his eyes. “She’s not coming back now.”

  And as she heard those words, it finally dawned on her.

  His promise. His vow. He’d broken it.

  “You love her. You’ve been waiting for her all along.” It wasn’t a question. Stella knew it, could somehow feel the wrenching pain she’d caused. It was her fault, of course. Her sudden, inexplicable neediness. Her lust. She’d damned him with it.

  She might as well have shot him.

  Oh, how utterly more despicable could she be?

  Her voice trembled, a knot in her throat almost clogging her words. “Faith wanted to come back. I know she did, and…oh, God, what have I done?”

  “Why do you tell me this now?” He shook his head, locks of raven black hair brushing over his forehead. “How can you know about her?”

  Her body was shaking so hard she could barely stay upright. “She talks to me. I have dreams…I see things, her memories. I think she wants to come to you. I think she was asking for my help, and instead…”

  “Stella,” he said in a low, hard voice. “It. Is. Not. Your. Fault.”

  But she hardly paid attention to his words, because, of course, it was her fault. If she hadn’t been so wanton…“Yes, it is!”

  “It’s not your fault, Stella,” he repeated, reaching out to her even as she stepped sideways to avoid him.

  “I told you,” she began with a voice perilously close to breaking, “if you gave me your body, I’d give you mine.”

  He was silent, his hand reaching out to her and again being avoided by her. Taking another step backward, she swallowed the lump in her throat and gathered the courage to meet his gaze. “Take it.”

  His eyes widened. What?

  “I said take it.”

  He frowned angrily. Stop it.

  “No,” she said flatly. “Summon her back. Use your magic, use my body, it’s yours. Use it and bring her back.”

  Gabriel’s hands balled at his sides, a muscle twitching in his jaw. Shut up, Stella.

  She felt her body start to shake. “You want to do it. Don’t pretend you don’t, and I want you to. I do!” She felt so lonely with Faith inside her, haunted by her horrible memories and her dreadful past. If Faith wasn’t happy, Stella never would be. She knew it now. She wasn’t giving her life to anyone when it had never even been her own in the first place. “I’m not doing this to be noble. I just can’t stand it.” She pines away for you in my mind, and I feel like I pine for you too, and you’ll never be mine, ever!

  His face was twisted with rage, sparks burning in his eyes. “Stop this,” he said, that low hiss quivering with withheld power.

  But she was deaf to him, to his words, and instead she spread her arms apart, tears stinging in her eyes. “Take me out of this body and call her in please.”

  “Never.”

  “Do it.”

  “Shut the fuck up, Stella!”

  “Do it, damn you!”

  With an unearthly roar that filled her ears, he lunged at her, red-hot rage flashing in his eyes as he spread his palms open and covered her face with them. Words spilled out of his lips, dark and poetic, like a foreign chant brimming with magic, and then his spell took hold of her, flinging her into blackness.

  Chapter Four

  “You’re coming to, thank God!”

  Stella stared up at the lines of worry on her mother’s face, and then quickly sat up on the bed, gazing around at her small, cozy bedroom.

  “What am I doing here,” she asked, “in my room?” Damn you, Gabriel, you stupid, hotheaded man.

  He’d damned well better hear that!

  Her mother took one hand in both of hers, brown-green eyes just like Stella’s staring back at her in concern. Stella hated making her mother worry. She hated how the dear woman’s fretting never seemed to end. Stella sometimes wondered if maybe it was better that she leave. Her mother seemed to have no life except Stella’s, no interest except Stella, and yet her daughter’s life had been so dreary, such a big nothing, filled with fevers and nightmares and someone else’s thoughts. Her mother—so dedicated, so giving—didn’t deserve this kind of life at all.

  “I found you like this on your bed. You were hardly breathing.” Her mom’s voice shook as she ran her knuckles down Stella’s cheek. “I’ve been so worried. For a moment, I thought—”

  Stella stared at her grimly. “What?” she demanded, her voice breaking unannounced. “That the Villain took me, is that what you feared?”

  Her mother cautiously nodded.

  Stella shot to her feet, thrusting her hands in the air. “Maybe I want him to take me. Maybe I want him to take me and do what he would with me!”

  Her mother froze on the bed, her eyes widening. “Stella!” she gasped, wrapping her arms around herself to suppress a shiver. “Don’t ever repeat that again in my house!”

  Stella pursed her lips, determined not to cry, not in front of her mother, not for that silly, stupid man.

  Her forehead creasing with worry, her mother bounded from the bed and rushed to her, hugging the breath out of Stella’s lungs. “Oh, my darling, my baby,” she cooed, tears brimming in every word. Stella let her herself be held, let her mother’s chubby, pliant arms remain wrapped around her, let them try to give her peace. “Sweetie, I’ve never told you this, but maybe I should have. Oh, dear God, this is difficult.” There was a long pause. “The day you were born…”

  Stella pushed herself back to study her. “I know what happened, Mother. I know it’s…I know it’s the day after she killed herself, the day Gabriel burned her body.”

  Her mother covered her mouth, stifling a shriek before nodding. “Dear God, yes. That’s his name! He burned Mr. Dawson’s house that night too. No one had ever heard from Mr. Dawson since. We’re all sure he was killed in the fire. Then the Villain stole her body from the grave and burned her to ashes and spread them on the sea. Mrs. Grieves heard him, speaking strange words, angry words, words of his … black magic.” Her mother’s eyes seemed to darken, and they looked unfocused, as if she were there, reliving it all over again. “Those crows that like to follow him went crazy that night. I could hear them out on the streets, cawing and cawing that ungodly sound. My birth pains were so heavy, but I was scared and…oh, dear God, one of those ugly birds cracked the window open—just like that! The hideous black thing burst into the room. The midwife panicked, but I was already halfway through the labor. The bird flew and flew around the room, shrieking like they do. Your father went crazy. He fetched a broom and tried to get it out, kill it even, while I pushed and pushed, and then you were born, and we heard your cry, and the bird stopped flying, suddenly just pausing by the window and…staring at you…and then it was gone.”

  Stella asked something she’d always wanted to, and yet had never dared. She squeezed her mother’s shoulders, the touch gentle as her voice. “Why did Father leave us?”

  Her mother sniffled and shakily brushed a tear from the corner of her eye. “Well, I was so busy with you, I never did have much time for him. You used to have such strange dreams, and go into trances all of a sudden, and then the fevers! You were such a sick little girl! He used to tell me—in fact we always fought because of it, because I refused to admit it—but the truth is, he always suspected…Oh, sweetness.” Stella had never seen that expression on her mother’s face, and the look of it filled her with dread. “I think you might be cursed.”

  Stella stared blankly at her as her brain digested the news, then she realized, feeling strangely unaffected, that she wasn’t surprised at all. She knew there was a reason she couldn’t ever seem to be happy. She knew there was something different about her, a reason the townsfolk kept a safe distance from her. She knew there was a reason she hardly ever smiled, hardly ever felt the desire to do anything but what she must. Until…

  She hugged her mother then, as tightly as she could, and buried her face into her hair. “Oh, Mother,�
� she said feelingly. “I think I am cursed.”

  When she felt the plump woman stiffen in her arms, Stella quickly expelled a breath. “I’m in love with the Villain.”

  * * *

  Damn you, Gabriel, you hotheaded, stupid man!

  He had heard her, and he had smiled; he was still smiling over that. She wanted to give him her body, and that touched him beyond measure, made his heart feel so damned heavy he was barely able to carry it in his chest.

  He’d felt rage at first, that she should even tempt him to do so, that she would think him so low, so capable of taking someone’s soul away. He’d been so angry, she was lucky all he did was send her home. But yet he’d pondered over it for hours afterward, concluding there was only one reason anyone would do something so unselfish. Only one reason Stella could know what Faith knew.

  And then he’d realized Stella was Faith.

  He’d trembled at the realization. Joy and love and disbelief all tangled and twisted inside him. His magic—it felt strong now, a burning light, more powerful than ever, simmering with energy in the pit of his being.

  Growing up, Gabriel had thought his magic was evil. It had been too strong for such a little boy, and he hadn’t known how to control it. Several times as a kid, he’d been angry, and he’d wished for things he shouldn’t have. His father’s drunken bouts hade made him wish to be left alone, and one morning his wish came true. His father never woke from his sleep. Gabriel was sure he had killed him.

  He’d felt so ashamed, so guilty, that he swore he’d never use his magic again. He’d tried to hold it back from then on, contain it, ignore it. But then the years passed, and he met her.

  Faith Harrison. Beautiful, kind, warm-hearted Faith.

  Was she blind? he’d first wondered when she smiled that dazzling white smile at him. Gabriel had turned to look at the sidewalk behind him, certain she couldn’t be smiling at him. Not that angel. Certainly not.

  But she had been smiling at him, and although Gabriel didn’t believe in love at first sight, that hadn’t kept him from falling, hard.