If he was fire, I was the fucking gasoline. And tonight, we burned for sport.
The thrust knocked the breath out of me.
Not gently. Not like he was trying to make me feel good.
He was trying to make me remember.
Each time his hips slammed into mine, it was a warning: this isn't love, this isn't safe, this isn't something you can walk away from.
My back scraped against the wall. The edge of something—marble, stone, maybe sin—bit into my spine, but I didn't ask him to stop. I pulled him closer instead. Legs wrapped tight around his waist, arms clinging to his shoulders like he was the only thing keeping me from collapsing entirely.
And maybe he was.
His breath was hot against my ear, every grunt a declaration, every muttered curse a confession.
"I saw your little boyfriend's name in your eyes when you walked in," he hissed, fucking deeper now, slower—like dragging a knife.
"I should've bent you over the second you stepped out of that car. Made you forget how to spell his name."
"You think I don't know what this is?" I gasped, fingernails digging into his skin. "This isn't sex."
"No," he agreed, lips brushing mine, "this is war."
He bit my lower lip. Hard.
And I moaned like it was a drug.
Because it was.
He was.
Dante Morelli, heir to nightmares, dressed in blood and power, and right now—inside me like he wanted to shatter every safe space I'd ever built.
I arched into him, hungry, aching.
He gripped my jaw, forcing my gaze up to meet his.
"No more running, Lexa. Not from this. Not from me."
I tried to reply, but all that came out was a gasp.
Because he was close.
I could feel it.
The way his rhythm started to shake. The way his body pressed harder, deeper, meaner.
"I'm going to come inside you," he said. "And when you go back to him, he's going to smell me in your fucking breath."
And just like that—he did.
He buried himself so deep I thought he'd snap me in half, coming with a groan that sounded like victory and violence had a baby.
I followed.
Not because he told me to.
But because I wanted to.
Because something about being his, even just for a second, tasted more like freedom than any lie Cassian ever wrapped in silk.
He collapsed against me, breathing heavy, heartbeat synced to mine.
Then he pulled back just enough to look at me.
Wrecked. Sweaty. Full of him.
"You want revenge?" he whispered, mouth still on mine.
"You just started a war."