I’d fantasized about kissing Death since I was a teenager, but I was always afraid it would change everything. Now everything had already changed. The desire from months of ghost kisses and years of flirting poured into that kiss, sweeping us both along with it. Tomorrow I’d worry about the rider, about Faerie, about mortality. Right now I abandoned myself to the feel of Death’s lips against mine.

He dragged me to the edge of the countertop, but left that last inch of space between our bodies. I closed it, my legs locking around his hips. The feel of him, hot and hard straining against his jeans, brought a moan from me, a sound he matched. Then he broke the kiss, pulling back.

“Alex, love.” His voice was strained, his mouth still close enough that I felt his quick breaths featherlight against my lips.

“Mmm?” My hand moved to his hair and I ran my fingers through the dark strands.

Death’s eyes fluttered closed, his fingers tightening on my hips as if I’d touched something much more intimate. I smiled and kissed him again.

There was no hesitation this time. He kissed me like I held his life in my body—actually, I guess I did, but that was one of the things I wasn’t thinking about right now. I focused on the softness of his T-shirt under my fingers and how it contrasted with the hard muscles underneath. I’d never seen him out of it, and I suddenly needed to more than anything else. My hands crawled down his waist as his moved up mine, as if mirroring my movements in reverse.

The shirt was tight, stretched over his muscles, and I hooked my hands under it, letting my fingers trail over flesh as I pushed it up his chest. He broke away from me long enough to pull the T-shirt over his head. A light feathering of dark hair covered his chest, coming to a point that drew a line down the center of his stomach and disappeared into the top of his jeans.

He watched me study him, that knowing smile on his lips again, but when I reached out, he caught my hand. He lifted it to his lips, pressing a kiss on my knuckles—an oddly restrained and formal gesture.

I frowned. “What’s wrong?” The question was more a pant than words.

“I’m just seeing if you’re really here, with me.”

Now I was confused. “Where else would I be?”

“Turning off your mind and focusing on your body. I know you, Alex. And I don’t want you to start thinking later and pull away from me.”

Heat burned in my cheeks. Way to make a fool of yourself, Alex. I unlocked my legs, scooting back on the counter. Death caught my hips, stilling me. One of his hands moved to my face, guiding my chin up, but I didn’t lift my eyes to meet his.

“Don’t do that,” he whispered, his lips finding mine.

I resisted the kiss at first, expecting him to return to those teasing, brush-of-the-lips kisses, but he deepened the kiss, and my body responded. I lifted my hands to his strong shoulders, now deliciously bare. Death’s thumbs brushed over my nipples through my shirt, and I gasped, things low in my body tightening. He drank down the sound and then broke off the kiss and stepped back again.

I was left breathless and cold without his body pressed against mine. “I’m not sure I like this game.”

“No game. I want all of you, Alex. Body.” His hands moved to my waist. “Mind.” He kissed my forehead. “And soul.” His hand moved and my back arched as a pleasure so thick it verged on pain spread through me.

When I could think—and breathe—again, I met his eyes. “Did you seriously just touch my soul?”

“Just a little.”

“Do it again?” I panted the request.

He stepped forward and kissed me, but there was more than just lips in this kiss. He touched something deeper. Something that made heat spiral in my core. I ground my hips against him, resenting the amount of clothing we both still wore.

Death made a noise deep in his throat and his lips moved from my mouth to my neck, trailing kisses down my throat, over my collarbone, to my chest. His hands moved to the zipper on my shirt, releasing me as he leaned me back against the counter. His lips never left my body as he stripped off my top. His hand moved to the thin silver chain holding the fae perception charm and started to lift it over my head.

“Not that,” I said, gasping.

He looked up. “I can See you, Alex. It won’t change anything.”

But it did for me. As soon as he removed the charm and set it on the counter, my skin turned luminescent. My pale glow was a strong contrast to his tanned flesh. He smiled at me.

“Just as beautiful,” he whispered, running a finger down the length of my torso. Then his mouth was on my body again, making me forget all about my strange glow.

His tongue circled one nipple, making it pebble under his attention. Small sounds escaped me. His mouth caressed me on more than a skin level and the tightness building low in my body, in places he hadn’t even touched yet, increased. He pulled back slightly and blew gently on the skin his tongue had moistened. I shivered in pleasure at the contrasting sensation, and squirmed, pressing myself against the hardness I could feel through his jeans.

We needed less clothing. Now.

I started to push myself up, but Death caught me, kept me from moving. His gazed up the length of my body to watch me as his lips moved over my breasts. I was lost in pleasure and the kaleidoscope of his eyes. I writhed under him. When he straightened he was panting almost as hard as I was.

This time when I struggled back up to a sitting position, he let me. I ran my hand through that downlike hair on his chest, feeling his muscles quiver under my touch. I used the slightest bit of nail, and his skin broke out in gooseflesh. I smiled. My hands traveled downward, toward the button of his jeans.

He grabbed my wrists, halting me. “Are you sure?”

Oh, I was more than sure.

I let him see my desire, my need. But that wasn’t all he wanted. I could read it in his face. He knew me, perhaps too well. We’d both danced around this attraction for a long time. It never occurred to me he was as afraid as I was that if things changed we’d risk the relationship we shared.

“I won’t run tomorrow, my word on it.”

He watched me with those multicolored eyes for several seconds. Then he released my wrists and his hands moved to cup my face, his lips taking mine, a wave of pleasure cascading from my lips to much deeper places as his soul touched mine. His hands slid over my shoulders, along my torso, pausing briefly to torment me with need as his thumb circled my nipples. Then he moved to the button of my hip-huggers.

“Hey, that was my idea.” I said the words directly into his lips and felt him smile.

“I got to it first.”

Which led to a race to see who could get the other’s clothes off faster. I should have won—gravity was on my side. But he was stronger, lifting me easily, which not only helped him with my hip-huggers, but pulled me away from his jeans.

I resorted to cheating. Sliding from the counter, I went down on my knees, dragging his jeans to his ankles. All that was left were a pair of black boxer briefs his body strained against. I happily freed him.

I took him in my hand, and ran my fingers down the velvety softness covering all that hard heat. Above me, Death shuddered. I smiled. Then I ran my tongue in a circle over the tip of him, tasting his saltiness.

“Alex.”

I looked up, meeting his gaze as I took as much of him into my mouth as I comfortably could. His eyelids fluttered, his chest hitching as his breath caught, but he didn’t look away as I slid down him. My hands moved to his thighs and then trailed up to his ass. Every part of him was toned, perfect. And there wasn’t a tan line in sight. I let my mouth move tortuously slow, swirling my tongue around the head of him as I reached the end. Then in that same smooth glide, I slid down his length again.

“Alex,” he said again, his voice hoarse, as he grabbed my shoulders. He pulled me up. “Not the first time. I want to be buried in your body.”

He lifted me back on the edge of the counter.

“I own a bed.”

“We’ll use the bed next time,” he said, and slid two fingers inside me. “So wet but still so tight,” he murmured.

I forgot all about the bed.

He moved agonizingly slow. Teasing, sweet torture. I gripped his shoulders as the warmth built in my center. My breathing turned erratic. Sounds escaped my throat.

The orgasm hit hard. Fast. My head fell back as every nerve ending flooded with sensation. Exploded in pleasure.

Death’s mouth covered mine and claimed my scream. He scooped me into his arms. The cool wall met my back, Death supporting my weight as the head of him pressed against me, into me. Even as ready as I was, it was a tight fit.

He slid in slow. Each inch sending ripples through me that mixed a bit of pain with exquisite pleasure. I writhed in his arms. He slid in the last inch, our bodies meeting.

I locked my legs around his waist as he began to move. He was gentle until his body could glide in mine; then his rhythm changed, sped up and he thrust harder. Every movement made things inside me tighten. My body clenched hard. His pace changed again.

I came screaming, my hands moving to the wall so I didn’t claw Death’s back. His rhythm faltered and he drove himself into me one last time, hard. The feel of his orgasm threatened to bring me again.

He leaned into me. We both breathed heavy, riding the aftershocks. I was caught between him and the wall, my legs curled around his waist, and I could feel his pulse pounding, matching mine. His fast breaths tickled my neck and I reached up, moving damp locks from his face. Death pulled back enough to smile at me, and the amount of emotion in his eyes was enough to scare me. He didn’t give me time to dwell on it, but kissed the last of my breath away. Then without letting go of me, he moved away from the wall, carrying me.

He didn’t lie. We moved to the bed next.

Later we lay with our legs in a tangle, happily exhausted. Death ran his hand along my hip, touching just because he could.

“Alex?”

“Mmm?” I was close to sleep. I’d skipped most of the hours of the night before, but it had still been at least twenty-four hours since I’d last slept and they’d been long, busy hours.