She relished the roughness and warmth of his hands.

Rune pushed down her leggings next, and her underwear with them, kicking herself free. At the sight of her, Gideon’s breath shuddered out of him. She dragged the tip of her nose carefully across his jaw as she undid the buttons of his uniform trousers. A moment later, they too dropped to the floor.

“Can we move to the bed?” she asked.

“We can do anything you want.”

Cupping her neck, Gideon kissed her, walking her backward. Rune sighed against his lips, letting him lead her there.

Her bare calves hit the wood of the bed frame behind her. Drawing back the covers, she sat down and drew him in after her. He straddled her legs as he bent to kiss her. Rune lost herself in the sensation of his mouth on the bare skin of her stomach, the scrape of his teeth on her hip bone, the roughness of his cheeks as he kissed between her thighs.

Rune had never known this kind of hunger. He was drowning her in it. Drowning her with his mouth and his hands and the growl of her name deep in his throat. Bringing her to the cusp of a world she’d never dreamed existed.

Before thrusting her over the edge, Gideon came back up.

“Wait, no,” said Rune, breathless. “Why are you stopping?”

“Oh, I’m not stopping.” He lowered himself gently on top of her, nuzzling her cheek. “I was just warming you up.”

Oh.

He moved against her.

Oh.

Her legs tightened around him like a snare.

“Unless you’d prefer me down there …”

“No,” she said, as his hands moved over her again, fingers stroking, warming. She liked him up here. The heat of his skin on hers. The delicious, heavy weight of him.

“Are you all right?” He sounded almost breathless.

She nodded, feeling her temperature rise. Her skin flushed as sweat gathered on her hairline. “Yes,” she breathed.

He kept going.

“Your heart is racing …”

She nodded. She knew. Looping her arms around his neck, she pulled him closer. She pressed her mouth to the scar on his chest, tasting him.

He spoke her name like an incantation. It made the warm ache between her legs sharpen and grow until she was more ache than girl.

Gideon continued, moving against her. Deeper, harder, insistent.

She was losing control.

“Gideon …”

“Do you want to stop?”

“No. No.” A laugh escaped her. “Please don’t stop.”

Her arms tightened. The hand cupping her breast fell away as his arm curled around her waist, pulling her into him, focusing completely on this task. When she arched against him one last time, something broke. The blood roared in her ears. The world beyond them disappeared.

Lost in the shattering, she called out his name.

He sighed.

“Rune.”

She clung to him, waiting for the world to settle back into place. Wondering if it would forever be off its orbit now.

He kissed her shoulder, her throat.

“I didn’t know,” she whispered when they stopped, staring up at him.

“Didn’t know …?”

“That it would be like that.”

He pushed himself onto his forearms, brow furrowing as he searched her face. As if she’d just told him he hadn’t satisfied her.

“Like what?”

Rune smiled, tenderly cupping his face.

“Powerful,” she whispered, kissing the crease between his brows away. “Like two souls fusing into one.”

Like a kind of magic.

“Oh,” he said, and grinned.

Grinned.

Rune had never seen Gideon Sharpe grin in her whole life. Were there other ways to make him light up like that?

She wanted to find out.

IT WAS ONLY LATER, after Gideon fell asleep with Rune cocooned in his arms, that she lay awake, her whole body buzzing with a frightening realization.

I’m in love with him.

Instead of getting Gideon Sharpe out of her system tonight, Rune had gone and gotten herself addicted.

The hunted had fallen for the hunter.

OceanofPDF.com

FORTY-NINE GIDEON

GIDEON WOKE TO THE sound of the floorboards creaking. He opened his eyes, letting his sight adjust to the darkness, and saw Rune’s silhouette picking up her underclothes from the floor.

He sat up, watching her pull them on, thinking of her only hours before. The way she arched against his hand, his mouth. The soft sounds she made when he did something she liked.

His body tightened with desire.

Gideon had been exceptionally thorough tonight. He could therefore say, without a doubt, that Rune Winters had no casting scars anywhere on her body.

He could also say, without a doubt, that he wanted to do what they’d done again.

And again.

And again.

His chest knotted. This feeling she stirred in him—not desire, but something deeper—scared him a little. It felt like a tethering. Like he’d given her a piece of himself tonight, maybe long before tonight, and in doing so, handed her power over him.

The last time he’d done that with someone …

Gideon smothered the thought.

“Had your fill of me?” he asked while she gathered the rest of her clothes.

Rune froze like a mouse sighted by a hawk.

“What? No, I …” Her voice sounded strange. Unsteady.

Gideon moved to the edge of the bed. “What’s wrong?”

“N-nothing,” she said, hugging the bundle of leathers. Gideon lit the lamp on the bedside table and got out of bed. “It’s just that I should go home. The servants will worry.”

But Gideon knew that Rune regularly attended the parties of other aristocrats. Parties that often ended at dawn. The servants of Wintersea House would be used to their mistress coming home at all hours of the night.

In the lamplight, he saw the shine of tears in her eyes.

Standing now, Gideon stayed where he was, wondering if he’d caused this. Had he misunderstood, somehow? Maybe she’d wanted none of it.

“You’re afraid of something,” he said. “Tell me what it is.”

She bit down on her lip.

Gideon wanted to close the gap between them, take her face in his hands, and tell her he’d protect her. But he held himself still.

“You,” she whispered. “I’m afraid of you.”

His heart sank like a stone.

“Me?”

She backed up a step. “The way you make me feel is …” She hugged the bundle of clothes tighter. “I’m afraid it’s something I could get used to. Something I could need.” She shook her head. “I’m afraid you’ll be the end of me, Gideon.” And then, much more quietly: “Maybe you already are.”

She seemed to truly believe this—that he had some strange power to crush her.

Did she think he was using her?

Aren’t I using her? he thought, remembering his conversation with Harrow.

Hadn’t he brought her into his bed to prove she wasn’t a witch?

No, he thought. That was merely his justification for taking what he wanted and not caring if it hurt his brother.

The sudden thought of it—of what he’d done with the girl Alex loved—felt like a punch.

Gideon clenched and unclenched his fists. He stood at a crossroads here. Two clear paths lay before him.

The first road was the one he’d meant to take all along: pretending to court Rune in order to catch the Crimson Moth. That road was always going to end with Gideon letting her go—to the purge, if she was a witch; to Alex, if she wasn’t. It was the higher road. The road that allowed Gideon to keep his conscience intact. To stay on it, all Gideon had to do was end this charade.

But now there was another road open to him. This one had Rune standing on it, telling him that she was falling in love with him. That this wasn’t pretend for her.