I loosen my grip on his lapel and slide my hand up and around his neck, tugging him back down to me. I love the size difference between us, his coiled muscles beneath my hand a reminder of how outmatched I am in this moment.

It goes without saying that I’ve never done anything like this, and he knows that. He knows by pressing me further behind the drape, he’s lifting me up and out of the mediocre sameness of the life I’ve lived for so long.

Anyone could look in and see, at least that’s the idea. In reality, though, it’s not so easy. The club is dark, this corner darker still, and Emmett is concealing me, ensuring it’s his back they’ll see if someone peers in, not his mouth meeting mine, hunger starting to win out against common sense. Not his hands sliding up from my hips and over my breasts, toying with each peak, making me whimper. Not my hands fisting his shirt, drawing up the material with no real goal in mind except to sate my need to touch him.

He takes more, tilting my head to the side, parting my lips so his tongue can meet mine. The way he makes me feel is almost enough to enrage me.

I let him slip his hand up beneath my short dress. It’s so little material for him to contend with and he’s so smooth at getting what he wants. My panties feel wet against his middle finger as he runs it along the seam, back and forth, teasing me. I shudder and he feels it, already trying to coax out more. It’s easy. I’m easy. Or perhaps not. These feelings have been pent up inside me for so long. Drawing them out shouldn’t be hard for him. Can he tell I would give him everything?

His ring finger joins his middle, running the length of my underwear, drawing circles over the most sensitive little spot so that my mouth pops open and I cry out.

He doesn’t shush me. He doesn’t seem to fucking care.

His fingers hook into the side of my panties and draw them aside. The silk was nice, but nothing compared to Emmett’s fingers. Thick, long, so so skilled at making me feel like I might shatter at any moment.

“This is what it will be like,” he says, all confidence as he kisses me roughly and then peels back to finish. “When you’re mine.”

It’s on that word that ownership seems to take full effect, because at that precise moment, he presses his fingers inside me.

A soundless gasp.

Eyes pressed shut.

Tiny tingles building up, up, up.

There is no stopping it.

Emmett had a hold on my life even when I was still a child at St. John’s, racing through the woods, trying to catch a glimpse of the French prince.

I love you.

It’s the thought I hold on to, cling to as he draws his fingers out then presses them back in, swirling his thumb where I need release. He lets me ride his hand in a cruel, savage way I shouldn’t like as much as I do.