I shoved off the wall and got my fists up before he could hit me again. Malachi was all severe angles and barely contained ferocity, the way he always looked when we trained—so intent, so determined to make me better.

I ducked to avoid his palm strike and gritted my teeth when his knee hit my side and sent me flying. Instead of pain, all I felt was a grim resolve, this desperate desire not to let him down. And also … that bone-deep hunger for him I couldn’t shake. It was too big to understand and too scary to analyze, but it was there, always. Low in my belly, clawing at me.

I scrambled to my feet, keeping low to avoid another kick, and leaped on his back. I wrapped my arm around his neck in a choke hold and hung on as long as I could before he flipped me over his shoulders and onto my back. In a flash he had me pinned to the floor. The weight of his body sent shockwaves of heat through mine. It should have scared me. It did scare me, but it was also exactly what I wanted.

Instead of punching or choking me, which was what he was supposed to be doing, Malachi stared down at me, his chest heaving, his eyes dark and intense. They held me fast, quickening my pulse. My hands slid up his arms, over the raised welts of his battle scars, over sweat-slicked skin and the rigid muscles of his shoulders. I took his face in my hands. “You win,” I whispered, pulling him down, giving him the signal I hoped he’d been looking for.

Malachi stilled as my lips touched his, but only for a moment. Then, like a switch had been flipped, he crushed me to the ground and fisted a hand in my hair. His mouth on mine was merciless, tongue and teeth and total possession, like this had been building inside of him forever, and he’d just been waiting for permission to let it out. He kissed his way down my neck, nipping at my skin, drawing a choked moan from my throat and a low growl from his. It was like a boulder rolling downhill. An avalanche. I could not control what I had unleashed … and wasn’t sure I wanted to.

The sensation of Malachi—the unyielding weight and smooth, hard contours of his body, the earthy scent—upended me completely, unlocking doors that had never been opened, shaking loose feelings that had been bolted down. Need and terror. Now and then. Every time we’d kissed in the past, he’d let me be in control, let me set the pace.

Not this time.