Heat flushed my veins as I toyed with the hem of my slip. My gaze dipped below the tight muscles of his abdominals, lower than his navel. He’d hardened, the skin there a deeper hue. A curling motion was sharp and sudden in the pit of my stomach and then between my thighs.

His chest rose sharply. “I think you’re interested in those inappropriate intentions.”

“And what if I am?”

“I would find it very hard not to cave to them.” His eyes brightened. “And that would be a problem.”

My pulse was a heady thrum. “I’m not sure how that could be problematic.”

“The problem? If I get inside of you right now, I don’t think I can control myself.” He stopped in front of me and dipped his head. His lips brushed the shell of my ear as he slipped a finger under the strap of the slip. “I’d have you up against that wall, my cock and fangs so deep inside you that neither of us would know where one began and the other ended.”

An intense, aching pulse washed through me in tight waves. The memory of the scrape of his fangs against my skin, the bite, and the brief pain that gave way to pleasure took center stage in my mind. “I still don’t see how that is a problem.”

A deep, rough sound came from the back of his throat. “That’s because you haven’t seen me lose control.”

“You were in control in that carriage? After the battle at Spessa’s End?”

“Yes.” His head tilted, and my entire body jerked at the feeling of a sharp fang against the side of my neck.

That tantalizing ache settled between my legs and throbbed. “What about that morning when you woke hungry and—?” I gasped as his tongue soothed the area his fang had teased.

“And I had my mouth between your thighs, and the taste of you coursing down my throat?”

I shuddered, my eyes drifting shut. “Yes. T-that morning. You weren’t in control then.”

“You reached me, Poppy.” His fingers slipped under both straps of my slip, and he drew it down slowly, over the tingling tips of my breasts. “I didn’t lose control then.”

“And after…after I fed from you?” I asked, finding it difficult to swallow. “In the hunting cabin?”

“I was still in control, Poppy.”

Air hitched in my throat. If he truly hadn’t lost control any of those times, I wasn’t sure I could imagine what it would be like if he did. As the slip gathered at my waist and then fell to the floor, I found myself shamefully wanting to know.

“I would lose control now.” His fingers skated down the curve of my shoulder and over the swell of my breast. The touch was featherlight, but my back arched. He brushed his lips over my cheek as his thumb moved in maddening circles over a tingling nipple. “My mouth would be all over you. I’d drink from your throat. I’d drink from here,” he whispered against my lips as he folded his hand around my breast, kneading the flesh. I gasped as I felt his other hand slip between my thighs. “I’d definitely drink from here.”