How Does It Feel? (Infatuated Fae, #1)

by Jeneane O'Riley

Menace flamed in his eyes briefly. A corner of his mouth pulled up in a lopsided grin as he leaned slightly forward, nearly grazing my ear. “I happen to know the only place I’m ugly is on the inside,” he whispered. His voice sounded sinister, like he knew exactly how evil and beautiful he was. He watched me for a moment with a grin. His pale eyes danced with caged madness.

“Say it, Callie. I want to hear the way it sounds from your filthy mouth.” I felt his hot breath on the back of my ass cheek. I could feel his body towering over mine. My face flared red at the vision he was seeing. My entire backside was exposed and raised to the gods, with only a tiny black triangle of fabric covering my center. I knew I was skating the line, but I was at war with myself between kicking him in the face and learning what my words really did to him. “Fuck you, Mendax!” Why was I so out of breath? “Very good girl,” he rumbled as his rough hand ran up the inside of my thigh, feathering where the seam of my panties rested. I gasped, biting my lip so hard I tasted copper as my eyes fluttered shut. I pushed my head harder against the blanket to make certain he heard nothing. “Your flesh is the softest thing I have ever felt,” he said breathily, almost to himself. “Tell me why you want me dead, little lamb? Don’t be shy with me. I quite like the fire that you attempt to mask.”

“I’ll ask you again, Callie.” He pulled the triangle to the right, and cold air hit my exposed throbbing sex. “Why do you want me dead?” His voice was thick and sultry, as if he could barely restrain himself at the sight of me. “I’m not an as—” His tongue swept over my center from behind with one long swipe. I bit a mouthful of the bedding and tried to rise, but the steady pressure of his hand pushing my face into the fabric stopped me. I needed to get away from him. I was unraveling at his fingertips—and his tongue. Holy gods. My thighs shook in anticipation, and I was thankful my face was hidden from view. Mendax groaned a low reverberating growl that had its own effect entirely on my body. “I am plagued by you.” Another light swipe of his tongue. “I am vexed with the thought of you constantly.” His lips pressed against me as he spoke, and I felt every breath and rumble of his mouth as it moved against me. “I beg the old gods that listen”—another swipe, this time his tongue deepened, and he lightly ran his teeth over my nub, following with his warm tongue— “that they will rid you from my system after today.”

“Mendax! Oh god! Me—” “Say it again, pet. Remind the gods exactly who you have bewitched.”

“We have been maids of the Unseelie castle for hundreds of years, since His Highness was only a baby.” Hundreds of years old?

Playful bites and trails of teeth raked across my cleavage. Mendax lifted his head to look deep into my eyes. “How does it feel?” he said, breathing heavily. “To know that I love you and that you have doomed me? That you and only you have the power to disarm and debilitate me. That you, a human, have dismantled every part of me and rebuilt it as a shrine in your honor.” His pupils were blown out, eyes almost completely black now.

All thoughts, rational or otherwise, left me. I was a puddle against his touch. It didn’t matter how much my mind fought for what it thought was right. “I am the bad guy, Callie.” He pulled away from my lips just enough to lay his whisper upon them, never opening his eyes. “Which is why you will never, ever be free from me again.”

He was crazy. An evil, psychopathic villain. But when he kissed me, it was like the entire world melted away—like everything was right for just once. Like when you step into your home after you’ve been gone a long time. The second the smell of home and comfort hits you, the tension in your body withers away. The feel of belonging and comfort cloak you like a warm blanket. That’s how it felt when Mendax touched me, when he looked at me with three different shades of light blue eyes. I saw—no felt—what I meant to him. He is the bad guy, I reminded myself for the trillionth time, but it didn’t matter. I craved him every bit as much as he seemed to be lost to me. But soon, it wouldn’t matter.

I honed in on my mind, reaching into my powers and pulling up the ability to impel her. She would not leave me, I would make sure of it, and when I got her back, I would show my goddess exactly what it felt like to be my queen. I would let her take everything from me she ever wanted. Electric heat coursed through me with the strain of my power. One call to her and she would return where she belonged at my side. Forever. She would be lucky if I ever took the chains off her pretty throat again; I would tie it to my own. “Callie Peterson, return to me,” I commanded, infusing my power into the words.