Lords of Wrath (Royals of Forsyth University, #2)

by Angel Lawson

I time my retreat perfectly. The sound she makes when I pull my hand away is high-pitched and wounded. “Rath, please.” It’s a long sob of a breath, full of frustration and agony. I brush her hair back, forcing down the wild, aggressive thing that’s boiling beneath the surface. “You know what I want.” She does. I know she does because she won’t look at me. Not even when she says it. “Please…” Swallowing, she gives it to me. “Dimitri.” It’s worse than never hearing it at all. There’s no kindness to it. No softness. Used to be, she’d say my name and I could feel the lightness of it. I hated it at first—resented the way it made me want to look at her mouth, watching the shape of it made flesh—until it just became a part of the bubble between us, quiet and so still that I could have covered myself in it and disappeared. Now it just sounds hollow, reduced to cold bilabials and sterile consonants.