“If he wakes up and catches us in here—”

“He’s asleep. I’m listening,” he assured me as he tugged my jeans over my hips, rocking them until they dropped to the floor. My panties followed. He barely gave me time to step out of them and kick them away before his hand slid between my legs. I yelped in surprise.

“Shh,” he warned playfully. His fingers smoothed, flicked, and rubbed. My breathing quickened. God have mercy, but the man had serious skills. I could hardly do better myself. He hadn’t memorized what I wanted—or what he thought I wanted. He listened to my emotional responses and made adjustments in his explorations. I sagged against him and muffled soft moans against his chest. Ten points for the empathy knack.

I somehow summoned the wherewithal to push his hand away. He smiled down at me with heavy-lidded eyes as I yanked his shirt up. He raised his arms briefly. I pulled the fabric over his shoulders and off his head, tossing it somewhere behind me with my discarded clothing, then reacquainted myself with the delightfully warm, rock-solid wall of his golden chest. So beautiful. I scored a fingernail down the golden trail of hair that bisected his torso and bent to kiss the scar over his ribs. He shivered violently. I couldn’t wait any longer.

Breathless, I pushed aside the nearby stool, then turned around and bent over the stainless steel countertop. The metal was cold against my stomach as he slowly smoothed a splayed palm down my spine. “Hurry,” I instructed, but I really meant, I need you right now. The metallic jingle of his belt buckle unfastening behind me made my breath hitch. A second later, there was heat and a familiar, insistent pressure . . . and with one long push, he was inside me. Every cell in my body suddenly roared to life.

“Holy Whore of Babylon,” I swore, clinging to the sides of the counter for support.

His pace was fast and hard and hyperventilatingly wonderful. Between a couple of hard smacks on my ass, I was thanking both him and every saint in the Bible. Even a few more that weren’t in it. I glanced over my shoulder so that I could watch him through jostling vision.

Unexpectedly, he pulled out with a groan. I cursed at him, then squealed when he flipped me around to face him. He slung an arm around my waist to haul me up until I was sitting on the edge of the counter. It was a good height for us. His jeans hung around the middle of his thighs, threatening to fall down to his feet any second. “Yes,” he whispered as he entered me again. “Just like that.”

I stretched a leg out and pressed my toes against a stool, struggling for leverage. He dug his fingers into my hips as they lifted off the table to meet his. Our pace increased. We gave each other no quarter—it was furious, breakneck, bruised-and-sore-later sex. My pulse jackknifed and sped up. The stool under my straining toes clinked against the counter. I became increasingly sure that I was going to have a heart attack or an aneurysm. Maybe my bones would snap from the strain. But I didn’t care, because it was just there, in the distance, so close.

“Look at me,” Lon growled.

“I can’t . . .” do two things at once.

“Yes, you damn well can.”

A strangled laugh caught in my throat, then I groaned in frustration.

One of his palms slapped down on the counter behind me. The other gripped the back of my neck. He lowered my hips back down on the table and pressed his forehead against mine again. Our labored breath mingled. I wrapped my legs around his waist and dug my heels into his ass. “Yes, yes . . . God, yes. Hold on—”

The transmutation roared in my ears and sent chills dancing across my skin. His horns brushed my hair as they spiraled into place. I curled my fingers around them like handlebars on a bike.

“Look at me,” he said, a breathless, gentle command this time. And I looked—I couldn’t not look. His eyes were a lush, dark forest, his lashes guarding the only entrance; everything I wanted was inside. He kissed me like he was staking a claim. His wavy hair and fiery golden halo fell around my face, blocking out everything but him. “No secrets.”

No secrets, I agreed in my head. He could hear my thoughts now. No need to speak. Slick and swollen, I constricted around him as the vanishing point flickered and the distance gave way.

“Christ!” he murmured in amazement, his grip on me tightening in response.

Thank you, thank you, thank you, I thought in my head as my muscles slackened one last time, ebb and flow, so close now . . . just needed to catch it.

“My pleasure,” he confirmed between huffed, short breaths.

Now, Lon, now, I encouraged, quivering madly, squinting my eyes shut to make it over the last peak.

“Look at me,” he pleaded one final time.

And I did.

Several minutes later, both exhausted and happy, we pulled each other’s clothes back on and made our way upstairs. I hadn’t crashed before midnight in weeks, but I was fully prepared to collapse on his bed and drift into a beautifully deep sleep, nestled up against him. I could think of nothing better. Tomorrow I’d deal with Hajo’s search and Jupe’s early-blooming knack, but tonight I was done. The world could just go to hell, I didn’t care.

As we shuffled through the living room, shutting off lights along the way, Lon picked up the remote to turn off the TV, then halted. “What the hell?” he mumbled, turning the volume up.

The 11:00 news was broadcasting live from Brentano Gardens. Tension flared as my mind jumped to what had happened there earlier. Jupe must be in more trouble than we’d thought.