Semua Bab Craving Forbidden Pleasures : Bab 131 - Bab 140

The air around him was too hot, like standing too close to an open oven. Mara’s skin prickled as if every pore were awake, every nerve stretched taut. She should have been running, clawing at the door, but her legs wouldn’t listen.The demon didn’t need to move quickly; his presence filled every corner of the room. Still, he stalked toward her like a predator that knew the prey wasn’t going anywhere. His steps were slow, deliberate, each one a reminder of how trapped she was inside her own ritual.“You smell like need,” he said, inhaling deeply, his nostrils flaring as though scenting her arousal in the air. His eyes burned brighter, and she had to press her thighs together to fight the embarrassing pulse between them.“I didn’t—” Her voice cracked, pathetic. “I didn’t summon you for this.”He laughed. Low. Dark. It sank into her stomach and left her shaking. “Liar. You called for fulfillment. You dripped blood onto the circle for desire. I am desire. What else could you possibly have

Morning came, but the light didn’t feel real.Mara sat on the edge of her bed, staring at the wall, her body aching in ways she didn’t want to name. The chalk circle was gone. She had scrubbed it until her knuckles split, until sweat soaked through her shirt. But no matter how hard she tried, she could still feel the weight of it—the ritual burned into her skin like a bruise she couldn’t wash away.And worse, she wasn’t alone.He leaned casually against the dresser, watching her with the kind of patience that felt less like kindness and more like possession. His eyes burned even in daylight, and his body—bare, sculpted, impossible—looked out of place in her tiny, cluttered room.“Why are you still here?” she whispered, her voice hoarse from crying.He smiled. Not cruel, not soft. Simply certain. “Because you summoned me. And because I’ve claimed you.”Her fists tightened in the sheets. “I didn’t know what I was asking for.”“You asked to be wanted.” He moved toward her, each step unhu

It began with the ache.Mara woke up in the middle of the night, body drenched in sweat, her sheets twisted tight around her legs. Her nipples were hard, her thighs slick. For a few blissful seconds, she thought she’d simply had another dream. But when she reached between her legs, she found herself wet to the point of dripping, her clit throbbing like it was screaming for attention.She bit her lip and tried to ignore it. Rolled over. Pressed a pillow between her thighs. But the hunger only grew sharper, hotter, crawling beneath her skin like fire ants.Her hand moved without permission. Fingers sliding down, slipping through the wet heat between her thighs. She visualized him as she touched herself, imagining he was there with her, that it was his hands and not hers that was fingering her, she imagined his mouth buried in her heat, making her crazy with want. Then she imagined his mouth clasped on her hard and sore nipoles, teasing, pulling, kneading, caressing with his tongue and f

Mara’s hands trembled as she spread the old, stained pages across the dining table. The inked sigils were smudged at the corners, the paper soft from repeated touch; it felt more like a confession than a spellbook. Her apartment smelled of coffee gone cold and the copper tang of old blood. The demon’s presence had become a constant pressure at her ribs, a heat she could neither quell nor ignore. Tonight, she told herself, tonight she would end it.She read the incantation once, twice, feeling the syllables like keys sliding awkwardly into locks. This time, she’d prepared—salt lined every threshold, mirrors covered, candles placed at precise intervals. She’d written her name on the final circle in ink mixed with ash from the one place she thought might answer: her grandmother’s frozen altar, the wax and prayer always at her hip. She had to believe there was a way out.When he appeared, he was the same impossible thing as always—beautiful, dangerous, the air around him a static hum. But

The letter arrived in the middle of a storm.Rain lashed against the cracked windowpanes of my tiny apartment, the thunder growling like some caged animal in the clouds. I had been curled up on my sagging couch, drowning in student debt and instant noodles, when I heard the mail slot rattle. Bills, maybe. More bad news. I almost didn’t get up.But there it was: a thick cream envelope, wax-sealed in crimson, my name written in looping script that looked too extravagant for the likes of me.“Miss Eveline Blackthorn.”I froze at the sight of my last name. No one used it anymore. Not since Mother changed it after my aunt—her estranged sister—vanished from the family record like a scandal better forgotten.I cracked the seal with trembling fingers. “To Miss Eveline Blackthorn, the rightful heir—It is with great regret and greater duty that we inform you of the passing of Madam Selene Blackthorn. By blood and by writ, her estate and her establishment now belong to you. You are expected to