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Niles Pottinger had long been obsessed with teeth.
Whereas most men of his … varied inclinations … might have gone for plump tits or rock-hard abs, Niles adored teeth. He loved the feel of them, hard and smooth against his skin. He loved the look of them, perfectly aligned like little soldiers awaiting orders.
He simply loved teeth and Amanda Rosewater had a perfect set. Ever since he’d first seen them, he had longed to know their feel and shape. He would have done anything, he had done anything, to know those teeth.
Amanda’s bed at the NeedWant was too soft, but Niles never complained. It was a necessary evil for the joy of lying beside her naked body as she smiled up at him.
He was naked too. His head was propped on his hand and he was gazing at her, blonde hair forming a halo around her head as it rested on the pillow. It was still slightly amazing that his plans had worked, that he had somehow managed to lure her into his arms. It had never worked with Connor, except that one time, that one broken and bloody …
Niles shook off these thoughts and ran his thumb along the seam of her smiling lips, over the surface of her incisors.
Pearly perfection.
She laughed softly and her eyes crinkled. He knew that look. He’d seen it on countless faces for as long as he could remember. It said, You’re not quite right in the head, are you?
Normally that look was his cue to backpedal into the perfectly coifed, perfectly normal persona he’d spent years creating. But he’d given up hiding his eccentricities from Amanda. On her the look was not laced with judgment. It contained something soft that Niles didn’t have a word for because he’d never seen it before.
It was like understanding or maybe even acceptance. And it was far more addicting than Adreno.
Niles tapped his nail softly against her canines, making her chuckle. He loved the sound of teeth too.
“Do I have to endure another twenty-minute session of you adoring my teeth?”
“Endure?” Niles asked, cupping his right hand along Amanda’s jawline. “You adore being adored. You bask in it.”
Her legs tightened around his waist, flipping them so he was lying on his back and she was straddling him. He could have stopped her. He was physically stronger, which always gave him a sense of ease that he’d never felt around Connor. Knowing that he could not be overpowered, knowing that Amanda could never hold him down as the blood pooled beneath his hands. It was refreshing but still oddly disappointing.
No.
No. It was refreshing. Safe. Comforting. It was not disappointing at all. No.
A wicked grin spread across Amanda’s face before her mouth dropped to his right pectoral and she bit down.
He sucked in a breath and groaned. Delicious, wonderful teeth.
“Will I be able to tempt you today?” Amanda asked before sucking on his nipple. He ran a bare hand through her hair, still amazed that he felt comfortable showing her his scarred palms. Before Amanda, he’d only willingly shown them to Churchill.
She stared back at him with eyes wide and green. He wanted to know everything that went on inside that head. Every desire, fear, and memory. Every time she had been with Connor and what Connor had liked best. Positions, foreplay, bed, shower. Everything.
“You are always tempting, Amanda.”
Her eyebrows rose. “Not that tempting if you can continually manage to resist me.”
It was true. They still hadn’t had sex, even after three weeks of making out like teenagers. She always broached the subject with humor but it was obvious that Amanda wanted more. Niles longed to give it to her, just as Nolan had on the video feeds. It had been so easy for the lawkeeper. Almost playfully he had thrown Amanda onto the bed and made love, often twice in one evening. And Amanda had soaked it up, met Nolan pound for pound. She was insatiable. Niles was certain he would lose her eventually if he continued to avoid sex. Amanda had needs, desires that Nolan had more than satisfied.
Needs that Niles longed to satisfy, but …
He couldn’t. Not yet. Not until he knew that every loose end of his unconventional courtship had been cut and singed. Not until he knew that Amanda would never find out what he’d done. Kenya. The implant. The surveillance videos. The Adreno.
Niles refused to lose Amanda, not after he’d lost Connor.
Connor.
Stupid, stupid schoolboy crush. Giving Connor the watch. Thinking that their time in the chapel had meant something to Connor.
After the first time, the Votanis Collective had left Niles on the shattered stained glass in the chapel, partially clothed and curled into a ball. He had been staring at the glass shards beneath his fingers, the blues and greens and golds, the faces of saints painted with his blood.
It had taken minutes for Niles to realize that Connor was curled around him, holding Niles’ back flush against his chest. It had taken longer for Niles’ sobbing to quiet enough for him to realize that Connor was murmuring in his ear, soft words of comfort. His voice had grounded Niles, a tether amidst the destruction. With surprising patience, Connor had dragged Niles back from that moment when the first Votan probe had entered his body. Niles had been stuck in that moment, in the helplessness and the pain. It had been replaying over and over in his mind, like a video feed of somebody else, like he was a just spectator to the violation but still capable of feeling the tearing of the flesh.
It had been Connor who had saved him, despite everything that had come before, the obsessive staring, stealing his brush, the Valentine’s Day card. Oh, how the other boys had laughed when he gave Connor that card. Still, Connor had come to him and saved him, his teeth scraping lightly along Niles’ neck as he whispered into his ear, “Everything will be okay, Niles. I won’t let them hurt us again. I promise.”
The Votanis Collective had come back at nightfall. Connor had been wrong.
“Niles?” Her voice broke through his thoughts like a knife through flesh. Rough and violent. He was shaking slightly, sweat forming on his brow as Amanda regarded him with a look of true concern. “Niles?”
He reached up and ran his knuckles along her cheek. Like a tide rushing out to sea, the tension fled his body and he breathed in deeply. Her scent filled him, whiskey and vanilla.
Sensing the change in him, her lips broke into a smile. She was filled with so much trust. Nobody had ever trusted Niles like that. If Amanda knew everything he’d done, she would never look at him like that again. As the tranquility spread through his body, warming his limbs, he knew that he would do anything to keep her from learning the truth. Dispose of Doc Yewll. Find the indogene Kenya and slit her throat. Anything.
He needed to keep that smile on Amanda’s face.
“What were you thinking about?” she asked.
“Nothing.”
“The chapel?” She responded kindly, not pushing, just inquiring.
“Perhaps.”
“I understand why you pull away and I want you to know that I don’t mind. No matter how long it takes, I won’t ever mind.” She grasped his right hand and kissed the scars on his palm, making him shudder with need and fear and love. A perfect mixture of emotions that he wanted to feel forever. “You know that, right, Niles?”
How he wanted to believe it. His entire body pulsed with the need to possess Amanda, body and mind and soul, if souls were even real. He doubted it, but if they were, he wanted all of Amanda.
She could never know all of the horrible things he’d done.
He laced his fingers along the back of her neck, gripping her blonde curls and pulled her into a kiss.
She was so trusting, despite what she had endured in New York. She had come through that darkness whole and complete, unlike Niles who had left a piece of himself in that chapel. Lost forever.
She could still love and give herself to another person, still open her heart and her body. He wanted to taste that wholeness. Drown in it until it was his.
As the kiss deepened and the world collapsed down to the singularity of their naked bodies, he could feel her desire in the press of her tongue and the scrape of her teeth.
Her perfect teeth.
He closed his eyes and moaned lightly, matching her desire. Maybe tonight he could give her what she wanted, what he wanted too. Maybe tonight he could be complete and open, just like her. Despite everything that had come before and everything that might come after.
Maybe tonight he could be whole. For her.
Maybe.