Afterlight - Elle Jasper [80]
Without waiting on me, Eli turned me around to face the door; I struggled to jam the key in the lock. Behind me, Eli’s body pressed against mine, his front to my back, and as his fingers pushed my hair aside, his lips sought my neck and his hands slipped around my waist, down over my hips, where he pulled me against him. Urgency and raw need ripped through me at his touch, so much that it didn’t even strike me to think that a vampire’s mouth was on my throat—skin that barely sheeted a vessel carrying a unique, druglike blood type. Honest to God, I didn’t care at that point. I did not care.
Finally, the key worked. I grabbed my pack off the ground and opened the door, and we stumbled inside. Eli’s hands never left my body, and as the door shut, the pack dropped from my hand, and we fell back against the door, his body pressed into mine, our tongues entwined, tasting, not getting enough. I felt him everywhere at once; every nerve ending throughout me hummed with heat, and the unique way he tasted made me crave, beg with my hands as I slipped my impatient fingers over the buttons of his fly. There was nothing gentle about either of us. I wanted him yesterday.
“Upstairs,” he muttered against my ear, and before I could hit the first step he’d pulled me against him again, both hands on my face as he lowered his mouth to mine; he kissed me long, then pulled back, and only the stream of light shining in from the storefront caught his eyes, making them appear dark, almost black. Never had I seen desire so heavy in a pair of eyes. “Hold on,” he said, his voice husky, raspy, and as I slid my hands around his neck, he lifted me, and I wrapped my legs around his waist. It was sixteen steps up to my apartment, and he kissed me the whole way.
Upstairs, I slid from his arms, and we stumbled together in the shadows, down the hall and into my room, our lips fastened, hungry, and I found myself once again hard against a brick wall, my fingers desperately grasping at Eli’s button fly and unfastening a few. I pushed his shirt up, and he took over, yanking it over his head; my palms skimmed the ripped muscles of his stomach, his chest, and I eased my hand inside his fly and over the hard ridge of his cock; his painful groan escaped his throat at my touch, and I slid my other hand around his ass and pulled him harder against me. When his gaze met mine, his eyes were dark, glassy, dangerous, and lost in desire. It turned me on even more.
Without words, Eli slid his hands up my stomach and over my breasts, where he nimbly released the single clasp keeping my top together. He slid it off my shoulders and dropped it on the floor. At the same time his mouth claimed mine once more, his hands claimed my breasts, and I pushed my body against him with blinding need. I couldn’t get close enough, fast enough—as though I wanted to just sink into his skin. I wanted him all over me, everywhere.
With deft fingers Eli trailed his hands down my abdomen to the buttons of my pants, and as he released each one I shivered with anticipation. I kicked out of my boots, he kicked out of his, and finally, we were both free of clothes and restrictions. The only thing that remained was a pair of slender black G-string panties; even those felt more like armor than the weightless, seductive cloth they were meant to be. I wanted to rip them off; Eli read my mind, lowered his hand, and did it for me, then tossed the shredded material to the floor.
We were nothing more than silhouettes and shadows as we stared at each other, with only the tapered band of light streaming in through the French doors. Eli’s hands slid to my hips, over my ass, his eyes watching me intently. “Turn around,” he said, his voice neither a whisper nor a growl but something in between. It sounded more inside my head than in my ears, and I did what he asked, my front now facing the wall.