"Ro—Rohan, are you—" She never got to finish those words as he closed the distance between them. But instead of biting her and sucking her dry like she imagined, he did the last thing she expected him to do.
He kissed her.
Rohan could not remember the last time he had been in a noisy place like the human market. The loud voices and sounds overwhelmed him, making him want to silence everyone around him forever so they would never speak or make noise again.
He liked to torment people and hear their cries of suffering, but not the sounds of their words, happy laughter, a joyful atmosphere, or movements. Those enraged or overwhelmed him. And at this moment, he couldn't do what he usually did to silence the noise, because he didn't want to terrify the already frightened woman who was now his wife, the one he planned to keep. For a moment, he had almost forgotten she was in the carriage with him until he heard her voice.
When he looked up at her uncertain, terrified, large hazel eyes, he could think of nothing but distracting himself from the noise. He went forward and kissed her.
She started, her hands coming up to push him away and fight him. But he ordered against her lips, "Stay still, little bunny." And she immediately went still, resting her hands on his shoulders instead. She made a soft noise of surprise when he sucked in her breath and licked her lips.
Hmm, her lips were softer and tasted sweeter than he had imagined when he first laid eyes on her. He had thought they resembled a ripe cherry, plump and full, and he was right. They were as sweet as the delicious sins he indulged in.
He needed her body under his. He wanted to watch her hazel eyes soften with desire and make her lips melt against his, her cheeks flush with pleasure. He wanted to rub the sweet berry between her legs and make her wet. He wanted to drive into her until he released, and then he wanted to do it all over again.
He'd wake with her head on his pillow and kiss her until she opened her eyes. He'd feed her breakfast and watch her smile as she took food from his mouth. He drew his tongue across her lower lip. She tasted of honey and the whiskey he'd given her, sweet spice.
He felt the pulse of her neck pounding beneath his fingertips, her breath scalding his skin. He wanted that hot breath on his arousal, which was already hard and aching. He wanted her to touch her lips to it like she touched them to his mouth. He imagined those thoughts to distract his mind from the damned noise. She was inexperienced, and he wanted to teach her how to move her lips, but he heard her whimper against his lips.
"I can't breathe..." she whispered when he moved back from her lips.
His lips twitched slightly. "Did he never teach you how to kiss?" he rasped against her lips.
Belle, whose mind was disoriented and unbelievably muddy from his sudden kiss that locked her breath away, did not understand his words. She didn't even remember how to breathe, talk more of who he was referring to. "W-who..." she asked shakily.
"How easy it is for you to forget the man you claim to love. Is love that easily forgotten?" His lips brushed against hers as he spoke. He could not feel love, but he despised the way her hazel eyes softened when they landed on the man outside the hall. She was his wife now, she had no right to look at another man that way. He would never give her love, but he would give her pleasure, so much that she would see how love paled in comparison to lust. Lust was the only sensation he could feel with full intensity, and if it was considered an emotion, then love could never come close to its delicious allure.
Belle tasted whiskey on his tongue, felt the firm brush of his lips, the roughness of his fingers behind her neck. He had a man's mouth, a commanding, erotic mouth that made one forget even their own name, but the words he spoke that questioned her love for Jamie made her snap back to her senses like she was doused with cold water. Her love for Jamie was unconditional! she thought and tried to move away from him, but he did not let go.
"I... did not forget Mr. Marchant, and love is not something so easily forgotten. Once one loves with all their heart, my Lord, nothing can make one forget, not even a mere kiss," she said firmly. She could not blame him for the way he thought when he had said he was incapable of feeling the emotion of love. Perhaps that was why he had killed his parents. She had been lost in his kiss for a moment because he was a sin that lured one in, and before she knew it, she hadn't fought him. His kiss tasted different from any she had experienced, not that she had many, just one.
He clicked his tongue without moving away from her. "Do not challenge me, Isa. I can make you forget you love that man. I can make you want me more than you want him." He traced his finger over a beating pulse in her neck and let it remain there.
Belle did not want to challenge him. Even though she knew her love for Jamie would not so easily die, she did not want to give him a twisted idea that would lead to him kissing her again. She placed her hands flat against his chest and quietly said,
"You are sitting too close. Can you let go, please..." His lips were only a breath away, and if he wasn't so close, she would not have forgotten how to think. Jamie had only kissed her once, and that too with her permission, and it had only been a brief kiss where his tongue did not leave his mouth to touch hers. But his...
She flushed earnestly.
He smirked at the color on her cheeks. "I want to see you with nothing on but the blush on your cheeks. Your Marchant did not know how to treat a woman properly, little bunny. I will teach you once we reach my home."
He licked her slightly swollen lips and pulled back with a wicked, challenging grin that unsettled Belle more than the way he had kissed her. His grin was that of a devil who had lured an innocent girl into his world, a world she wasn't sure she wanted to be part of.
What Belle did not know was that everything about her contradicted everything Rohan believed in. And whatever lay beyond his understanding was what attracted him the most. Innocence, selflessness, purity, generosity, those things were foreign to him, beyond his comprehension. He wanted to taint her, to drag her into his world. And the first step? Teaching her to sin.
And sin? He was a master at it.
It had been a long time since something had truly challenged him, and now, his new wife was his latest challenge. She was too selfless, too innocent, for her own good and for his. A person shouldn't be that selfless. And he would teach her how to live.