He wrenched away suddenly, breaking contact.  His hands went to my hips and he tried to turn me around.

“No,” I said firmly.  “Like this.  I want it just like this.”

The Bastard wasn’t having it.  And he was much, much bigger than me, the fucker.

He picked me up like I weighed nothing and carried me straight to bed.

I let out an embarrassing little squeak as he tossed me on the mattress, then followed me down before I could scramble away.

Still fully clothed, he wedged himself between my naked thighs, pinning me.

Slowly, eyes watching me all the while, he cupped my face in both hands.

“I don’t think I have to tell you this.  You already know it, but—I miss you.  Even your bad attitude, I miss.”  His voice was clear, vulnerable, and succinct.

Shut up, I wanted to snap at him.  But it would reveal too much about what his words did to me.

“The feeling is not mutual, you fucking stalker,” I told him, voice fraudulently collected.

He just smiled and pressed his mouth to mine.

I turned my head away, gasping, “Don’t kiss me!”

He gripped my chin in his hard hand and turned my face back.  His defiant gaze bored into mine as he melded our lips back together.

A feeling of raw, violent need quaked through me.

“Fuck you,” I snarled into his mouth.

“Yes.  That, too,” he breathed back.  “But first—kiss  me, angel.  Please.”

It was the please that did it.  Dirty fighting bastard that he was, he knew how to use that word in the most devastating way—absolutely effective in its rarity.

With a moan, I gave in.

Kissing him ruined me.  He knew it.

Apparently I wasn’t the only one out for blood here.

His lips were my own personal hell.

They were either his biggest lie, or his greatest betrayer.  Every kiss he’d ever given me, when we were in love or in hate, told me how he cared.  Told me how he longed.  Craved.  Pined.  Mourned.  Despaired.  Told me he was as desperate for me as ever.

I hated him for it, and I couldn’t get enough, my hands driving into his hair, nails scoring against his scalp, tongue diving in to taste his liquor sweet breath, clashing with his as unwanted whimpers escaped my throat.

I let it go on for way too fucking long.  I have no defense for myself there.

It was too good.  Too sweet.  Too bitter.  Too pleasurable and too painful.

I lost myself so completely that at one point, I even let my hand pull at the chain around his neck, fingering the cursed object that it held, which was a complete slip-up.  As soon as I realized I was doing it, I jerked my hand away.

Finally, it was my sex drive that put an end to that torture.  I was throbbing from the inside out and addictive as it was, kissing him was not enough to physically satisfy me.

It was one of the few times in my life where I could say that my libido worked in my favor.

I started tearing at his shirt, wrenching at the front until buttons flew, shoving it off his shoulders, then pushing impatiently at his chest when it caught on his elbows.

He wouldn’t budge, still kissing me like I was the air he needed to breathe.

I’d almost forgotten.  Dante always turned fucking into making love.  Even when he was drunk.  Even when it was rushed, hurried, hard, angry, or desperate.  You name it, he turned it all into something more.

I didn’t want any of that.

I wasn’t here to make love.

I was here to make war.

I bit his tongue hard enough that he recoiled with a curse.

I smiled at him, a hostile baring of teeth, and pointed at his pants.  “Clothes off.  I didn’t come here to make out with you all night.”

He was too far gone to tell me no, thank God.

His eyes were glazed over, his breath short as he started to unbutton his slacks.

I rolled over onto my belly and began to crawl across the bed.

If he could resist that view, I’d lost my touch.

I didn’t want him to have control of any part of this, and I didn’t plan to let him kiss me again.

My ploy worked.

He was on my back before I could make it to the other side.

He covered me, lips on my shoulder, hands cupping my breasts right as I felt him lining his thick tip up at my entrance.

He paused too long there.

“Do it,” I bit out.

I hid it better, but I was as far gone as he.  I needed this.  Needed it like the possessed need an exorcism.

“Ask for it,” he spoke into my skin.

There he was.  The Bastard I knew and loathed.

“Go die in a fire,” I gritted out, pushing back against him.

“Ask me nicely,” he added.  “Say, please, Dante.”

“Please go die in a fire, Dante,” I spat out right as my elbow connected sharply with his ribs.  He grunted in pain, and I made a break for it.

He caught me just as my second foot hit the floor and had me flipped around and straddling his lap at the edge of the bed.

He looked up at me with a conciliatory smile and said, “I take it back.  Old habits, ya know?  But I take it back and I’m sorry.  I meant it about the truce tonight.”

A please and a sorry from him all in one night?

It was a miracle.

Or the apocalypse.

One thing was for sure, it wasn’t fucking normal.  Or right.  Or even okay.  I could count on one hand the number of times he’d said both words combined in the last five years.

And for this he was sorry?

He had plenty to be sorry for, grievances much worse than anything he’d done in the last five minutes.