All Too Well (Lust: Deadly Sinners Collection #1)

1. Prologue

Prologue

I know all too well the pain and torture of love.

We always promise to protect our hearts, but after each massacre, we silently hope that we were wrong.

But it makes you wonder just how many stabs in the heart someone can take before it's too much. How many nails in the coffin before it's sealed shut?

If I knew then what I know now, would I have changed it in hindsight? Possibly. I like to believe that each end is the start of a new beginning. Life lessons they say. Let's be honest though — sometimes that's just bullshit. Sometimes an asshole… is just an asshole.

They say you have three great loves in your lifetime.

With the average life expectancy being as long as it is these days, it's hard to grasp that only three is adequate. But realistically, I think it's assumed that each love will start an era — setting the scene as you grow. Love is a fluid concept, changing just as much as we do as we age. We can love hard, or just a little. We can love someone, or be in love with someone.

The problem with society is you're meant to be on your third love by your thirties — ready to thrive for the next fifty years together. But I was never one to abide by social norms.

What are the chances I'd meet all three great loves in the same year?

I guess in my defense, I thought I was on my third great love. But as I said, we change and grow. Looking back at my past relationships, I now realize that the immature boys I was infatuated with were nothing more than validation seeking, companionship and life lessons.

Love number one in your life is meant to teach you what love is. It's going to be hot and fast, fizzling out just as fast as it started.

Love number two is the major life lesson. The love that consumes you so deeply that you feel like you are going to die when it's over. You live and breathe that person, coming to terms with heartbreak and survival.

And love number three — well, that's meant to be the greatest of them all. It's your redemption — the person that is sent to heal you, and spend the rest of your life with.

Sometimes the criteria overlaps, and I guess in a way, all of them are life lessons. It's why our mothers warned us not to be so hot-headed over that boy in high school that breaks our heart because he's a bad boy. We're told we'll get over it but we don't believe it until we are older. But we do — we heal and move on, laughing and cringing at our former selves.

Your three great loves are never meant to entwine — at least, not physically. Maybe that's where I've gone wrong.

I dwell too much on things. Scenarios play in my head — sometimes flashbacks of the trauma. Even worse, sometimes I picture an alternative scenario, when they realize their mistakes, apologizing for the hurt they caused. That's the problem with narcissists though. They will never admit that they were wrong.

I guess I should start at the beginning, back when life was simpler. Sometimes I miss the person I was before all this happened. But then I remind myself of one minor piece of advice.

Revenge is best served hot — steaming hot with burning passion as I replace their touches on my body with someone else's.

Death by a thousand papercuts? No — rebirth by a thousand orgasms.