Chapter 20 #2
"Yes," she says, without hesitation, but stutters through her next sentence. "I'm sure that if I had to, I could. People always say you can't know until you're in the situation. But trust me, I don't need to be in the situation to know. If I had to kill, I could do it."
"That's a big responsibility," I reply.
"Is it?"
"Yes," I say, sitting up to look at her and hoping to stress the seriousness of my words. "The most important thing to know about killing, Sage. It is a responsibility. Every time it is possible to spare a life, then you must. Only kill when there is no other option."
"Only when there is no other option?"
"Only when there is no other option," I repeat. "That's the only way to kill and still keep your heart. If you break that rule, you don't just kill the other person, you kill a part of yourself."
"How will I know if it's the only option?"
"You'll know," I say, whispering. "Trust me, you'll know."
She nods once, letting me know she's taking the advice I'm sharing seriously.
"Come here," I say, holding out my hand for her to take. She frowns as she hesitantly accepts, holding her hand delicately in mine. She gasps when I pull her into my body and start running my hands along her side.
"You're giving me such mixed signals," she whispers.
"I know," I say. I'm ashamed to say I'm doing it. I know I am. I know I'm hot and cold. I recognize I'm a hypocrite for asking for all of her secrets when I won't give her even a fraction of mine.
"I'm supposed to let you go with Victor. I'm supposed to do that. But every time I try, I can't do it. I don't want you to belong to him." Because you belong to me.
She raises a brow at me.
"I'm sorry. Always. For all the dumbass things I keep saying."
"You'll have to do more earning it," she says, but she wraps her arms around my neck anyway, giving me a deep kiss.
"I can do that."
"I mean it," she says, pulling back to pin me with a serious glare. "This doesn't make us a thing. You're gonna have to earn it."
"I know I-"
She puts a finger over my lips. "I'm serious, Nic. You know I want you. But I can't keep playing this game with you where you destroy me every time you change your mind."
My heart drops.
"We are not a thing," she says again, pinning me with a serious look. "If you really want more from me than this stupid game we've been playing, then you'll need to earn it."
"I know, Sage, and I'm so-"
She scoots down over me, putting her face close to my crotch.
"Wait, what?"
She kneels over me, pulling apart my belt before she glares up at me again. "This doesn't make us a thing."
I nod furiously even though I hate the idea that I've hurt her enough that she feels like she has to guard her heart around me.
I'll have to tell her. I'll have to tell her the truth about-
She takes my cock in her mouth. "Holy fuck!"
I grip the back of her hair, looking down at her as she smiles wickedly up at me, maintaining eye contact as she takes me to the back of her throat.
All of my words run together as I lose all sense. "Sagewe'reoutinthemiddleofafield- whatisitwithyouandpublic- Jesus Christ!"
She sucks me deep, running her tongue along my cock and massaging my balls as she deep throats me. "Oh shit, shit, shit."
I'm losing the tentative control that I have over the situation. I brought her out here so that I wouldn't get tempted to do this. So she'd know I was serious about wanting to win her heart and her trust and not just because I wanted a place to get my dick wet.
She slurps and releases me with a popping sound. "Feel good?"
Internally, I cringe. I have a chance here to stop this. To not allow her to finish me, and prove to her that I'm after her heart, not just her body.
"Fucking fantastic," I say instead. "Don't stop.
" I gather her hair into a ponytail and guide her mouth back to my aching dick, moaning and dropping my head as she takes me again.
She's so fucking good at this. The way she licks and sucks, and how she uses her hand to massage me and stroke me while she does.
"Sage, I'm going to-"
She grips my hips and forces herself onto my cock, pushing me further down her throat than I thought possible. Then she swallows, and the muscles at the back of her throat tighten around me.
Holy fucking shit.
I yell loudly as I spill into her.
When I come to, she's still kneeling in front of me. I shake my head to clear the fog and wonder if I'm seeing things. Nope. Yeah, she... she has her mouth open and her tongue out so she can show me the cum sitting on the end.
She makes sure I'm maintaining eye contact, then she closes her mouth and swallows.
I drop my head back to the picnic rug. "Fucking hell."
She lays down next to me and smiles over at me, giving me a smug expression that she more than deserves. I lace my fingers through hers.
She accepts but gives me a meaningful look. "You and I. Not a thing. Got it?"
"Even though I just came down your throat."
She smiles. "Yep!" Then she laughs at the look on my face.
Eventually, the sun gets low and we have to come back from our picnic. Sage leaves me alone to clean up the mess, still sitting in her righteousness that we are not a thing, and that I'm going to have to prove to her that she means something to me.
When I come back up to the house, dirty rug and picnic basket in tow, my head is a mess.
A nightmare of confused, jumbled thoughts that I can't make sense of.
I knew I didn't deserve instant forgiveness.
That she wouldn't tell Victor to eat shit just because I'm ready to open up. But still, a guy can hope.
The thing that cuts the deepest is that Sage is guarding her heart from me. As she should. I can admit that. Even if it hurts.
In the past, every second that I spent wanting her I also spent fighting it. Convincing myself that my only concern should be keeping alert to keep her safe. Not indulging in fantasies I've had for as long as I can remember. Not lending myself to distraction.
I'm not allowed to want her.
That hasn't changed. But I don't really give a fuck what I'm allowed to do anymore.
I leave the kitchen and head for my room on the bottom floor of the house. I'm coming around a corner when someone else slams into me at speed.
"Rushkoff," I say to the tempered brother. "Where are you off to in such a hurry?"
Alexei glares at me. "None of your fucking business."
Despite the circumstance that I can't quite wrap my head around - he saved Sage last night - I still can't seem to find common ground with this imbecile.
He continues in a fury driven rush around the corner. I'm about to stop him when the blonde girl, Isla, runs into me in her pursuit of him.
"Oh!" She slams to a stop, hand over her heart. "Sorry I didn't expect to run into anyone."
She surveys me with interest. Not in a sexual way. But like she, too, is trying to work out if I'm a threat.
She was certainly an asset last night. A force to be reckoned with. I can't fault her for that. She jumped into the fray without really knowing whose side she was on. All for her allegiance to Alexei.
"What's up his ass today?" I frown, looking to where Alexei disappeared.
"What isn't?" she says, but she says it with a smile, like she's thinking of him fondly. She didn't exactly give up much of herself or him in the little time I got to talk to her at dinner last night.
"You're Alexei's... girlfriend?" I ask. It's not a question that I would usually dare nor care to ask.
But I feel something unpleasant brewing in my gut.
Every time I watch that psychopath look at Sage.
Every time his eyes survey her with interest. Like he wants to pretend he doesn't see something he wants in her.
Like he's trying far too fucking hard to hate her.
It burns me. Every single time I see him glare across the room at my girl.
My. Fucking. Girl.
Who I drove away.
Isla laughs. "No...uh, no. We're very good friends. Platonic. Very platonic."
My stomach drops.
That's not what I wanted to hear.
I look up the stairs, following the direction that he went, as if I can sense him out from just where I stand. When I turn back to look at Isla she is watching me curiously.
"Why do you care?" she says with a smirk on her lips.
I chuckle and shake my head. "Forget it."
"Miss DeMarco doesn't seem to have taken a liking to me," Isla grins. But I just frown at the abrupt turn of conversation. "I think she thinks I'm a threat. To her relationship with you."
"We don't have a relationship," I answer. Cringing when I realize how bitter that sounds coming out of my mouth.
"I've only been here a day and still, some of us aren't blind," Isla says, starting up the stairs but turning back to look down at me.
"Everyone seems to be so worried about me being here," she too looks up in the direction that Alexei disappeared, "when there isn't an eye in this house that isn't on her. "
I raise my brow, watching her as she walks away. Wondering if what I just heard was a threat.
Or a warning.