Chapter 16
SIM
Ishould walk away. Hell, I need to walk away.
Olly's nothing but a stranger, a face I stumbled across in this mess of a night, yet somehow she feels like a snare laid temptingly just for me. Every rational thought in my head is screaming that she’s trouble.
Trouble with anger issues. Trouble with eyes that shine like they could see straight through the filth I try to keep buried, but my stupid body doesn’t want to listen.
My gaze keeps coming back to her, unbidden, as if there's no other choice.
God, she’s beautiful, but not just in the obvious way, though she is.
Her beauty isn’t loud. It doesn't demand your attention. It’s something sharper, quieter, like a secret that cuts deeper the longer you stare.
It’s there in the way she tilts her head, the quirk in those sinful lips, and the curiosity in her pretty green eyes.
In the way the very air shifts when she’s near, like she could crack me open without trying, and spill out all the ghosts I’ve spent years locking away.
There’s a light in her I don’t understand, a warmth that scrapes against the cold I’ve been carrying so long, I forgot what it felt like to want anything different.
It fucking terrifies me right down to my core.
Her scent, and the feel of her soft, silky skin underneath my roughened fingertips, are a branding on my damaged and weary soul.
All the hardened pain that wallows inside of me seems to soften, and the noise in my head is suddenly quiet.
Everything within me lights up with need, and the desire to force her roughly to her pretty knees before me, like a glorious offering to a weary and tempestuous god.
An unbidden image of Olly, tied up with my fancy, silk ropes, and staring up at me with defiance in those light gemstone green eyes of hers, while I grip her soft purple hair in my bruised and scarred fingers, as I force my hard cock past her lips, scorches through my brain like a five-alarm fire.
Fuck, I'm not a good man, not a gentleman, in fact, I'm the furthest thing from one, but for her, I might try to pretend to be anything she wants.
She says she doesn't want a gentleman, but does she want a savage animal, 'cause that's what I am underneath this exterior.
You hurt people, and you enjoy it, my mind reminds me, as if there was ever a possibility of forgetting.
I graze my teeth across her sweet-smelling flesh, even though I desire nothing more than to bite down hard and mark her skin.
I want to taint her, corrupt her, and brand her as mine.
I watched the looks on those Mayhem fuckers’ faces, and they're not immune to her.
If anything, they're just as much under her siren call as I am. Bewitched. Hungry. Feral.
She's mine, the angry beast that lives within me declares, causing my heart rate to jump. I’ll kill them all, if they try to take her from me. I have to try to stop these insane thoughts about a woman I don't even know.
Olly is temptation and sin personified, mixed with peril.
I almost feel like I'm in some sort of hedonistic fantasy that my brain has conjured up, instead of the reality of the situation.
I've just met her, and she should mean nothing to me.
Just another hole, and a warm body to lose myself in for the night, and in the morning, I'll be all alone again.
Always alone, that's my destiny, my penance for my crimes.
I watch as her tongue slides out over her soft, pink lips, and the desire to bite on them almost overwhelms my senses.
She can't be real, there's no way. Maybe I took a hit to the head, and I’m dreaming right now.
Her sexy green eyes glow with mischief and arousal, as they burn into mine, and I have to take small, shallow breaths to prevent losing all of my hard-fought control.
Her lips graze the side of my jaw, the barest of touches, but it's as if someone has unleashed a cyclone inside of me.
Twisting, turning, and wreaking havoc in every direction.
"Will you purr for me, little lion cub, or are you going to growl? "
Fuck! I feel the last vestiges of my self-restraint fraying and snapping.
She has no idea how close I am to exploding, and losing all control.
Control that I've spent the last two years working tirelessly to ensure I've constructed as a solid foundation, and an impenetrable wall to protect myself from others, and them from me.
I can't allow her to break down my walls. I can't allow anyone past them, not now, not ever. Doing so could be detrimental to my plans. I’ve mapped out every step out of this pit, every lie I have to tell, every move I need to make to keep the past from dragging me back under the gruesome rock I've crawled out from underneath. There’s a millstone wrapped tightly around my neck, and choking me, every moment of the day. I’ve clawed my way this far, and one wrong turn could send me straight back into the grave I barely crawled out of.
Why her? Why now? Why does it feel like the world narrowed to this moment, to the impossible idea that she might be meant for me?
Deep anxiety coils in my gut, hot and heavy, and mixes with desire.
If I let this happen, I’ll ruin everything.
She’ll destroy me, I know it. I can feel it with every breath entering my lungs, and in the intense beating of my heart inside my worthless chest. God help me, for the first time in years, I want to be ruined, I want something I never even dared to dream of having.
Mine. Even as I give myself all the reasons why I need to stop this from going any further, the thought races through my mind with a vicious predatory growl, and I know there's no turning back from it.
My arms wrap around Olly, as I lift her slight weight off her feet, and throw her in a fireman's hold over my shoulder.
All the air expires from her lips in a ragged wheeze, that eggs on the unbalanced Neanderthal who lives deep within me.
He grins manically at my actions, pleased with the direction of our efforts.
Her shriek of protest and terror has a shudder racing down my spine, and it feels incredible.
I have to bite down on the inside of my cheek to temper my moan, as she tries her best to dislodge my hold, and force me to release her, but I'm not having it.
Her sexy, round ass is close to my face, and the temptation is there to take a bite out of her, but instead, I inhale deeply, and I settle for allowing one of my hands to fondle her asscheek.
When her tight fists pound on my lower back with force, I spank her hard.
"Baby, you're going to be the one purring and howling by the time I'm done with you.
" My voice is all gravelly, and filled with primal need.
Heat is working its way through all of my limbs, and any cognitive thought outside of making my Lavender scream is nonexistent.
I move with purpose toward my bedroom, which lies behind thick, velvet-black curtains that hang from my fifteen-foot-high concrete ceilings.
The space is intimate, warm, and cocooned, where she and I can hide away from the shitty world together.
I'm about to worship every single inch of her, and I want nothing to interrupt us.
I desire her completely at my mercy, unable to run from me.
I drop her without clemency on the top of my bed, and she bounces with a scream filled with expletives.
Before she can make it off the other side of the bed, I pin her to it with my much larger body, grabbing both her wrists in one of my large hands, and forcing them to stretch toward my headboard.
The little she-demon tries her best to bite and headbutt me, but unlike that cunt Damon, I see her actions a mile away, and dart out of her reach.
"Uh-uh, Lavender, be a good girl for me. "
"RELEASE ME, SIM!" She pants, out of breath, while I straddle her waist, using my much heavier weight to prevent her from getting away.
I wrap one slim wrist in the leather cuff I have strapped by chains, and bolted to my solid-wood headboard, then the other.
The minute she's secure, I pull away, dragging my gaze down her sinful body.
Well fuck, if that isn't the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.
"What the hell is this?! Are you fucking crazy?
! Release me immediately, or I'll break your face!
" She thrashes across my charcoal linens, and damn, it's a stunning sight.
Her breasts are heaving in the tight sports bra, and her abdominal muscles quiver with her effort, encased in perfect golden skin, tattooed with a beautiful, black, shattered heart on her side.
Her well-shaped and toned thighs, the ones I crave to have wrapped around my head, push against my back, as she attempts to buck me off of her.
All of it has my granite-hard cock straining inside my jeans.
For a second, I think about pulling out my phone, and taking photos of her like this for my memories.
Who knows if she'll ever let me do this again with her, or if she'll bludgeon me to death after this, for daring to manhandle her.
One thing is for sure: my pretty Lavender has anger issues, not to mention an abundance of malice toward the male species.
I wonder who hurt her. Just the thought of someone doing anything to her has rage firing within me, and causes an unhinged desire to set the world on fire.
For the briefest of moments, her body goes completely stiff, goosebumps break along her exposed flesh, her eyes become large and glassy, and a look of petrified fear crosses her features, as she bites down so hard on her bottom lip that a drop of blood wells instantly on its surface.
It all makes her look incredibly young and vulnerable. Fuck, have I gone too far?