Chapter 27
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Isabelle
It’s ten at night. I’ve been locked away in the art studio since seven.
I passed on dinner with my friends to work on my sculpture. I haven’t been able to think straight all day, and I feel like I’m in limbo.
The one moment of relief I had was speaking to my father. He called minutes after the meeting. Dad wasn’t happy with Parker’s decision and agreed it was strange. However, that’s as much as he said.
I know my father. No matter what he thinks about Parker, he won’t discuss too much with me.
Everyone I spoke to kept telling me to focus, be strong, and believe in myself. If anyone can do it, you can, Isabelle. That’s all I kept hearing.
But that was because no one else saw what I saw—the trap.
I looked at Parker’s request and laid it out with my current schedule. Unless I’m the Flash or Wonder Woman, I’m not going to be able to do everything.
I have fifteen hours of art classes and three hours of English literature per week, so that’s already eighteen hours. We’re expected to do twenty-four to thirty-six hours of work outside classes each week, and it’s going to take me a minimum of fifteen hours per week to do my sculpture.
Parker wants me to have two hundred hours of work experience by the end of the summer semester and a portfolio of a hundred drawings. Ten of which must be sculpted. I also have to do my compensation service for Kade.
It’s all too much. Completely and utterly not doable.
On top of that, I’m doubting myself—which I think is exactly what he wanted.
If I doubt myself, I can’t work. I won’t have the vision to create. That’s how doubt works.
I’ve sat here for the last few hours looking over my notes. That’s it. I haven’t been able to sort through my materials or the design plans.
I keep hearing Parker saying that there’s nothing about me that makes me stand out from the crowd.
What a shitty thing to say. But what if he’s right and he was just being professional?
Art is all I have, so I don’t want anyone, especially him, to take it from me.
But what if I’m bitter because of that? Because he’s right?
I don’t fucking know. That’s the part I hate. I don’t know if I’m right about him or if he’s right about me and it’s messing with me. I feel like I’m playing a game of tug of war with savage dogs and wild cats.
I want to blame Kade. If he hadn’t destroyed my sculpture, I’d be outside Parker’s control and on my way to Cambridge in a little over two weeks’ time.
But this feels like it stopped being about Kade from the moment Parker told me Aleksander wanted him to exclude the incident. Everything else we spoke about was to do with his requests. None of that was to do with Kade.
That felt more personal to me.
If I’m right about Parker— which I feel I am —and he wants me gone, then it suggests more guilt on his part toward Mom.
As horrible as that feeling is, knowing it is worth something to me.
It just fucking hurts that I can’t do anything. Once again, my hands are tied behind my back.
No one—not even Dad—is going to help me based on a gut feeling. And I can’t go accusing the Lord Chancellor of murder when I have no proof.
God, this is torture. No wonder I can’t do anything.
When I gaze down at my notepad, a sudden wave of grief floods me.
“Damn it…” My chest caves, and I slump against the table with my head in my hands, a quiet sob building in my chest.
I mustn’t cry. When I did last week, it was terrible. I don’t want to go back to the dark side of grief, but I don’t think I ever left.
I will still be trapped in the dark until the truth comes out. As it stands now, I don’t think it ever will. Parker will be allowed to walk free and progress in life while my mother’s soul continues to cry out to me.
Despite my attempts to hold myself together, a tear slides down my cheek. Another follows, and darkness swarms my mind like a cloud of thick black smoke.
Just when it’s about to swallow me whole, a warm hand rests on my back.
At first, I think I imagined it, but then fingers flutter over my skin. I lift my head, look over my shoulder, and I find Kade standing behind me.
I wondered how I’d feel when I next saw him. Now that he’s right here, the blame I expected to feel is nowhere to be found.
Instead, my thoughts have switched to his touch. The simple, warm touch is the only thing that’s pulled me away from the turmoil of conflicting emotions pulling me under. If only for a few seconds.
I straighten, and he touches my face, swiping away my tears with his thumb.
“What happened to you, Lolita?” Those piercing blue eyes bore into me, but it’s the first time they’ve been free of malice.
I shake my head. “I… can’t. I…”
I bring my hands to my cheeks and look away from him, but he guides my face back to meet his gaze.
He leans on the table, getting close and looking at me as if he’s trying to search my mind. “Someone hurt you. Someone who isn’t me.”
We stare at each other in silence until another wayward tear rolls down my cheek.
He catches it, but this time, he cups my face, and I’m pulled into the possession of his touch.
Desire darkens his eyes, turning the blue to that stormy sea color. Inching closer, he strokes my cheek and brushes his nose against mine. That’s all it takes to hook me.
We move toward each other at the same time, our mouths meeting in the middle for a searing-hot, desperate kiss. It dances in my blood and sings in my soul, feeding me with everything I crave.
My mind empties of everything except him and something he said to me the other week.
He told me that I forget everything when I’m with him. I do.
I need to forget now. Because it’s all I can do to save myself.
My hands aren’t tied behind my back when I’m with him. I’m free.
The sudden though makes me kiss him back with the same hunger he shows me, as if I’m trying to take everything from him.
Kade pulls away, staring back at me with a mixture of surprise and mischief in his eyes. Then he looks like a predator again. Like the Big Bad Wolf, happy that Little Red Riding Hood just walked into his lair.
With a husky sigh, he grabs my shoulders and lifts me to stand, then he crushes his mouth back to mine and kisses me like he never has before. He moves with me until we crash into the wall, and he pins his body to mine.
His pushes his granite-hard erection into my belly and holds me in place while he moves from my lips and nibbles on my ear. “You’re not getting away from me tonight, Isabelle.”
He caresses my nipples, catching them between his fingers and squeezing. “ Kade …” I moan out his name, savoring the wild pleasure stimulating my
core.
“Be bad with me, Lolita,” he husks at my ear, then grabs the hem of my top. In one swift motion, he pulls my top off then pulls my skirt up my hips. “You’re mine. All fucking mine. No more running away. Unless you want me to chase you and fuck you. Do you hear me?”
“Yes,” I murmur. The simple word frees me further, pushing me to take what I want—him. I want him .
The satisfaction on his face from hearing my answer is unmistakable. It makes him look more foreboding. “Good girl.”
He pulls his shirt over his head, revealing his masterpiece body that instantly makes my mouth water and my knees weak. Then he frees my bra and throws it to the side, exposing my breasts to the cool air around us.
Before I can take another breath, he dives in and sucks my already hard nipples until the peaks are tight and heavy with pleasure.
God, that feels so good, I don’t want him to ever stop.
Kade gazes up at me and gives me that conqueror's smile I’ve grown used to. “I’ll never get enough of these and this sweet pussy.” He crouches and buries his face between my thighs.
He spreads my legs and moves aside my panties, then his tongue finds my clit, and the moment he starts to lick and suck, my body crumbles.
I float on a sea of pleasure lost in the delirium of him. He eats me out without restraint. Like a wild animal getting their first meal of the day.
Each thrust of his tongue goes deeper, dominating my mind, my body, my soul.
Then I come. I never even felt the buildup; the orgasm just grabbed me and wracked my body from the inside out. I cry out, basking in the sweet sensation as he continues to lick and suck.
Kade watches me, watches me come undone and unravel in his grasp. When he finishes drinking my arousal, he slides my panties and my skirt down my legs, leaving me completely naked.
This is the barest anyone has ever seen me in my life.
Kade looks me up and down, sweeping over my body. The need in his gaze makes my blood throb in my veins and my pulse quicken under my skin.
I could never imagine him, the football god, looking at me the way he is now with such longing.
He pushes to his feet and molds his body to mine, then he lifts my leg so that I have to wrap it around his waist. Catching my face, he keeps my gaze trapped in his.
“Keep your eyes on me. Only me.”
I press my hands to his chest while he pushes his pants and boxers down his hips.
His massive cock juts free, and my eyes snap wide. He’s bigger than I could ever imagine. Big and long and so erect precum has beaded at the tip of the head.
This is it. We’re doing this.
“Don’t look so scared, Lolita.”
“It’s going to hurt.”
“Yes, but the good kind of hurt.” He plants a soft, brief kiss on my lips. “The kind where you’ll want more and more. And I’ll give it to you.”
He lingers before my lips, his fingers gliding over my throat. I’m mildly aware of his free hand caressing my waist, then gripping my hip.
The next thing I feel is the head of his cock pushing against my entrance. He forces his way in, and it hurts. I wince, closing my eyes from the pain.
“Eyes on me, Lolita. Look at me.”
I obey, keeping my eyes on his bright blue gaze. Then, in one ruthless stroke, he thrusts inside me.
I cry out from the pain. Pant with shallow breaths as it sears into me like hot burning coals. It feels like it’s going to tear me open then shatter everything inside me.
“Oh God.” It hurts so much the pain forces tears down my cheeks.
“Shh. Stay with me, baby.”
Kade pushes harder into me, and I’m shocked when I realize I’m wet. He moves past the pain, going deeper, deeper, deeper until he’s buried to the hilt and I feel so full I can hardly breathe. My body responds to the sensation with greed, wanting more of it with twisted wantonness.
And he gives it to me.
He starts a slow, steady pump, easing the pain away until pleasure floods my body and blazes over my skin. Then we become fire and gasoline, igniting with every thrust.
“Fuck,” he grunts, pulling me closer. “You’re so fucking tight and perfect.”
He speeds up, short-circuiting my mind, then he starts fucking me hard up against the wall.
Kade dominates every inch of my body, leaving me utterly helpless.
He goes deeper with each thrust, tunnelling into me. Pleasure rockets through me, severing my mind from reality.
He is what I needed. This with him—only him. I just didn’t know it.
Or rather, I was too afraid to taste the darkness. I still am. But I’m doing it now regardless of what happens next.
“I want to see that ass of yours,” he groans, then he pulls out of me and turns me to face the wall.
My hair falls over my face as he grips my ass again and plunges back into me from behind. This position feels even better. When he starts pounding into me, hitting that secret place of me that feels everything, my body goes up in flames.
My lips part in a silent cry as I grasp the wall, trying to hold on to something, but I’m met with the flat surface. A chorus of mindless moans pours out of me, mingling with his groans and the sound of our bodies slapping together.
I can’t believe we’re doing this. That I’m doing this with him. That I gave myself to him. And here. At the art studio in the dead of night.
The thoughts drain from me once more when I come. It’s not like before. It’s different having his cock inside me, pounding into me and sliding back and forth over my clit.
Kade pulls out of me again and turns me back to face him, but this time, he picks me up, and I instinctively wrap my legs around him.
When he slides me back down the length of his cock, he pins me to the wall again and continues devouring me.
I’m caught in a trance as his cock ploughs inside me, dazed by the energy rippling all around us like a million stars.
I come again, but he still keeps going.
“Kade—” My voice breaks as he speeds up, hammering into me.
“I’m not done yet.”
I don’t know how he keeps going. He’s still hard, while I feel like I’m going to faint.
I arch my back, my body bowing to take what he gives me.
We keep going like this, then I feel his cock jerking inside me, and he releases hot cum into my body.
It’s the strangest feeling, but I soak it up, relishing the heat inside me. I come again, too, and the two of us cry out loudly from the shared release.
Kade holds me up against the wall, our bodies covered in slick, hot sweat.
Burying his face in the side of my neck, he rasps, “You were made for me, Isabelle Kolyav. Now you really belong to me. You're mine. All fucking mine.”
“Yours?” I whisper.
“Oh yes. And now I’m taking you to my bed.”