Chapter 6 #2
The creek bed welcomes Cassia's hooves with a symphony of crunches, each step breaking the night's silence.
Moonlight catches on the cottonwoods, turning their leaves to silver coins that flutter and whisper above me.
The path is exactly as I remember it—worn by water, and hooves, by two teenagers who couldn't keep their hands off each other.
If this is a dream, I'm gonna let it kill me slow.
I've been dyin’ piece by piece for three years anyway—might as well go out honest.
Around the bend, the silo appears—cold, silver, still standing after all these years. It rises from the prairie like a sentinel, like it's been waiting just for me. The metal gleams under the moon, a beacon I've been avoiding and craving in equal measure.
I've made peace with a hundred things. But not this. Not him. Not the way I still get wet thinking about his mouth between my legs.
I remember, even when my mind tries to forget.
Cassia slows to a walk without me asking. She knows this place, knows what happens here. I pull her to a stop thirty yards away, suddenly unsure. The mare huffs, impatient with my hesitation.
Three years of smiling for someone else's camera.
Three years of pretending those hands didn't ruin me.
My nipples tighten against my dress. Just the memory of his touch is enough to make my body crash through every careful wall I've built. Every promise I made to forget him. To leave him behind.
And then I see him.
Legion leans in the open silo door like he never left, like time stopped the day they locked him away.
He’s a shadow against warm golden light inside.
The moonlight catches on his face, illuminating cheekbones that look sharper now, a jaw that's set harder.
The last traces of boyhood gone from his features.
Like life has carved away everything soft and only pure longing remains.
I can see it in how he stands—like he's deciding whether to worship me, or destroy me, or both.
When his eyes find mine, wet heat pools between my legs. That gaze of his is hungry. Patient, but predatory. His eyes track my every movement, missing nothing.
Cassia shifts under me, sensing my tension. My fingers shake on the reins, betraying my careful composure. My heart hammers against my ribs like it's trying to escape, trying to reach him before the rest of me can.
I'm soaked through my panties and he hasn't even touched me yet. Hasn't said a word. Just stands there, watching me with those eyes that have always seen right through me.
He steps away from the golden light behind him, entering the dark shadows. Moonlight filters down through cottonwood leaves, making him sparkle a bit. When he's close enough that I can smell him—leather, and smoke, and something darker—he reaches out his hand.
Just his hand, palm up. Nothing more.
It’s an invitation. Not to love him, or be with him, just to fuck him.
That’s all these silo visits have ever been. Friendship and fucking. Because even as children—before the sex, obviously—we knew we didn’t belong in the real world. We existed only as something provisional and transitory.
He invited me here for sex. And I could lie. Say I didn't come here for that. But that’s all it is, just a lie.
Neither of us says a word as I place my hand in his and the moment our skin connects, electricity shoots straight to my core. A small sound escapes my throat—not quite a gasp, not quite a moan. Something in between that I'd be embarrassed by if anyone else heard it.
Legion helps me down slow, hands warm on my waist. The strength in them is familiar and foreign all at once—the same hands, but harder now. More certain.
My feet hit the ground and I break open.
I've been good for too long. Polite. Clean. Untouched. Marcus kisses me like I'm made of glass. Legion fucks me like I’m made of fire.
My legs are unsteady beneath me. I am crumbling with one touch.
His hands linger at my waist, thumbs brushing against the thin fabric of my dress.
"Savannah," he says, and my name in his mouth sounds like a prayer, and a curse, and a blessing all wrapped up into one.
Then his lips meet mine and it's not sweet—it's desperate.
It's the kiss you give someone after three years of silence.
After too many nights with the wrong name on your tongue.
This isn't romance. This is possession. This is me handing over everything I tried to bury. He tastes like salvation and sin, and I wanna drown in it.
I moan into his mouth, shameless and hungry. My hips press against his thigh and I can feel how hard he already is. His hands tangle in my hair, pulling just enough to make me gasp.
He breaks the kiss, both of us breathing hard. "Inside," he says, voice rough with want.
He leads me through the silo door, and I'm not prepared for what I see. Fairy lights strung across the metal walls cast a soft glow over the space.
Blankets—actual clean blankets—spread across the dirt floor.
Sage bundles hanging from the rafters.
Wildflowers in mason jars.
He built this while I was pretendin’ to be the perfect future wife. That’s all I’ve ever done at home. Just pretendin’.
But everything with Legion is real.
This is the place where he takes me apart.
It’s also the place where he puts me back together.
My pussy clenches with anticipation. I'm already imagining his mouth between my legs, his hands holding my knees apart while I come against the thrusting of his tongue.
"When did you do this?" I ask, gesturing to the space around us.
"This afternoon," he says, eyes never leaving mine. "Finished it right before we paid our respects to your future husband."
I don't say anything back to that last bit—but he's not waiting for it anyway.
He knows who I belong to.
Him.
He knew I'd come.
I reach for the hem of my dress, pulling it over my head. The night air kisses my naked skin, raising goosebumps across my bare nipples. Legion watches, unmoving, as I slip my panties down my legs and stand before him like an offering.
There was never any doubt we were gonna fuck.
It’s all we do.
We never dated. We never went dancin’ and drinkin’.
We just fuck. And when we fuck, we fuck hard.
Legion's eyes roam over me, taking in every inch, every change the years have wrought. His shirt comes off. The angel and the demon inked into his chest staring back at me now. New tattoos, prison tattoos, covering scars I don't remember.
I understand exactly who he is in this moment—a man caught between salvation and damnation, fighting both as hard as he can. He fights what he is harder than any man I've ever known.
And still he holds space for me inside all that rage
"I've been empty without you," I whisper, the words torn from somewhere deep inside me. "Show me I'm still yours. Make me remember what it feels like to be claimed."
And then he’s here. Hands cupping my face with a gentleness that belies the hunger in his eyes. His thumbs trace my cheekbones, my lips, the line of my jaw. His touch is reverent. Mapping my body like he's memorizing scripture.
Every scar, every freckle, every place that makes me gasp.
"You're so fucking beautiful it hurts to look at you," he growls against my throat, and I wanna tell him I've been ugly without him. Performing pretty instead of feeling it.
His mouth trails down my neck, across my collarbone, leaving fire in its wake. When he reaches my breast, his tongue circles my nipple before taking it between his teeth. I arch against him, a sound between a whimper and a moan escaping my lips.
His hands slide down my sides, gripping my hips, my ass, pulling me against him so I can feel how hard he is through his jeans. I reach between us, palming him through the denim, and he hisses through his teeth.
"I tried to forget," I gasp as his fingers trail lower, tracing the inside of my thigh. "Tried to want someone else."
It's a lie.
I didn't try at all.
There is no one else for me but the man standing right here with his hand between my legs.
Legion's fingers find me wet and ready, and the sound he makes is almost pained. "Fuck, Savannah," he mutters, sliding one finger inside me, then another. His thumb circles my clit, and my hips buck against his hand.
I fumble with his belt, desperate to feel him, all of him. He helps me, kicking off his boots, jeans, and boxers until he's naked against me, hard length pressed against my stomach.
We sink to the blankets together, a tangle of limbs and need. He positions himself between my thighs, the head of his cock teasing my entrance. Our eyes meet, and in that moment, everything else falls away but us.
When he slides inside me, we both go still.
This is home.
This is church.
This is the religion they'll damn us both for practicing.
He begins to move, slow and deep and devastating. Each thrust brings me closer to the edge, closer to the truth I've been running from.
This is when reality hits.
This is when I understand the choice I'm really making.
I'm gonna lose everything—my family, my inheritance, my carefully constructed life.
But I don't care.
At least, not right now.
I just come apart in his arms, moaning his name as his endless battle between good and evil plays out across his chest in ink that reminds us both that this love we have… is forbidden.