Chapter 16 Malice
MALICE
My jaw clenches as my words hang in the air between us.
My body fucking aches.
I’m not a stranger to fights, not even to fights where I’m outnumbered, as that bitch Olivia so helpfully pointed out. But it’s been a while since I had to go all-out, and my muscles are screaming from exhaustion and overuse.
My chest aches even more, though.
I hate the way Willow is looking at me right now. Like she doesn’t know what to say and wants to be careful of my delicate feelings, when I sure as fuck don’t have any.
I hate the memories of that time. I hate thinking of the helplessness that I felt when I was jumped and then held down and raped.
I never wanted to feel that way again, and I made sure I never did.
I became stronger and tougher, and built myself a reputation that makes people think twice before fucking with me.
But no matter how much distance I put between myself and that moment in time, the memories are still there, haunting me.
Willow swallows hard, and her gold-flecked brown eyes go soft. She closes the distance between us and then climbs onto my lap. Even though my entire body is tense and on edge, her weight is a soft, welcome addition.
Not seeming to care that I’m sweaty and bloody, she reaches up and cups my face with both hands, and it’s a struggle not to lean right into the comforting feeling of her hands on me.
“I don’t pity you,” she says softly, responding to my earlier words. “I don’t. But I hate that that happened to you. You didn’t deserve it, and I wish I could kill the men who did that to you.”
A surprised breath huffs out of me. It almost makes me smile, hearing her say something that sounds so…
well, so like me, I guess. It unwinds some of the tension in my chest, making it easier to breathe.
Easier to look at her. My fierce Solnyshka, with the spirit of a fighter inside that delicate, fuckable body of hers.
I pull her closer against me, needing to feel her. Needing to be close.
“I already killed one of them,” I remind her. Not smug, just a statement of fact.
“Good,” she whispers. “The rest of them deserve it too. I just… you didn’t deserve that.”
“They sure fucking seemed to think I did,” I mutter. And I never talk about this when I can help it, but it’s easier to say the words with her soft body pressed against mine, her gentle fingers tracing paths along my jaw. “Those fuckers had it out for me in a big way. They almost killed me.”
She blinks, looking appalled. “That’s the gang you told me about before?”
I nod. “Yeah. Same assholes. It happened not long after our mom… after Nikolai killed our mom. It was a shitty time, you know? I almost gave up when I found out. I was in there because we’d killed our shitbag father to protect her, and finding out our mom had died anyway almost broke me.
I didn’t think I was going to make it out, and I didn’t have the energy to fight off every fucker that wanted a piece of me. My heart was just… shattered.”
Willow wraps her arms around my shoulders, holding on tight. From anyone else, it would feel claustrophobic and demeaning, but from her, somehow, it doesn’t. I know she just wants to be there for me, so I let her.
“But you didn’t give up,” she murmurs, and it’s not a question.
“No, I didn’t. I decided I couldn’t go out like that. I couldn’t let them kill me. So I kept fighting, and that’s when I came back and took out the leader of that gang as a warning to the rest of them.”
“And then they put you in solitary, right?”
I nod. “Yeah. The warden thought that was going to be some big punishment, but for me, it wasn’t like that. For one, it gave me space away from everyone who had it out for me, and I spent most of the time just thinking about shit.”
“Like what?”
“Like… I dunno. All the stuff that was keeping me going. All the reasons I was fighting in the first place. For the longest time, it was my family. Even while I was in there, I knew I had to make it back to them. I wanted to see my mom smile again, see her reading her favorite books, see her build a better life without our dad. I wanted to see Vic and Ransom and do all the things we’d talked about before I went to prison.
But even after Mom died, her memory kept me going.
Once I really thought about it, I knew she wouldn’t want me to fall apart just because she was gone.
It was the only thing I cared about, and focusing on what was left of my family kept me from losing it in solitary.
Even when I got out of that cell and then out of prison altogether, they were all I cared about.
The rest of the world could burn as far as I cared, but as long as my family was safe, I wouldn’t give a shit. ”
“They’re lucky to have you,” Willow murmurs. “Your brothers. And your mom was too. You love harder than just about anyone I’ve ever known. You care so much.”
I shrug a shoulder, the intensity and sincerity of her words hitting me right in the chest.
“I’ve added a couple other things to the list of stuff to care about now,” I murmur. “And I’d do anything to keep them all safe.”
I meet her eyes as I speak, watching to make sure she understands what I’m saying.
Her breath catches, her full lips parting a little. Then a smile spreads across her face, lighting it up and making her look even more fucking gorgeous than she already did.
She leans in and kisses me, her mouth soft and warm on mine.
It’s such a fucking contrast to the beating I was taking a little while ago or the smug, cold way Olivia taunted me before she walked out.
This is just affection and care, pure and sweet in the way that only Willow can be, and it feeds something inside me even as it makes me ravenous for more.
I kiss her back, gripping her hips harder. She sets the pace for it at first, and I fall into her rhythm, letting it be deep and slow. Our mouths only separate when we need to snatch breaths of air, and then we’re right back together, tongues tangled, bodies close.
There’s so much goddamned meaning in it, but I’m starting to realize that every kiss with Willow is like that. Not just a kiss, but so much more on top of it.
It’s only a matter of time before the heat starts to build though, and that’s how it always is with her too. It starts to get deeper, hotter, us chasing the need to be as close to each other as we can.
She’s like a fucking drug. Just having a taste of her always makes me crave more. Kissing isn’t enough, and I need as much of her as I can get.
“I need you, Solnyshka,” I mutter against her mouth. “I need to be inside you. I fucking need it.”
She moans softly and then nods, her eyes bright when I pull back to look at her.
“Yes,” she pants. “Please.”
That’s all I need to hear. I growl under my breath and move quickly, lifting her up and spinning her around so she’s facing away from me.
I work her pants down just a little as she reaches back to drape an arm around my neck.
It’s a little awkward in this position, but I know we don’t have time for more than this.
I leave her pants and panties bunched up around her thighs, the fabric pinning them together, and just thinking about how tight she’ll feel as I fill her up has my cock pulsing.
I fumble with the elastic waistband of my own pants quickly, shoving them down too, and my shaft springs free, rock hard and ready. Willow moans when the tip of it presses against her, and she trembles against me as I lift her up and start to work my way inside her.
“Fuck,” I hiss, curling my fingers against her skin. “Goddamn, you’re so fucking tight like this.”
This position and the way she’s pinned mean I can’t go as deep as I want, but it’s good enough. I pull her down onto my cock, and her head falls back onto my shoulder as her chest rises and falls fast.
“Yes,” she pants. “Fuck me, Malice. Make it hurt a little. I want to feel some of your pain.”
“Shit,” I groan, shoving up into her hard and fast. We don’t have time to do anything else, and I don’t know any other way to be.
Willow makes me want her completely. Makes me want to consume her.
It’s hard, brutal, and messy, no finesse to it, just the need to be inside her, to claim her, to seal this connection between us.
Especially now, when she has to be at her grandmother’s beck and call.
When we both do.
“You feel so fucking good,” I grunt, shoving my hips up harder and relishing the sound of our skin slapping together. It echoes in the locker room along with her moans, primal and filthy. “You like this? Is this what you need?”
“Please—I can’t—” she chokes out. Her thighs strain at the fabric that pins them, and she writhes in my lap.
“Touch yourself,” I rasp. “Rub that pretty pink pussy of yours until you fall apart for me.”
She whimpers, but she does what I say, managing to work her hand between her legs so she can find her clit. Willow moans at her own touch, her hips bucking as she grinds down on my cock at the same time.
“That’s it,” I murmur, urging her on. “Let me see you. I wanna see you come, Solnyshka.”
“Malice,” she moans. “Fuck. More. I need—”
“I know what you need. You need it to hurt a little. I’ve got you.”
I slam my cock into her harder, and she bites back a scream as her fingers fly over that sensitive little nub.
We’re playing with fire, and I know it. Her grandma could come back at any time. Anyone could find us like this, Willow writhing against me as I fill her up.
“You like that?” I pant to her, my fingers digging harder into the softness of her hips. “You like knowing anyone could walk in here and see this? See you getting fucked like your life depends on it and begging for more?”
“Malice.” My name sounds so fucking good on her lips like this, and I keep going, wanting to drive her insane.
“They’d know right away. As soon as they laid eyes on you. They’d see what a little slut you are for my cock and how you can’t get enough. How you’d let me fuck you all night if we could.”
“Yes,” she moans. “Yes, please, fuck. I don’t care if they see. I want them to see.”
Fuck, that’s hot. I can hear the truth in her words, and it makes my balls tighten.
“Good girl,” I growl in her ear. My cock pulses inside her, and even though I don’t want this to end, I’m too fucking close.
I know she is too, from the way the walls of her pussy are clenching around my shaft.
“You’re such a perfect slut, aren’t you?
Say it. Tell me you’re a dirty little slut for my cock. ”
She whines softly, her face flaring with heat, but her lips part. “I—I’m a dirty slut for your cock,” she manages to get out in a rush. “For you and for your brothers.”
“Fuck,” I groan. “Fuck.”
Willow comes fast and hard, her sharp cry of pleasure cut off as she slaps a hand over her mouth.
That’s enough to push me over the edge too.
I thrust up into her a few more times, pulling her down to meet my strokes so I can get as deep as possible, filling her up and biting down on her neck as I ride out my orgasm.
We’re both panting and breathless as my cock pulses inside her one last time.
I rest my head on her shoulder, right in the crook of her neck, breathing in the smell of sweat and sex and blood. And beneath it all, there’s the scent that I’d recognize anywhere in the world. The scent that’s started to feel like home to me.
The scent that’s indescribable except by one single word.
It’s just her.
Just… Willow.