21. Wilder
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
wilder
B y the time I let myself into Evangeline’s with the key she gave me, it’s past midnight. I almost didn’t come, and it took hours of driving aimlessly for me to get here.
The house is quiet and dark—or as dark as she can stand it, with nightlights plugged into multiple outlets in every room. At the threshold of her bedroom, the sight of her sleeping face almost takes my knees out. I grab ahold of the doorframe to steady myself.
She’s curled on her side, a nightlight glowing on a flushed cheek, pale hair rioting across the pillow and around her shoulders. She looks ageless. Both young and ancient. Her thick, dark blond eyelashes flicker with dreams; from her furrowed brow, unpleasant ones. Probably about me.
She cannot survive in your dark.
Katherine’s words whisper through me for the thousandth time since I left my parents’ house hours ago.
The need to protect Evangeline from harm bucks against another need, just as potent and driven by selfishness. I want her. It consumes me. Owns me.
How can I protect her from me when I can’t even protect myself?
“Wilder?” She rubs her face sleepily and sits up. The comforter slips down her torso, giving me a glimpse of her breasts outlined by a silky camisole before she shivers and yanks it back over her shoulders. “Are you okay? I was worried. You weren’t answering your phone.”
She’s too sleepy to be as annoyed as she should be. Her gray eye shines silver in the light from the bathroom, her darker one shadowed. That single, otherworldly gaze spears me like nothing else can. I’m a naked, quivering fool beneath it.
I’ll never be worthy of her. She’s a goddess of truth and goodness, and I’m a formless, slithering shadow.
Find the light inside you.
How am I supposed to find my light when all I see is hers?
I have no idea what expression I wear, but when Evangeline reaches a hand toward me, the ache in my chest increases a hundredfold. The pressure of regret and longing and fear presses down so fast and hard I gasp.
Then she says, “Come to bed,” and desire ignites like a flash fire inside me. My fingers curl with the impulse to take, consume, feed . Warp her and mark her. Brand her with my body so deeply she’ll never want another. Only me. Only us.
“Are you sure?” My voice is a dangerous rasp, the crackling death of my good intentions. Her eyes flare, pupils expanding, chest lifting on a swift inhale.
“Yes.” Her consent is both a demand and a plea.
My feet carry me across the room. I shed my clothes as I go, already hard for her, leaking in anticipation. She lifts the covers and I slip beneath, my hands finding purchase on soft skin. I yank her against me. She’s music and light and warmth. Infinite sunrises in my black world.
I press my face to her neck and breathe. Just breathe.
Her fingers weave into my hair, short nails grazing gently over my scalp, sending tingles down my spine. She’s soothing me even though my grip is punishing enough to leave bruises, a thought that makes me even harder—makes me hate myself even more.
I’m afraid to move my hands. Afraid of not being able to stop myself from hurting her. Using her. I’d rather die.
I’ve never felt this out of control.
“It’s okay,” she murmurs. Like she can hear my thoughts. Like she knows me.
A full-body tremor rattles my bones and tightens my skin. I open my mouth against her neck, the tip of my tongue finding her racing pulse. A new urge rises and eclipses all others.
I want to taste her pulse and swallow it.
Swallow her .
Evangeline squeaks as I suddenly lift her, rolling onto my back and dropping her knees to either side of my head. My hold keeps her upright as I press my nose to the soaked cotton between her legs, then gently bite the swollen folds beneath.
She gasps. “Oh God.”
I bite harder, making her jerk. Her head drops forward, our gazes clashing. “That’s not my name.”
Her pupils blow out, black swallowing gray and green. She licks her lips. “Wilder.” So soft, barely audible, then louder and ragged with need. “ Wilder .”
“That’s my girl.”
Releasing one of her thighs, I drag her camisole up and grunt at the sight of her breasts rising and falling as she pants. Pebbled nipples framed by spun-gold hair. Gorgeous, heart-shaped face and half-lidded eyes hazy with lust.
Mine.
Flattening my tongue, I lick the fabric between me and what I crave. She whimpers and rocks forward in search of friction, but I don’t give her what she wants. The next sound she makes is an angry one, causing my dick to jerk and my lips to curve.
“You want to suffocate me with this perfect cunt so badly, don’t you?”
Her lips part on a silent gasp. My tongue finds her clit, flicking it through the cotton. This time her gasp has tone, a pure note of desperation. Her body pulses against my hold, thighs flexing beneath my hands.
“I need to hear it, baby,” I murmur into her heat, my eyes never leaving hers. “Tell me what you want and I’ll give it to you. I’ll never say no.”
The look in her eyes darkens until all I see is the pieces of me inside her reflecting the pieces of her inside me. Two jagged halves locking together seamlessly.
She licks her lips. “I want to be your perfect little slut.”
Shock and a dagger-like stab of arousal vacuums the air from my lungs. My arms weaken, depositing her on my chest, while every other muscle group in my body stiffens with the same resistance I felt the first time we slept together. When she asked me to fuck her like I hated her. Like she didn’t mean anything to me.
Denial tangles in my throat with an equal truth: I want what she’s offering with every depraved inch of me.
Her fingers dip into my hair and tug gently until I look up. I’m flayed open by her gaze, which I’m terrified sees too much. Everything . All my sick desires, my compulsion to break her apart so I can steal more pieces of her soul for myself. Tarnish her perfection with my shadows. Imprint myself into her every cell so she can never be rid of me.
She’s offering me exactly what I crave, and it feels both unbelievably right and unbearably wrong.
“Eva, I—” Her palm presses gently against my lips, quieting my weak protest.
“Before you say no, listen.” She moves her fingertips to my jaw, painting a line of heat up to my ear. Her gaze flickers away from mine, her cheeks turning deep rose. “You were right when you said no one has been able to read my music. I’ve never been able to climax with anyone but you.” Her eyes return to me, flashing with determination. “I feel safe exploring this with you. I know you respect me, Wilder. I’m asking you to safely, consensually disrespect me. I want this. I’ve wanted it for years, since that day in your bedroom. And I know you want it, too.”
Blood surges to my cock, making it pulse in time with my heart. Her words have the opposite effect on my thoughts, which shift from whitewater rapids to a placid lake. My skin stops feeling like it’s stretched too tight. The burning in my spine dissipates.
She feels safe. She wants this. Me.
“You mean that?” I ask unnecessarily. If there’s one thing I trust in this world, it’s that Evangeline says exactly what she means.
Confirming it, she rolls her eyes. “Obviously.”
I swallow once, twice, my fingers tensing on her waist. “Then yes, of course I’ll explore this with you. But if I say or do something you don’t like, you’ll tell me immediately. Promise me.”
Triumph shines in her eyes as she nods. “I promise.”
The last of my doubts float away.
“In that case…” Lifting her back to her knees so she hovers above my face, I yank her underwear to the side. She’s wet as fuck, as aroused as I am, and the knowledge turns my next words guttural. “Grab the headboard and sit on my face.”
She doesn’t hesitate and neither do I. The second her weight comes down, I’m lost in her flavor and scent. The music of her moans, gasps, and cries. When she stiffens, her hips jerking, pussy fluttering on my tongue, I throw her to the mattress and follow her down.
Her chest heaves against mine, her eyes wide. “I wasn’t done.” She sounds so irked, I fall in love with her again. Deeper. Even harder.
I wrap a hand around her throat, squeezing lightly. Angling her face up, I drag my teeth over her chin, then kiss her hard and deep, forcing her to taste her release. She writhes beneath me, legs tightening around my waist.
“More,” she whines.
I find her ear and bite the lobe, whispering, “You’re a greedy little slut, aren’t you?” And when she moans breathlessly and grabs my cock with both hands, I briefly wonder if I died on my drive here and accidentally wound up in heaven.
My vision blurs as she feeds the first inch of me into her hot, tight body. Every instinct demands I thrust all the way in, but the erotic euphoria of her wiggling as she tries to impale herself is too fucking perfect to miss.
“That’s right, baby, stuff yourself full. Take every inch you can. God, I love stretching this pussy. I love how soaked you are. How you drip all over my cock.”
My rough words make her even wetter. More desperate. When I’m seventy percent inside her and she can’t get me any deeper because of the hovering position of my hips, she growls in frustration. It’s the cutest sound I’ve ever heard.
“Wilder, I swear?—”
I give her throat a gentle squeeze. “Shut your mouth unless my tongue is in it.”
I don’t give her time to think about what I said, punching my hips forward with every ounce of my pent-up hunger. She cries my name, her spine bowing and her eyes closing. I fuck her hard and fast, the slap of our bodies as rhythmic as a metronome.
“Look at me,” I snarl. Her lashes flutter, parting on hazy, victorious eyes. “This is what you wanted, huh? Me off the leash? Fucking your cunt like it’s mine?”
She nods.
“Good. You are mine . Do you understand? My dirty, needy girl. My little toy. No one else’s. This pussy only comes on my cock, my mouth, my fingers.”
“Y-yes,” she pants. “Only yours.”
“Right answer. I think you deserve a reward.”
Scooping a hand beneath her ass, I hold her against me as I shift to a tight, rolling grind that stimulates both her clit and G-spot. She starts to shake and gasp.
“Such a perfect toy,” I whisper, inhaling puffs of air from her parted lips, “telling me what I want to hear, stretching for me and clenching me so tightly. I can’t wait to find out how many inches I can fit down your throat. See your pretty tears as you gag for me. I bet you want my cum dripping from every hole in your body, don’t you?”
The hot gush and constriction around my cock tells me the answer even before her eyes roll back in her head. “I’m—oh?—”
Another orgasm crashes through her, her body clamping down and throbbing hard. I watch her face, enthralled, my own release taking a back seat. Knowing she’s never experienced this with anyone but me feels better than a stadium full of screaming fans, better than any high.
As she relaxes, I kiss her languidly. “Say ‘thank you, Wilder.’”
“Thank you, Wilder.” She smiles up at me, soft and open, all her defensive walls abolished. She’s never been more beautiful. “Was I good?”
My breath stalls in my lungs. My heart turns to fiery goo. I’m one thousand percent here for all her kinks, but something about her wanting praise does me in. My cock agrees, jumping with renewed vigor, begging for friction.
I press my forehead to hers. “So good, baby. So, so good. But it’s my turn now. You’re going to take everything I give you, aren’t you?”
She moans. “Give me everything. I want it all.”
Holy fuck.
I yank her legs from my waist, bending them so her knees are pressed to her armpits, then drop my weight. My hands seize fistfuls of her hair, close to the scalp so I don’t actually hurt her as I pull her into me with every thrust. Slow at first, then faster and harder as I chase my release.
I’m already close to the edge, acute physical pleasure compounded by the visual perfection beneath me: her gorgeous face slack with ecstasy, her eyes a doorway to the secret world that exists solely for us.
My tongue finds the succor and sanctuary of her mouth. On my next and final thrust—as my orgasm explodes like a nuclear blast in my body and she clutches me to her, holding me with all her strength—I understand how foolish I was to think I could steal more pieces of her.
Evangeline Sullivan is a law unto herself: impossible to subvert, immune to external force.
She’ll never need me like I need her.
As more fragments of my soul break free, flying into her keeping, I decide it doesn’t matter. She can have them. Every last piece of me.
I’d rather be lost in her than found anywhere else.