Chapter 27
Chapter Twenty-Seven
RONAN
She’s exactly where I want her. Exactly where she shouldn’t be.
I have her pressed against the bricks, my fingers working her clit. The heat of her burns through the lace, slick and hot against my fingertips. Every pulse of her body sends feedback through my hand, up my arm, and then down to my dick.
I told her to walk away. She didn’t.
And now she’s mine to ruin.
She’s trembling, her breath coming in small gasps as my fingers tease her.
I can feel how wet she is, soaked through the fabric and coating my fingers when I push past it.
The knowledge that she’s this ready, this wanting, makes my blood run hot.
My pulse hammers in my temple, my jaw aches from clenching it, and fuck if that doesn’t make me want to break her apart even more.
Because I remember every goddam fucking thing I’ve spent years trying to forget.
I remember her whispering my name like a prayer in the dark. The way she’d trace my knuckles with her fingertips, soft passes over split skin and bruised bones, and how she never flinched from my rough edges and sharp tongue.
She was my first everything. Friend. Kiss. Lover. And me? Well, I was hers from that very first note—heart, mind and soul.
We were complete opposites. We never should have worked.
I was rough edges and desperation. She was soft hands and quiet confidence.
She gave herself to me on the floor of the factory, her body shaking, her fingers exploring me with a reverence I didn’t understand, her breath catching every time I touched her like I was giving her something sacred instead of taking it.
The floor had been freezing that night. I remember how the cold seeped into my knees, my elbows, how it made everything sharper—her warmth, her softness, the way she gasped my name when I finally pushed inside her.
I remember the taste of her skin and the scent of her perfume.
I remember being terrified of getting it wrong.
Of taking too much. Or not being enough for her.
Every touch felt like I was stealing something I didn’t deserve.
But she let me. She wanted me. Every time I tried to push her away, she walked right through the walls I built like they weren’t even there.
And now she’s here, gasping my name like it’s the only thing holding her together … and it makes me so fucking angry my vision whites out at the edges. Because some things haven’t changed. And some things prison couldn’t burn out of me.
I press my chest against her back, my free hand smoothing up her ribs, feeling every ragged inhale she fights for. Her heartbeat thrums against my palm, rabbit-fast and frantic.
“You feel that?” I whisper against her ear, dragging my teeth over the lobe. “How wet you are? How fucking desperate? You still want everything from me.”
She exhales sharply, fingers flexing against the bricks, then she pushes back against me.
Her hips roll, a breathless whimper leaving her lips as she chases my fingers.
She’s not just taking what I’m doing, she’s demanding it.
Grinding against my hand like she’ll die without it.
The way she used to. And for a moment, I’m back there again, our bodies wrapped around each other on that freezing factory floor, her nails digging into my shoulders, my name breaking on her lips while I bury myself inside her and forget about the world waiting for me outside.
The memory hits like a fist to the gut. My stomach twists, drops, and that nearly fucking undoes me.
I drop my hand to her hip, fingers digging deep enough to bruise so she’ll carry my fingerprints tomorrow.
“That’s it, Phare.” The nickname I gave her falls from my lips while my fingers push inside her, and my thumb flicks over her clit. The sensation of her clenching around my fingers, hot and slick and tight, makes my dick pulse painfully. “You want it? Take what you need.”
“Ronan …” Her voice is breathless and so fucking sweet it fractures what little control I have left.
My dick grinds against the curve of her ass while I fuck her with my fingers, and kiss my way up the length of her throat.
“Look at you. Still so fucking greedy for it. Squeezing me so tight. You missed this, didn’t you?”
She shakes her head in denial. It doesn’t matter. I know she’s lying. The way she’s moving, her legs shaking, her gasps when I twist my fingers just right, angling to hit that spot inside her that makes her whole body jerk. She wants it. Needs it. Just like I do.
I bite down on her shoulder, sucking hard enough to leave a mark. Back then, I used to worship her skin, afraid to leave traces, not wanting anyone to know she was dirtying herself with me. Now I want everyone to see. I want them all to know who’s marked her.
“Say it.” My thumb taps her clit, light and teasing when she needs pressure. “Say you missed me wrecking you. Say you still need me.”
Her hands scramble for purchase against the wall. “I—”
“Fucking say it.” My hand lifts from her hip and wraps around her throat, reminding her who’s in control, while I bite along her jaw. My control splinters further with every sound she makes, every shudder that runs through her body. The pulse under my fingers beats wild and erratic.
Her breathing stutters.
“I missed it,” she chokes out. “I missed you.”
Fuck.
The words punch through every defense I have. My ears ring. Everything turns too sharp—her voice, her scent, the feel of her pussy clenching around my fingers. My dick throbs so hard it borders on pain, trapped and aching against my zipper, and my grip on her throat tightens as she gasps.
“Good girl.” I suck another mark onto her skin, fingers moving faster, deeper, inside her. The wet sounds of my fingers working her fill the alley, obscene and perfect.
A moan tears from her throat, her body arching, her breasts almost escaping from the dress. I want to turn her, fasten my lips on her nipples and suck on them until she screams. But I know if I do that, that last thread of my control will snap.
“You still love being my good girl, don’t you? Still love being used by me?”
“Yes.”
I groan, my lips finding the pulse hammering at the base of her throat, and I lick it.
“You love it when I make you mine, don’t you? You love it when I take you apart, piece by fucking piece.”
She whimpers, hips jerking against my hand. “Ronan, please—”
I laugh, licking up her throat, savoring the taste of her. The salt of her skin, the sweetness I remember.
“There it is,” I croon. “That sweet little beg I missed so much. Say it again.”
Her entire body goes taut. “Please,” she pants.
I curl my fingers inside her, finding that spot that always made her fall apart for me. Her head tips back, eyes half-closed, while her pussy flutters around my fingers. So close, so fucking close to coming.
“You want to come? You want to ride my hand until you fall apart?”
“Yes.” The word shatters on her lips. “Yes, Ronan. Please.”
My mouth finds her ear. “Then come for me, Phare. Let me feel it. Let me own it.”
Her body locks up, a strangled moan ripping from her throat, and then she’s gone—convulsing, writhing, grinding down on my hand while she shatters.
I feel every desperate pulse, every needy clench around my fingers, every ounce of her surrender.
Her pussy spasms around my fingers in waves, hot and tight and perfect, and the sounds she makes …
broken, desperate and fucking mine … almost drag me over the edge with her, and she hasn’t even fucking touched me.
It’s devastating.
It’s too much.
Cold sweat breaks out across my back. My vision tunnels. The ringing in my ears gets louder.
I can’t fucking breathe.
I pull my fingers away, releasing her, and step back so fast she nearly collapses. She catches herself against the wall, chest heaving with each gulped breath.
And I watch her.
I fucking watch her.
The way her legs barely hold her—knees buckling, thighs shaking. The way her lips part on ragged breaths. The way her head lifts and she blinks at me, eyes unfocused, caught somewhere between now and the past, between this moment and every other time I touched her.
I need to leave. Walk away before I say something I’ll regret. Before I drop to my knees and beg her to forgive me for every cruel thing I’m about to do.
Because inside, I’m still that hungry kid who couldn’t stop himself from taking what she offered. I’m still that desperate boy who’d press his fingers into the bruises she left, just to remember she was real.
My hands move on autopilot. I lift them, and suck each finger into my mouth.
She whimpers, a broken sound that shoots straight to my dick as I groan, licking each finger clean, slow and filthy, holding her gaze, and making her watch the way I savor her flavor.
The taste of her explodes across my tongue, so fucking perfect that I want to drop to my knees for a different reason.
I want to bury my face between her legs and make her come again.
Instead, I pull my fingers from my lips, and hum softly, letting the taste settle onto my tongue.
“Just like I remember.”
Her pupils are blown, breath still coming in shallow pulls, the marks I left on her throat and shoulder already darkening, and for one second … one fucking second … I think she’s going to reach for me. Try to pull me back to her, and make me forget all the reasons this can’t happen.
The panic crystallizes sharply. Ice floods my veins. My stomach turns over, nausea rising fast. My hands turn numb.
I won’t let her. I can’t.
Prison taught me that to survive you have to be untouchable, and she makes me want to be touched. She makes me want things I killed inside myself years ago.
She makes me weak.
Weakness gets you hurt. Gets you used. And ultimately, gets you destroyed. I learned that lesson bleeding out on floors, learned it with every beating I took because I showed the wrong emotion at the wrong time.
My face goes blank. Muscle memory takes over.
I brace a hand against the wall and lean close to her. Her lips part when my head lowers, clearly thinking I’m going to kiss her. I stop when my mouth is less than an inch from hers.
“You’re just like them, you know.” My voice is low and cruel. “Amy and Kate. You think you saw me. But you only ever saw what you wanted to see.”
Her entire body goes rigid. The haze in her eyes, the shattered need, vanishes, replaced by confusion and then anger.
Good. Let her hate me. It’s easier than letting her see how much I still want her. How much what I’m about to do is going to destroy me.
I smirk, dragging my fingers down her spine, and take a step away. My legs feel unsteady. The ground tilts slightly under my feet.
“Next time you want to scratch an itch, baby, pick someone else. I’m not your pet project.”
I turn before she can respond, avoiding whatever is building in her expression.
Before I can change my mind.
Because she’s right. She is the only person who ever fucking saw me. And that kills me.
The alley swallows me as I walk away. Each step feels like tearing off skin. My hands shake. Everything inside me screams to turn around, to take it back, to drop to my knees and beg.
But I keep walking.
Because that's what I do. I survive. Even when surviving means destroying the only thing I ever wanted to keep.