Chapter 17 #2
I stop. Shit. The word vomit really needs to chill.
Clearing my throat, I shift my weight back, but he’s already closing the distance.
He takes his time between each word. “What do you mean?”
My gaze snaps to his. “Nothing. It doesn’t matter.”
He lifts his hand, but I step back, the space between us charged with tension.
“You were real,” the admission is rough, like my body tried to force it back down. “I never—”
His shoulders draw tight as his features harden.
Pressing my lips together, I try to do what I was trained to do. Shut the fuck up. Only I’ve never been able to do that around him.
Asher steps in close enough that I have to tip my chin up.
“Never what?” His hand flexes at his side, blue eyes fixed on my mouth like he can drag the rest out of me if he really wanted.
“I never...” I start again, quieter this time, and the admission is right there, a secret I can’t take back once I let it out.
Before I can get away, his arm clamps around my lower back, dragging me against his chest. His other hand finds my cheek, his thumb circling a path of fire across my skin.
“In all that time we spent together,” he lets the silence stretch, his thumb still branding my cheek, “did I ever give you the impression I’d put you in danger?”
My breath catches before I let it go, shaking my head. “No,” I answer honestly, twisting to get free of his arms. “But people are never as they seem.”
He pins me with a glare. “Clearly.”
My feet leave the floor as he hauls me up, my legs locking around his waist. He backs up until the table hits my lower back, setting me on its edge as the shelves close around us.
“But why the fuck...” His mouth brushes mine, tongue tracing my bottom lip. “...do you like monsters?”
“What?” I gasp.
Is he talking about Parker? What the fuck does he know?
He shakes his head, mouth pressed into a straight line.
“Asher.” It’s a plea. A plea to give me something. Anything. Before I either for real kill him or do something stupid that I might regret. Again.
“You have to trust me, Venom.” His gaze holds mine as his thumb drags across my collarbone and dips beneath the strap of my top. The touch is light, almost absent.
“You still wanna fight?” His finger traces my lower lip, then pushes into my mouth. “Or you gonna shut the fuck up and ride me?”
His shoulders ease back, and I clench my thighs to keep him from leaving. His mouth twitches, and I know he caught it.
Shadows darken the detailed planes of his face. “I’m fucking done playing house.”
My legs slowly part, the offering clear.
His mouth slams into mine, his teeth scraping as his tongue pushes deep. His fingers hook the waist of my yoga pants, yanking them down in one hard pull. The fabric slips over my skin and drops away, leaving me bare and open for his taking.
He steps back, drinking in every curve, like he’s deciding how much of me he can take before I break.
“Fucking perfection, Venom,” he says, voice rough.
This is what he does. Makes me see things differently. I’ve always been the one in control... my life, my marriage, every job I ever took. He strips me down until I’m empty, then penetrates every part of who I am. Every part where he already lives.
He peels off my bra and tosses it aside, and I bury my hands back in his hair, nails scraping his scalp as every circle of his hips grinds against me, his mouth working mine with controlled rhythm.
His teeth graze my jaw and trace a slow path to just below my ear, his knuckles skimming my collar before his fist closes around the choker and jerks me forward.
Rolling his tongue, he spits on my clit and the warmth of his saliva spreads through me.
“You’re exactly as I remember,” he groans into the crook of my neck. “All fucking mine.”
Pulling back, he nips at my lip and drops to his knees. I’m motionless, watching his mouth drag over me, his tongue flicking against my swollen knot of nerves.
“Asher,” I gasp, embarrassingly close to coming apart after a single lick.
I grind into the rhythm of his mouth, his inked skin shifting against my thighs. A finger slides inside me, circling tender as sweat soaks my skin, my orgasm threading tight and about to snap.
Then it breaks, ripping through me so hot I see white.
He stands to his full height, fingers wrapping around himself, stroking with deliberate patience, lips still wet from me. “You think I’m gonna make everything easy for you?”
I fist a hand in his hair, pulling his head back to expose the stretch of muscle in his neck. He groans, and it vibrates through me, landing right between my thighs.
Yanking him closer, I tighten my grip and ignore his laughing outburst. “I think, if you don’t fuck me, I’m sliding right off this table to go find your broth—“
He drives into me hard enough to arch my spine off the table, and a scream tears out of my throat.
His fingers bite into my hips as his mouth crashes over mine. “Shut up.” The words are rough against my lips. “It’s the last time you’ll ever use my brother—or any other man—in a sentence with you.”
His teeth catch my bottom lip.
“I mean it.”
“You didn’t answer.” I grind against him, chasing the friction until it sparks through every nerve. “And you’re damn lucky you feel this good, or I’d be pushing you away until you did.”
“Oh?” His tone darkens. “How good?”
God. That shouldn’t sound as hot as it does, with his eyes gone lazy and the hard line of his jaw cutting through the shadows.
“Like you belong there,” I whisper.
Every muscle in him locks.
My breath catches. “Like you were made for me.”
The corner of his mouth lifts. His rhythm turns merciless. Harder, not faster. One more.
“Like you’re mine.”
I barely get the words out before he takes them from me with his mouth. He drives into me again, grinding deep enough to make my vision blur, and the room narrows to nothing but the ruthless drag of his body against mine.
I’m climbing too high. Too tight. I know the fall is coming, and when it does, it'll take the whole fucking room with it.
A growl vibrates between us.
I shatter.
My body locks around him, every pulse wrenching another broken sound from my throat. He catches each one with his mouth, swallowing them like he’s starving.
Then he pulls away, leaving me trembling and exposed to the cold and lowering me to the concrete. He settles between my thighs again, covering me with his weight.
Time stops.
He looks through me with eyes that feel like home—if home were a battleground, if safety came with blood on its knuckles. The dark rings around his blue irises have nearly swallowed the color, matching the shadows carved beneath his cheekbones.