Chapter 12 #2
“I need to see you come,” he growls, increasing his pace. “Need to feel you fall apart on my fingers before I take you properly.”
The pressure builds with each thrust of his fingers, each circle of his thumb. I'm close—so close—teetering on the edge.
“That's it,” he urges. “Let go for me, princess.”
And I do. The release hits me hard, a rush that swallows my breath and scatters every coherent thought.
His name tears out of me before I can stop it, my body reacting with a force that shakes me to my core.
He stays with me through it, guiding me through every lingering tremor until I’m loose, breathless, and melted into the sheets.
When I finally manage to open my eyes, he’s watching me with an intensity that sends my pulse skittering.
Slowly—deliberately—he lifts his hand, the same one that undid me moments ago, and draws his fingers to his mouth.
His eyes stay locked on mine as he does it, and the look he gives me…
God. It sends heat curling low in my belly all over again, even though I’m still recovering from the last of those shattering tremors.
“I need you, Brayden.” I reach for his belt, but he captures my hands, pressing them into the mattress.
“Patience, princess. We've got all night.”
“I don't want patience,” I argue, tugging my hands free to reach for him again. “I've been patient my whole life. I want you inside me.”
“Then who am I to deny you?” He growls in agreement and pushes himself off me, moving to the bedside table. I watch him, admiring the play of muscles across his back as he yanks open the drawer. His movements suddenly still, and I hear him mutter something under his breath.
“What's wrong?” I prop myself up on my elbows.
“These condoms...” He holds up a small foil packet, examining it in the dim light. “Fuck. They expired when I was in high school.” He tosses it back in the drawer with disgust.
My heart skips a beat, but not from disappointment. The responsible part of me should be concerned, but something reckless has taken hold tonight.
“It's fine,” I tell him, sitting up fully. “I'm on birth control. Have been for years.” It was one of the few rebellions I'd managed against my father's expectations—a private decision he never knew about. “And I'm clean. Got tested after...after I found out about Ethan. Are you…”
“Clean,” he freely admits. “Not that the idea of fucking you bare doesn’t excite the shit out of me, but I’m going to ask again. You’re good without a condom?”
“Yes,” I answer as I slide forward on the bed. “More than okay.”
I reach for his fly, my fingers working the button of his jeans. I'm done with hesitation, done with waiting. The metal gives way under my touch, and I drag the zipper down slowly, feeling his body tense as my knuckles brush against him through the denim.
“Jesus, Cece,” he hisses, his hands fisting in the sheets beside my hips.
I look up at him through my lashes, enjoying the way his jaw clenches as I hook my fingers into his waistband. “You talk too much,” I tell him, tugging his jeans down his hips. “Less talking, more action.”
His laugh turns into a groan as my hand finds him through his boxers, stroking the hard length of him.
He's...substantial. I now understand why he was stalling earlier. There is absolutely no way on this Earth that he will fit. Even with his very extensive prep work, I’m starting to have doubts that this monster will not rip me in half.
Brayden notices. He steps in closer, crowding me until my back presses into the mattress again. One hand slides up my thigh, slow and sure, as if he’s reminding me this was my idea and he’s going to make damn sure I understand what I asked for.
“You look like you’re about to say a prayer,” he mutters. “Go on. Let’s hear it.”
I blink up at him, heart pounding. “What?”
He leans in, his lips brushing mine, just barely. “You want to get on your knees for something holy, don’t you?” His hand curls around himself, and he strokes once, slow and dirty. “Then start praying, sweetheart. But not to your daddy’s god. Pray to the man who is about to fuck you senseless.”
My breath catches, heat flooding low in my belly. My thighs clench around him as he pushes them apart again with a quiet grunt. He drags the head of his cock along my soaked entrance, just enough to make my hips jerk. I’m already slick, already aching, but he doesn’t push in. Not yet.
“Say it,” he growls. “Say who you’re begging for.”
“Brayden.” His name falls from my lips, breathless. Not nearly enough.
He slaps the head of his cock against my clit, just once.
“Not good enough.”
I look at him, fire burning in my chest, my cheeks, my thighs. And I give him what he wants.
“I’m praying to you.”
He smiles, and it’s not kind. It’s hunger. Triumph. Possession. “That’s right. Say your prayers, Cece.” Then he thrusts into me.
All the air leaves my lungs. My body stretches around him, shocked and greedy all at once. I cry out, legs instinctively locking around his hips, grounding myself as he buries himself to the hilt. He doesn't move. He waits, watching me take him.
“You feel that?” His hand wraps around my throat, not tight, just there. A promise. “That’s your new religion.”
I nod, mouth open, chest heaving, absolutely undone.
“Good girl,” he says. Then he starts to move.
He starts to move, slow at first, just enough to let me feel the weight of him dragging against every nerve ending inside me. Each thrust is deliberate, grinding, his hips rolling with lethal control. Not fucking. Not yet. This is a claiming.
“You still praying?” he asks, lips brushing the edge of my jaw.
I can't speak. I nod, barely.
He pulls back and drives in harder. My breath punches out of me as if he knocked it from my lungs.
“Use your words, angel.”
“Yes,” I gasp. “I’m praying.”
“To who?”
“You.”
He groans like I just made him lose control. One hand fists the sheets beside my head, the other tightens just slightly at my throat—not to choke, just to hold me there, to make me feel owned.
“That’s right. Say it again.”
I moan as he drives into me again, rougher this time, the sound of our bodies meeting loud in the quiet room. The preacher’s daughter, legs spread, back arched, begging to be ruined by a man who doesn’t play by rules. A man who would burn churches down before ever kneeling in one.
“You,” I breathe. “I’m praying to you, Brayden. I want all of it.”
His mouth crashes into mine. This kiss isn’t tender. It’s possessive, wet, and consuming, as if he wants to swallow every lie I was ever told about what love is supposed to look like.
“You’ve been waiting your whole life for this,” he growls, dragging his teeth down my throat. “For someone to take what’s theirs.”
“Yes,” I whimper, rocking up to meet him.
“For me to take what’s mine.”
He shifts, deeper now, angling his hips until he hits a spot that makes me cry out. He does it again. And again.
“That's it,” he grits out, sweat starting to slick across his chest. “You feel that? This is where you break.”
His fingers slide down between us, finding my clit without hesitation. He rubs tight, filthy circles in rhythm with his thrusts, eyes locked on mine, begging to see me fall apart.
“You come for me,” he growls, rough and breathless. “Right here. Right now.”
I try to hold on, but it’s impossible. The pressure coils, white-hot and relentless, until it snaps all at once. I cry out his name, legs shaking, body clenching around him as the orgasm crashes over me.
He groans as I squeeze around him, his rhythm faltering.
“That’s it, baby. You’re mine now.”
And when he follows me over the edge, spilling inside me with a growl torn from somewhere deep and primal, I swear I feel it everywhere. Not just inside, but under my skin, in my blood, in the places I thought were untouchable.
When it’s over, he stays there, breathing hard against my neck, both of us tangled in heat and sweat and something neither of us dares name.
He presses a kiss just beneath my ear and whispers, “Amen.”
His breath warms the hollow of my neck, slow and ragged, chest rising and falling against mine. He's still hard inside me, still holding me open around him, like he carved a place for himself inside of me, and now he refuses to leave.
I shift beneath him, sensitive and overstimulated, but craving more.
He feels it.
“Fuck,” he growls, barely lifting his head. “You’re still clenching around me.”
I can’t answer. My throat is raw from crying out his name, and my body is still reeling. But I want it again. Deeper. Slower. Meaner. Whatever way he’ll take me.
His hand finds my jaw, thumb dragging across my lower lip.
“You got one more in you?”
I nod, dazed. “Yeah.”
“Thought so.” He kisses me, slow this time, but no less intense. He tastes like sweat, and sin, and ownership.
Then he starts to move again.
The pace is different now. No urgency, no rush. Just long, deliberate thrusts that make me feel every inch of him, every inch of myself. I’m sore, stretched, and already unraveling all over again. And he doesn’t let me hide from it.
“You feel that?” he murmurs. “That’s me, inside every part of you.”
I nod again, eyes fluttering.
“You’re taking my cock so good, princess,” he continues, breath thick and filthy. “Like you were made for it. Like you’ve been waiting for me.”
“I have,” I whisper.
A flicker crosses his face. That dark, disarming softness only men like him know how to wear. He leans in close, lips brushing my ear.
“Say it again.”
“I’ve been waiting for you.”
“Good girl,” he rasps.
He thrusts harder, just once, and I cry out, nails digging into his arms. “Oh, God.”
“You don’t pray to him anymore. You pray to me now.”
I moan, already close again. The rhythm of his hips becomes punishing, reverent. My name falls from his lips, a benediction wrapped in the grit of everything he isn’t supposed to feel. He reaches between us again, fingers finding my clit, circling in time with his thrusts.
“You gonna fall apart for me again, baby?”
“Yes,” I gasp.
“That’s right,” he growls. “Break for me.”
And I do. Loud, feral, helpless. Another orgasm crashes through me harder than the first, stealing sound from my throat and thought from my head. I can feel him losing it too, his rhythm unraveling, his jaw tight, every muscle locked.
He thrusts one last time and holds himself there, deep inside, groaning my name like it’s the only thing keeping him grounded.
When it’s over, he collapses beside me, dragging me into his chest, still breathing hard.
The room is silent, save for the sound of our bodies cooling, the mess we made between us still warm.
He kisses the top of my head and mutters, “Guess I found something worth believing in.”