3. Chapter 3 #3
A sick part of me wanted to demand a kiss right then and there, to taste the blood on his mouth and force him to give it up. But that wasn't my place anymore, and it was all his fucking fault. I hated it. I hated the bitter taste of knowing I had to check myself with a man who used to belong to me.
I stared back up at him through my lashes, my upper lip curling into a dark smirk.
Being choked by a man who was terrified of me felt so damn good.
It meant I had total control over his sanity.
Seeing the amused look in my eyes made him realize how useless hands on my throat really were.
His grip loosened before a long sigh slipped past his lips as he backed off, deeply exhausted.
He backed out of the bedroom, keeping his distance as he led the way out into the quiet of the living room just to get some breathing room between us.
I followed him at my own pace, casually slipping the piece back.
"Was I really that easy to get over?"
Quan groaned, his shoulder slumping against the doorframe. "Danni... please don’t start this shit."
I rolled my eyes and marched into his kitchen.
I grabbed a clean dish towel from the counter, ran it under the cold tap, and walked back over to him.
Without asking, I gripped his jaw, tilting his head up to dab at the fresh, split skin where the gun barrel had caught him.
He winced, his eyes darting with irritation, but he didn't pull away.
"Why don't you just call like a regular ex?" he muttered. He knew I wasn't normal; he’d known it for years. "And do you keep forgetting that you broke up with me?"
I stopped dabbing the cloth against the blooming bruise and tossed the damp towel straight at his chest. "That was because you cheated."
"Was it because we didn't have sex?"
He looked genuinely hurt by the question, his voice dropping an octave. "No. I knew you were abstinent and I always respected that."
"But you just couldn't respect our commitment?"
He went quiet.
"So me sucking your dick with ice meant nothing?" I spat out, the memory left a bitter taste in my mouth.
Quan’s eyes flicked back toward the locked bathroom door, a quick, panicked check to see if the bitch inside was listening. He quickly shifted, covering his boxers with one hand and holding the other out in a defensive hush. "Danni, chill out. Stop being so fuckin’ disrespectful."
Seeing the effect I still had on him was a high.
His elevated pulse, his heavy breathing, the way his eyes tracked my every movement did something to me.
But seeing him give a damn about the woman he was hiding?
Watching him protect her while standing in front of me?
Yeah, that fucked me up. A cold rage twisted through my chest.
I should have put a bullet in her forehead when I had the gun against her face.
"So I wasn't really special to you?" I murmured.
Quan let out a dark, breathless chuckle. "We both know you as special as they come."
"Don't fucking play with me," I responded. "I'll fuck you up, Quan."
His jaw was set and locked my gaze. "You ain't gon’ do shit to me."
Quan took a step back toward me. He wrapped his fingers around the front of my neck again, pinning me with just enough force to make my lungs work for air.
Leaning down until his mouth brushed my ear, he rasped, "Stop being so fucking crazy before you get fucked up."
Feeling his fingers tight around my throat while he hovered over me made my skin prickle. It was sick. It was twisted, but feeling that power hit me right in the chest, turning me on all over again.
When he pulled back, his eyes dropped to my mouth. He didn't ask before he pressed his lips hard onto mine.
His tongue slipped into my mouth, tasting of iron and heavy adrenaline.
I grabbed him and shoved him backward until his knees hit the living room couch. He fell back, and I immediately climbed him, straddling his lap.
I tangled my fingers deep into his hair, yanking his head back until his neck was stretched wide open to me.
I drove my mouth hard into his, smothering whatever sound he was trying to make.
I bit down on his bottom lip, feeling the skin yield under my teeth.
His fingers dug deeper into my windpipe, cutting my oxygen down to a thread, but the heat pulling through my gut only burned hotter.
I kept my weight pressed against his chest, grinding our mouths together until he was breathing my air and tasting his own blood.
It was an intoxicating poison, until the fog suddenly cleared.
What the fuck am I doing?
I broke the kiss, reeled my arm back, and delivered a stinging slap across his jaw. Then, I threw myself off his lap, scrambling back onto my feet. I aggressively wiped my lips with the back of my sleeve, scrubbing at his taste, his blood, and the disgust washing over me.
Quan slumped back against the couch cushions, clutching his jaw as a deep, agonizing groan tore from his chest.
"Stop fucking hitting me!"
I tried to control my breathing, punishing myself for being so impulsive.
"You got a whole kingdom to run," he said softly, breaking the silence. "And you and I both know I'm not a prince or a king."
I rolled my eyes. There he was, doing that ignorant thing he always did; downplaying himself because he was a messy, regular man with a regular sales job and regular habits. The most money he had ever touched at one time was two thousand dollars, and there wasn't a drop of royalty in his lineage.
In spite of all that, when we met at that party years ago, the math just worked.
We fit. He hadn't flinched when I laid out my diagnosis, admitting the exact way my brain was wired.
If anything, it had made him open up more, which in turn made me lower the shields.
I still kept things back, but I had let him in. We both knew it.
He saw me analyzing him and shook his head. "You know you're too good for me."
"Stop taking the easy way out of this."
"What else do you want from me?" he asked quietly.
"Your heart," I replied instantly.
He let out a low chuckle, his eyes rolling toward the ceiling. "Then go get the knife and come get it."
“Fine.”
I walked into the kitchen, grabbed a pairing knife from the block, and walked right back.
He didn't flinch. He didn't even blink as I leaned over him and let the tip of the steel blade tap against the center of his chest. But as the metal pressed into his skin, something in my forearm froze.
The calculation wouldn't complete; I couldn't cause him real harm. He knew it, too.
His eyes stayed locked on mine, completely still.
Furious at my own failure to strike, I whipped my arm back and hurled the knife across the room. It buried itself deep into the drywall.
"Why don't you just admit that you love me—"
"I can't... do that," I interrupted quietly. "You know that."
"But I was yours though, right?"
I nodded as he stood back up. He leaned forward to press a soft, lingering kiss against my forehead.
"I will always be yours in some way," he murmured against my skin. "But you gotta let me go."
I rolled my eyes, the absolute fury rushing back because why couldn't he just be better? "You never deserved me."
He nodded, unbothered by the truth of it. "I know."
"I should kill you."
"You should."
I wiped the rest of his blood off my upper lip, my eyes drifting back toward the locked bathroom door.
"...Was she a good fuck?"
He tried to suppress a smirk, his lips twitching as he looked down at the floorboards, still cupping his wounded jaw. "Oh, the worst. It was an absolute nightmare."
The corner of my mouth twitched, dark reflex I couldn't filter in time. His eyes locked right onto it.
"You still do that?" he murmured softly.
"You know I really..." I trailed off, the words sticking in my throat. I hated explaining myself, and I hated how easily he could read the small cracks in my wall.
He nodded as he looked at me. "I know. Trust me, I know. And I doubt I'll be the last man you leave a mark on." He opened his arms wide, inviting me into his chest.
I eyed the gesture coldly, keeping my stance rigid. "I don't do hugs."
"You do with me," he rasped. "Come here, you sick monster."
The rest of my smirk slipped out before I could lock my face back down. I dug my face into the crook of his neck, wrapping my arms around his waist tight enough to squeeze the air out of his lungs.
I squeezed harder as the possessive sorrow twisted through my gut.
"Why did you traumatize her?" he asked into my hair, his hand cupped the back of my head.
"The same reason you fucked her," I muttered into his collarbone, feeling his pulse jump against my lips. "Doing reckless shit just for the hell of it.”
“Mhmm. I’m going to miss you, Adanna.”
“I know.”
He chuckled while his arms tightened around me as the heavy quiet of the apartment settled over us.
***
The morning sun was just beginning to peek over the horizon, bleeding a pale amber light across the water as I pulled through the gates of the fortress.
I walked in through the reinforced doors and dropped my weapons onto the entry table.
Dawn meant Aunt Idris would already be up, nursing her first cup of coffee.
I bypassed the main, main kitchen on the ground floor and took the rear stairs up to the smaller, private family galley. It was a more intimate space, wrapped in glass that looked out over the estate.
When I walked in, Idris was standing by the floor-to-ceiling windows. Her fingers curled around a steaming mug as she peered out at the tide crashing against the blend of sand and marsh grass below. She didn’t turn around when the floorboards shifted beneath my boots.
"Nice of you to come back home, niece," she said.