Chapter 16
16
I t’s not supposed to be this way.
I’m not the kind of man who simply sees a pretty girl and immediately falls for her.
I’m not some creep who lurks in the shadows, taking what he wants by force.
Yet with her, I’ve crossed so many goddamn lines and boundaries I’m in danger of forgetting the reason this all began.
She’s a sickness… and I don’t know if I’ll ever find the cure. Or desire to discover one at all.
Posey Reed. The girl who I’ve been charged with watching and hunting. Goddamn well infiltrating her life without her knowledge.
I hated myself for so many months when my only task was to continually haunt her.
She doesn’t know how much I’ve violated every part of her existence, and there’s a black fucking hole in my chest filled with dread for the day she eventually finds out and gives me those brown eyes brimming with disgust.
Her breathing shallows, but she’s not asleep. Instead, her muscles twitch, and she drifts somewhere between awake and dreamland or maybe the realm of tormented memories.
I shouldn’t be in this bed with her.
Where I should be is across the hall, lying in my own sheets with aching lungs. A chest that wants to burst from all the words pent up and desperate to spill over and say exactly what I need to. Yet, cannot.
Yes, I was angry with you.
No, I didn’t stay away because of that.
Why did you take so long to walk back?
Why didn’t you ask to be picked up?
I damn near wore a hole in the tiles pacing the kitchen, waiting on you to return.
It only took one glance to know you’re the most gorgeous woman I’ll ever encounter in this lifetime.
I lie flat on my back, hands on my chest, staring into the darkness. Beneath my head sits a pillow that carries her scent like a delicate cloud, surrounding me with a litany of reminders as to why I’m not allowed to grow attached to this girl.
I’ve already texted Grey to let him know about the kitchen. For a man who slices people up day in and day out, he’ll be perfectly at home with the mess out there. The last thing we need is for Poe to walk straight back into the situation that triggered her tonight.
Her hand might need stitches, or it might be able to mend on its own. That’s for us, and possibly another visit from Doc, to determine in the light of day.
We’ve been lying together a while, maybe another hour when I feel it.
Shivering.
It isn’t cold in here at all.
Her muscles clench, and the shock rolls through in small, unrelenting waves .
I’m only surprised it hasn’t set in sooner.
I roll onto my side and reach for her in the darkness. Finding her arms clamped tight around her stomach, her knees drawn up into a ball. God, she’s so tiny and soft, I feel like a bull about to trample this girl into the dirt just by looking at her.
Grey would soothe her. Shushing and crooning and speaking in that low, dulcet tone he’s so masterful with when he wants to be.
Hawke would have found a way to have her forget all about her trauma.
Me? I’m an oaf with nothing, not even words of comfort to offer.
I tug her body in close to mine, even though it fucking kills me to do so. Because now we’re skin to skin. Her cheek against my bare torso. Legs pressed against each other. Acres of contact between our arms where the sleeve of my t-shirt has pushed back, and my forearm bands her tight against me.
This is hell and heaven and ultimately pure torture I don’t want to ever have to walk away from.
I can’t think about the fact she’s got nothing on beneath that shirt. My fucking shirt against her naked, smooth skin.
Jesus.
Running my hand up and down her spine goes a little way to giving me something to focus on, other than the fact I’ve got the girl of my dreams in my arms, and we’re in bed together, and I can’t even fucking tell her how many times I’ve wished to steal a moment like this with her.
She begins to breathe a little easier, and the shuddering subsides. With each glide of my palm, I feel her body melt into mine. I have to squeeze my eyes tight and bite down on my own tongue when I feel her fists unclench, followed by hesitant fingertips discovering a spot to rest against my torso.
My heart is fucking jackhammering .
She can surely hear the frantic beat beneath her ear.
There’s no disguising the way my blood is racing through my body with a hurricane-like force. Even though on the outside, I’m trying my goddamn best to be soothing and calming and let her feel safe enough to get some rest, I’m failing.
My throat works down a thick lump.
Her fingers slide just a fraction, tracing over my skin.
God, I want her hands everywhere. I want to say fuck everything and just flip us on this mattress. I want to show her every single way I’ve been forced to replay fantasies about savoring her body, about owning her the way she enjoys.
Seeing out this initiation, following faceless orders is the worst kind of punishment.
All for the sake of other men and their fancies.
All for those who actually get to have the girl who I’d give anything to make mine.
“ Angel .” Her whisper is so quiet, I’d almost be able to convince myself I imagined her speaking, except her fingers press against me at the same time as she says my name.
My first instinct is to freeze. There’s an edge to her voice I haven’t heard before, the faintest rasp to it that I’m in goddamn dangerous water if I misinterpret in any way.
Rolling over, I flick the lamp onto its dimmest setting, bathing us in a golden glow that won’t hurt her eyes. But it’s imperative I see them.
She’s staring right at me when I turn my body back toward her, and Christ, that look on her face is hesitant and curious and spells my absolute ruin.
I’m the monster put in charge of making sure she was a perfect candidate. Of ensuring she entered this world we inhabit. Now, here she is, inviting me into her bed, and I’m the worst excuse for a man because I’ve taken that first opportunity without hesitation .
Poe licks her lips, eyes slightly hooded as she lies curled on her side, with her dark hair mostly dried into loose waves. It’s too tempting to reach out and sink my fingers into those soft strands. My skin itches with the need to feel that again because I already know what it’s like to do exactly that.
“Would you do something for me?”
I swallow hard.
“Would you kiss me?” There’s such a gentle plea in her tone. I nearly goddamn die hearing those hushed words as they’re uttered into the shadows.
A rumble comes out of me. The closest thing I can manage to giving her a reply.
She deserves so much more.
God, I wish I could.
I want nothing more than to seal our mouths together for the first time and to know exactly how good it feels to swallow down every soft noise I know she’ll make.
There’s nothing I want more at this moment.
As I watch her face fall—as she interprets my silence as denial—I move.
Bracing myself on my forearm, I slide down her body, knocking the blanket aside and sheet back to pool at her ankles. My weight shifts between her soft thighs, and she clutches the sheets. There’s a stiffness in her limbs; her eyes are wide and fixed on me, but as I hover and readjust my weight, I see the way that resistance fades.
I can’t kiss her in the way she means, but hopefully, I can give her what she’s seeking instead.
A shaky breath leaves her lips, mouth hanging open.
I’m lost right now, incapable of changing this course, and hoping to hell that she’s going to take exactly what she needs from this. That’s all it can be, me helping her to escape those memories scratching away inside her mind.
Sliding my palm beneath the hem of the t-shirt, it easily slips up above the crease of her hips. Revealing her exactly as I remember. That sweet little pussy is exposed to me with a tiny landing strip of trimmed curls.
In the dim light, I can already see the glistening evidence, the undeniable arousal there laid out for me. Showcasing everything she needs but hasn’t been able to ask for.
My dick is already painfully hard, rubbing against the mattress through my sweats. This is going to make it a thousand times worse, but I don’t fucking care.
I have to taste her. To finally hear the sounds I’ve been caught in a dream state remembering so often since that night.
Keeping my eyes firmly fixed on hers, I lower my head. Watching for any fragment of a hint that she doesn’t want this, that she’s going to tell me to stop, because I fucking well should, and yet she doesn’t do anything.
There’s no going back when my mouth fastens over her pussy, and I finally get to taste that forbidden part of my every wish come true. To inhale all Poe’s sweetness, and the scent of her cunt, as I kiss her there. Devouring each whimpering noise that pours out of her unrestrained.
My shoulders force her legs wide as I curl my palms beneath that lush ass, holding her in place as I suck and lick and allow all that slickness to coat me.
Poe grips the sheets with her good hand and rolls her hips, chasing my tongue, with tiny noises bursting forward each time I go near her clit, each time I add that extra bit of pressure, followed by exploring lower with my tongue.
Christ, she’s so perfect, and I’m so goddamn addicted already, I don’t know how I’m ever going to stop this.
I don’t care if I never get the chance to experience anything else again. But this?
This is going to spell my fucking doom because I already know. With my bedroom lying only a few feet away, directly across the hall, I know there’s no hope in hell of resisting. I’m going to need to have this sweetest fruit to take and devour over and over until she’s shaking.
“Oh god. Oh god .” Above me, Poe’s losing it.
All my blood has run to my dick. The friction of my pants against each piercing drives me insane as I damn well hump the bed imagining, no, desperately wishing it was her pussy I was pounding into instead.
She lets out a low moan, entirely losing control of her voice as I swirl my tongue over her swollen clit. So I do it again, and again. Each time those sensual noises edge closer to the state I know she wants to stay in. I know she wants to be out of her head. I know she needs this climax to tear her away from a place she doesn’t want to be trapped in.
Except, I can’t be the one to give that to her, as much as I want to. So, I keep teasing and toying with her, letting my tongue roam all over and drown in her sweetness, until the pressure builds low in my spine.
It’s too easy to lose myself with her. She upends me and disarms me, and once again, I lose my fucking mind having her spread out on this mattress.
Sucking the pouting bud of her clit into my mouth, her legs tremble around my head, and she’s so close.
I hear her whine, and have to move, right now.
Tearing myself off her, everything is frantic, as I get to my knees and shove my waistband down. Quickly spitting in my palm, I allow my fist to wrap my rock-hard length and shuttle up and down as she lies there with legs splayed.
“What—why did you stop?” Her dark eyes are glazed with lust, and there’s just enough of a throaty rasp in her voice that if I were a fool, I’d think she wanted me to do more.
“ Please . Please, don’t stop.”
God, I can’t. Don’t beg me, because I’m already so damn close to forgetting everything and saying to hell with it and plunging inside her.
My balls draw up, and the taste of her is everywhere. She coats my mouth, lingers on my tastebuds, and the softness of her pussy beneath my tongue is the last thought that tips me over the edge. I fall forward and brace one palm beside her, aiming the head of my cock at her clit, and the powerful surge shoots forward.
I damn near blank as my cock spurts cum all over her exposed center.
Fuck. Holy fuck.
My chest heaves as I sit back on my heels, with my dick in hand, leisurely stroking through the last remnants of intensity—the sheer insanity. Because she makes me lose touch with reality in a way I can’t begin to understand.
“No. Oh god, I need more. Please. ” Eyes wide, they beg me not to leave her hanging.
I tuck myself away, then jerk my chin toward her non-bandaged hand.
“I—I have to do it?”
A nod.
Get yourself off.
I stay right where I am, watching her unsteady fingers reach down between those soft thighs. The moment she makes contact with the sticky residue I’ve marked her with, is a sight to goddamn savor. Her hand jerks ever so slightly with surprise, before another of those sexy goddamn whimpers escapes her flushed lips.
Poe is so close, perched so perfectly on the edge, that it only takes a few rolls of her finger over her clit to plunge into that oblivion she’s been craving.
Her back arches up, with eyes squeezed shut, and her hard nipples press against the worn material of my t-shirt. The rolling climax sweeps through, leaving her body jerking at the same time as she sobs out small noises of pleasure at the relief of finally being carried away on that wave.
Eventually, her fingers still, and she drags her hand away. Her eyelashes flutter a few times as she comes back to herself, and sees me still there through a hooded, sensual gaze that fucking slaughters me.
Lay my body down right here forever in a grave nestled between her thighs, with the taste of her pussy flooding my senses.
We remain trapped there for a long moment, both breathing in the reality of this secret we now share.
She hums a noise that sounds sleepy and languid, granting me the certainty that even if that’s all we get, I’ve helped her in some way tonight. So, I climb back onto my position on the bed beside her and cover us both, keeping her small body tucked against mine.
I’ll watch over her while she finally sleeps. I can feel her body already slumping against me as the mix of pleasure and exhaustion takes the wheel, allowing her to drift.
I’ll watch over her because that’s my duty in all of this.
To watch the initiate.
That’s all she is.
The whore we’re not allowed to keep.
The girl I can’t seem to go five minutes without thinking about, except she hardly looks my way. Come morning, she might never again, when she wakes up and the impact of this evening has resided. Once the next steps of this game are revealed to her.
When all I damn well want is to hold her close, like this, every night.
I want to hear her breathless gasp followed by that barely-there whine, to feel every divot left in my skin from where her fingernails embed themselves, to take in the way she slams her eyes shut and pleasure flushes her cheeks as she falls apart .
She’s not meant for the likes of us, so why should I treat her any different to the way they’ll treat her?
Assholes who will use her and ruin her.
They’re the type of men who won’t think twice about leaving her bleeding and broken.
And I can’t do anything to stop it.