THIRTY-TWO #2
His hand fisted into the fabric at my lower back, dragging my dress upwards in frantic, jerking pulls, exposing my thighs until the hem was bunched at my hips.
The other tangled in my hair, grip tight enough to sting, but perfect enough to draw a moan from me.
Want. Need. Obedience – all in the same breath.
‘I told you not to fucking run,’ he snarled against my mouth, each word biting, brutal.
He pulled back just enough to drag his gaze over me.
His eyes devoured every exposed inch like a man assessing what was his.
Like a beast reuniting with its chain.
‘Now look what you did…’ He pressed into me, rolling his hips until I felt the full weight of his length grinding against the already soaked fabric of my panties.
I gasped, my spine arching off the wall.
‘Touch me,’ he rasped. ‘Like you fucking did before.’
‘Cain…’ I whimpered, but not in protest.
He dragged his nose along the column of my neck, breathing me in with the desperation of a man about to commit a crime. As if he needed my scent to moor him to survive this. ‘That’s it, say my name.’
His lips brushed my skin in threat of a kiss. ‘Touch me, Paula.’
Then he grabbed my hands, guiding them up—
And pressed his face into my palms like a prayer.
His breath was fire. His stubble scraped. His body vibrated against mine.
Something unleashed inside me.
A need I couldn’t smother; a madness that matched his.
Tangling my fingers into his thick hair, I fisted hard, yanking him into me.
With a raw groan, he bit down lightly on the side of my neck.
His hands found my thighs and gripped, digging into flesh as if he needed to bruise me to believe I was real.
Then he lifted me up, dragging me against him, pulling me into his heat as if he could absorb me – merge me with him, fuck the masks out of existence.
Wild and heavy, his breath tore through the air, his cheek pressing into mine.
‘Say my name, little angel.’
I did. Without hesitation.
He took my mouth again, stealing the breath out of me.
‘Why did you leave?’ The question broke from me, fragile and shaking as my hands gripped the front of his shirt. The words hung there shakily, as if they’d been lodged in my throat for days and only now had the strength to tear out.
He locked in place – not loosening his grip, not letting go – as if I’d disappear the second he did.
And maybe I would. Into nothingness.
‘Isn’t it obvious…’ he rasped, his hands roaming all over my body. ‘Obsession…’ he murmured, dragging his teeth along my jaw, nipping the corner of my lips, his breath scorching. ‘Addiction. I can’t stop, Paula.’
The hard shaft was already pressing into my belly with a dark promise of more.
I spread for him. Needing to feel him again. ‘We can’t. Not here.’
‘We’re fucking doing this right here,’ he rumbled, pressing me harder into the tiles. His hand released my hair, slid down, and wrapped around my throat the way it used to: gentle, possessive, absolute.
‘They’re just behind that door,’ I hissed, voice barely there.
‘I don’t give a damn.’ His tone dropped between a threat and prayer.
‘Cain…’ I croaked, his scent flooding my senses. Spice and sin and him.
‘You’ll be a good… quiet girl while I fuck you right here.’
Oh… my God.
His hand ripped off my thong in a single, swift motion.
He sank to his knees before I could answer, his breath ghosting hot between my thighs, palms urgently tracing up my calf. Fingers spreading, guiding, forcing my leg up and open.
‘Fuck, Cain, stop! They’re—’
The protest fell apart into a gasp as his mouth met my soft heat. His moan vibrated against my skin, the rough scrape of his five-o’clock shadow sending shocks up my spine.
I bit my lip until I tasted blood, my fingers tangling into his hair as he nipped and licked and damned me more with each move.
His name burned through my mouth.
And when his lips sealed around my clit, I nearly cried out.
I needed him – needed him violently lost in me.
I teetered on the edge, seconds from madness. He growled into me before he spread me further with his other hand, thumbs dragging along the crease of my thigh as if he were prying open a secret he already owned.
Then his tongue scuffed over that aching bundle of nerves again with a hard and punishing stroke—
And again.
And again.
Each pass shattered me a little more.
My hips rolled greedily into the rhythm he dictated, as if my body had been attuned to move for him only. Desperate to be branded again—
Not by Ghost.
By Cain.
Cain, who’d bled for me. Protected me. Who had haunted every inch of my damned soul.
He didn’t stop. Not when I gasped his name. Not when I whispered, ‘Please.’
Not when my body began to tense and coiling and shake…
Almost fucking there—
And just when I tipped, just when the world began to blur—
He stopped.
Wrenched his mouth off me like a final breath torn from blazing lungs.
And the emptiness felt cruel. A sob clawed up my throat.
Footsteps? Quick. Behind the door.
Voices.
The living room – they were back.
Cain surged, his lips wet with me, eyes black with desire—
He picked me up with sure hands and a bruising grip, setting me down hard on the narrow cabinet to the side of the sink. My dress bunched at my waist again. The cold surface bit into my thighs.
And then he drove in – one ruthless thrust. One complete possession.
I arched, mouth parting on a cry. His hand caught it as he clamped his palm over my lips. His body was anchored deep inside mine, shaking.
My scream dissolved against his skin.
But the truth of it – the ache, the claiming, the need – pulsed between us louder than any words.
His thumb brushed the edge of my cheek as he held his hand pressed in place.
‘Things I want to do to you now…’ he rasped into my ear as he began to fuck into me; deep, punishing thrusts that sent shockwaves straight through my spine.
‘Stay quiet,’ he whispered, his breath warm. His voice lethal. ‘You hear me, little angel?’
I gave a weak nod, eyes wide, already slick with tears from the effort of holding back my release – and bliss… for having him back.
‘Good girl,’ he rasped, rolling his hips again, slower this time, deeper. My legs shook against the cabinet edge as heat spiralled up my spine.
Then he pressed his lips to my ear again.
‘I want you to feel everything we never did… every night I wasn’t inside you.’
His voice broke through me, dragging shame to surface, curling it into something molten and filthy. ‘I want you to come on my dick while they sit outside that door. While they talk like you’re not taking me like a good—’ a strangled sound escaped him as he hit the right spot, ‘—good girl.’
And as if summoned, we heard it—
Genevieve’s voice, muffled. ‘Maybe five more minutes, then we pick it back up?’
Vinnie’s baritone followed close. Too casual.
I flinched.
Cain’s other hand moved to cradle my neck.
His mouth brushed mine as his fingers slid away, trailing heat as his pace picked up and I could feel him everywhere.
‘Fuck, is it really you?’ A whisper.
‘Yes,’ I breathed.
I whimpered, feeling that familiar sting of pain as his hard length filled me and took from me all at once.
‘Oh, I’m going to fill up every fucking hole in your body, Paula.’
The promise had me shuddering against him. My thighs clenched, pulling him deeper into me as watched the desolation with open delight.
‘I’m going to make you remember what it means to be full of me. Mouth…’ He swiped his thumb over my lips and bit down under my ear. I groaned. ‘…cunt…’ I sobbed as my knees began to tremble. ‘…arse…’
‘Cain…’ I murmured against his skin.
‘You’ll cry with my dick down your throat and scream when I stretch your pussy. And when I’m done… when you’re shaking…’ He bit down on the words, battling his own release. ‘When you’re dripping, broken – I’ll do it all over again.’
I breathed him in, eyes closing. ‘Green…’ I whispered.
He tensed. Moved faster.
‘That’s it,’ he murmured, his hand falling to my throat and tightening – just slightly, his rhythm building. ‘Soak me, baby.’
He pounded into me, eyes locked on mine, each thrust like a vow, each snap of his hips erasing the distance we’d forced between us.
His mouth latched onto mine and he took and took and took.
The cabinet creaked underneath. My thighs were already drenched. The edge returned.
Cain dropped his forehead to mine, rumbling low.
He consumed me, heat blooming up my spine as he bit down on my lip.
Each breath now belonged to him – and mine came shallow, stolen, as if the air wasn’t mine to claim any more.
Outside, Genevieve laughed at something.
Inside, I broke.
The orgasm ripped through me brutally; my body arching, clenching, choking on the scream I couldn’t let out.
He held me down with his hand back on my mouth, cock buried deep inside, his pulse thrumming beneath my cheek like a war drum – until his ruin followed.
He spilt into me with a groan that tore through us both – once, twice – before he stilled.
And held.
Breathed.
Trembled.
It had always been him. The shadow I returned to, the fire I crawled back to.
Outside, voices murmured, the world still turned… But in here, the clock had shattered.
The air didn’t move. The heat didn’t leave.
And his breath was still in my mouth, pressing into mine. Sweat cooled between us, chests synced in fractured flutters. My hands were still fisted in his shirt, knuckles white.
The silence wasn’t empty – it pulsed with everything we hadn’t said, everything we couldn’t take back.
There was no returning from this.
Not to masks. Not to fantasy.
Not to before.