Chapter 28
TWENTY-EIGHT
GEMMA
Grim pulled back, touching the spot I’d bit him, blood staining the pads of his fingers red. I had half a second to feel the rush of terror, the sane part screaming, What the fuck did you do? His gaze darkened into something lethal, and with a deep, guttural noise, his lips crushed mine.
Grim didn’t kiss like he fucked.
Grim fucked like he was dying, vicious and violent. Grim kissed like he had already died, and this was heaven. He kissed me like I didn’t have a knife biting against his neck. A toe-curling possession oozed from his soft yet demanding lips.
If we were a fairy tale, this kiss would have been under the stars. Not here, while a body bled out at our feet.
But Grim and I weren’t a fairy tale.
Grim sucked on my bottom lip, pulling it out with a bite I felt in my toes. I gasped and he pushed his tongue into my open mouth, punishing.
I leaned into it. Addicted to the dichotomy. Somehow both gentle and rough, demanding and imploring.
Possessive.
With each swipe of his tongue, he claimed me. Ruined me for anyone else.
He tasted like some dark, secret liquor. Something spicy but also sweet, heady like good liquor, illicit and not meant for human lips.
Ambrosia. The drink of the gods.
I moaned and his mouth slanted to pull me deeper, as if trying to swallow my sounds. One hand slid down my body, around my back, up to my neck, back into my hair—touching all of me like it was the last time.
Grim forced me closer, the knife cutting deeper into his flesh until sprigs of blood dotted his flesh like Christmas holly.
Grim wanted this. I couldn’t pull back if I tried.
Blood dripped down his neck, and an insane part of me liked it, wanted to mix it with mine so even if he tried to leave me, he never could. I’d be stuck inside him.
Maybe my breathing got too raspy, or my heart beat too loud, because it was like he knew what I was thinking.
His teeth scraped my bottom lip, groaning. “My fucked-up princess.”
His kisses grew frenzied and bruising, lips traveling down my neck, mouth a searing-hot brand on my flesh, alternating between tongue, lips, teeth against the muscle.
The butterflies in my belly electrified, shock waves of heat rolling through my body.
Grim spoke a mix of English and Spanish, my skin prickling with each hot whisper against my flesh.
So fucked up.
Jodida princesa.
Te voy a hacer mía.
So perfect.
And when Grim said it, I…I felt perfect.
Our eyes opened at the same time. Lips wet, eyes heavy, the Grim I saw on the beach was back. His mask gone. I wanted to burn the way he looked at me into my brain. My teeth tingled with it. Like he wanted to fuck me. Kill me. Right here.
His Adam’s apple bobbed jagged with a swallow.
He was still holding back.
“Grim…”
His breath was hot on my lips. “What, mi locura?”
I fell apart. Shattered into a tiny, million pieces of pure pleasure as the nickname slid across my skin.
“Please.” I scored my nails into his neck. “Please, Grim. Please.”
I heard myself as if from underwater. Gemma Crowne didn’t beg, but whoever was speaking had no shame. She begged and pleaded with Grim, scythed nails into his neck and repeated it over and over again: please, please, please.
Fuck me.
Please.
I need you inside me.
I was scorching. Heated. Twisted.
So maybe that was why I didn’t notice the change in Grim until it was too late.
His mask was back. Eyes cold and iron, mouth a solid line. But he gently swiped his thumb down my cheek, almost as if petting me.
“Do you think your pussy is so magic I’ll forget why I’m here?” His words settled icy on my hot skin. “I’ve already been inside you, Rich Girl—it’s not.”
Any lingering warmth vanished.
Whatever spell had been cast shattered like glass at our feet. Grim stepped back, adjusting his cock with a casual indifference that made my throat dry.
As he adjusted, he flashed the fresh tattoo. My fucking teeth. My nails were inked into his chest, my mouth on his hand. Why? Why the fuck would he do that?
I still gripped the knife, maintaining some facsimile of control. He eyed it and laughed.
I don’t understand what changed, why he went from whispering beautiful things against my skin to this. At the same time, I knew I shouldn’t have been surprised.
Everything was a game to Grim.
So this was worse than anything we’d done over the years, because for a moment I’d let him back inside, into my fucking soul again.
White-hot anger slid inside my veins. I focused on that, on the tightness in my skin and the scream lodged in my throat like a broken tortilla chip, rather than the dull, bruising ache in my heart.
“You ripped me out of the ocean,” I said. “Have held me hostage for five fucking years. You can’t just—”
He spun, slamming my back against the sink before I could blink, caging me. “What? I can’t what?”
“I didn’t want this contract.” With two hands I shoved his chest, but he barely moved. “You put those lines on your chest without my consent.”
“What contract was that again?”
My lips parted, but I said nothing—tongue-tied.
“Right…” He dragged the word out, lips twisting up—fucking cocky. “Because you can’t fucking say it. Nah, you’ll do what Gemma Crowne does best, pretend you’re just like everyone else.”
He stepped off like he’d won.
“You promised to kill me, Santos,” I said. “You can’t put a line on your chest without putting a bullet through my skull.”