Chapter Eight #2
Ecstatic . I reply telepathically. Suddenly I want to laugh because wow, Raven has really gotten under our skin if we can communicate with just body language, blinking, and eye rolls.
But I keep my features in check, his eyes on me and mine on his as I begin to tell him everything about the Syndicate.
About the different tiers in the brotherhood, how before being initiated it’s all about the thrill of the hunt, finding ingenious ways to get away with murder.
Once the case officially turns cold or the coroner releases the body without abnormal findings or anything that could lead to a homicide case, that’s when you’re initiated.
I tell him about how some commit their murder their freshman year and don’t get their cloaks until their senior year.
The night they graduate from a black cloak to a red, they’re branded on the ribs.
When I tell him this and show him the brand on my ribcage, he pales, realizing that yes, I murdered someone and got away with it.
What I don’t tell him is how I killed Jacob Cartwright, Paris, or their unborn child.
That to me, is still my dirtiest secret.
The one I’ll take to the grave, the one I know will never escape my future wife’s lips, and the one he doesn’t deserve to know.
When I'm finished, his gaze shifts to Raven. “So there was a hit placed on you then?”
My girl, who has stopped eating, looks down and nods her head, inhaling before raising her hands.
She looks pained, nervous about whatever she’s about to tell him, but Damon rubs her thigh, and I put my hand on the small of her back.
I reassure her that she only has to tell him what she wants him to know, and Damon backs me up on that.
She asks him to translate for her, and her hands move more quickly.
I wasn’t expecting her to tell Maverick everything about the night of her attack, being in the asylum, being released into bi-weekend home visits after being at Lorne Wood Falls Mental Institution and weaning herself off her medication in order to think clearly, figuring out her night terrors were more, her loneliness, the isolation she felt, the depression, but she does.
She doesn’t incriminate herself, but she also doesn’t claim herself as innocent.
Maverick looks sick the longer she signs and when she’s done, tears are welling on the rims of her eyes, threatening to fall but she shakes them away.
“At first, I didn’t think I could trust you.
But then I realized, I didn’t want you to see me in a bad light because you…
saw… me. All of you do. But you, you didn’t know my story and somehow knew what I needed, and then I fell in love with you, and the more I wanted to keep you away from all of this because I was selfish…
and just wanted to be delusional in thinking it was all okay.
Because when I was with you, it was just us and nothing else mattered.
I was simply yours. The three of you make the extra noise in my head stop.
And I… felt safe… alive .” Damon translates, his voice rasping on that last word and my heart breaks for her again, wanting to go to her so I can fix whatever he broke.
I can do that for her. There may always be a Harrington-sized hole in her chest but over time, I’ll make sure he’s nothing but an afterthought.
Maverick’s chest slowly rises and falls at her stark revelation that she’s in love with him, paling further he looks ghostly.
She slips down from her bar stool beside me and walks around to him, placing her hand on his cheek, swiping her thumb across his cheekbone. His eyelids flutter but I watch him go ramrod straight, not letting himself relax into her and she sees it, too. My heart breaks for her.
“I…t’s… oh…kay i-i-if y-y-you.. d..don’t love mmm… me… any… any… mmm… more.”
His eyes go wide. She turns and leaves us to go upstairs, stoic for now, but I know when she’s in the shower, she’s going to let the water hide her tears. Because I know my girl. I know her heart like she knows mine .
I half expected him to run after her; to chase her and apologize so we can put all of this behind us and work together. But he stays planted in his seat looking like he’s about to lose the three barely digested noodles.
Good. I hope he fucking hurls as soon as he gets home. I hope he can’t sleep, and he tosses and turns and can’t eat. I hope his pillow is warm on both sides and they make his favorite book into a movie – not a series – and ruin it.
“She’s talking?”
Damon’s gunmetal eyes glisten. “I took her to the best neurologist in the country. One that doesn’t report to the Monroe family.
They found an old contusion in her brain from the night of her attack.
It affects her speech but mostly, her vocal cords are weak from no use.
She sees a speech therapist twice a week.
We have her read to us every night for twenty minutes.
For you , Maverick. Because you asked her to speak.
We were content with her signing. Content with her little icy glares and blinks…
but you asked something of her that requires her to be out of her comfort zone.
Even though she hates it, she did it for you. ”
I stare at my cold noodles, the soft-boiled egg on top half hidden under veggies and bamboo.
“I love when she reads to me. Weirdly it makes me feel like I’m being useful when a lot of the time, I feel use less .
I know sometimes she’s trapped inside her mind.
It must be chaos – all those words up there…
but I want to know them all. I don’t care if she only signs to me or simply expresses everything she feels via body language and facial expressions.
I always want to know how I can make it better…
then I think I do. I think I have a handle on things because she had a good day.
Because she went to bed smiling. Because she’s safe in my arms.” I rise and stare down at Maverick.
“But every fucking night since you shoved her away, she sleepwalks. She slips away from me, from us because you threw her away.”
“I didn’t-“
“And that’s fine .” I wipe the angry tear that escaped me with the back of my fist that I want to punch him with.
“She’s had enough people she loved pushing her away, thinking she’s everything but perfect when she is.
And you piece of shit motherfucker,” I grit my teeth so hard the roots hurt, fists shaking at my sides but then point to the stairs with one hand.
“She loves you… and you threw her away like she was defective.”
“She’s not de-“
“ I know that!” I get in his face and point to myself. “ I fucking know she’s not, you self-righteous prick. But it’s fine. It’s fine . I love her enough for the both of us. I could love her enough for the three of us and I do.”
“Then don’t let her do this anymore.”
I scoff then, laughing in his face. “Because the cops will help? More than half the cops here are in the Syndicate’s pockets. More than half of the FBI are in their pockets, too.”
“I can help-“
“And drag us down, too?”
“I have friends-“
“Oh, that’s fucking rich. You have friends ?” I mock, “We were your family, and you threw us away, too.”
“Jonas, I-“
“Save it, Harrington. I’m so goddamn tired of hearing your non-excuses.
You’re a fucking coward and that’s all you are.
” I shake my head, dismissing him again because I’ve had more than enough of his presence tonight.
“You know everything now. Do what you will. Turn me in. Turn in Damon. Whatever. But at least do it after she gets her answers. Give her that, at least. But her? Don’t talk to her unless it’s to apologize or leave her alone altogether.
We got this. We got her. Just stay out of it. ”
He opens his mouth, but I’m done. I turn and leave him behind, going upstairs to see if my girl needs me.
I find her in her room, in her bed under a heavy lilac duvet turned with her back towards me when I enter.
I strip to nothing but my boxer briefs and climb into bed with her, pulling her as close to me as I can, inhaling that delicious jasmine and berries scent that clings to her skin, wanting it to cling to mine and lean over to kiss her temple when I feel her sigh deeply.
“Have I ever told you about George?”
She turns in my arms to face me and shakes her head.
I grin. “You know the big ugly gargoyle on the bell tower?”
She nods once .
“That’s George.” I chuckle softly. “The day you walked on campus, I was up there scoping the place out, talking to him,” she arches a brow, “Hey, think what you want but he’s a great listener.”
She pushes me to my back, and puts her chin on my chest, big whiskey eyes staring at me waiting for me to continue.
“I watched you get out of Axel’s douche car through my binoculars.
I hadn’t even seen your face and I wanted you.
” I recall. “Then you came into the dining hall and fuck, baby, I just had to get to know you. It was such a coincidence I saw you going to the pond the next day and then I followed you there. I tell myself it was to make sure you were safe, but I’ll be honest – it felt like divine intervention.
Like I was meant to find you… fuck, I made Miss Overly switch my schedule just so I could have a reason to talk to you. To get to know you.”
She twirls her finger at the side of her head, and I laugh.
“I’m crazy, for sure, baby. But… I’m crazy for you.
And only you. I’m near you and I need to be closer.
I’m inside of you, and it’s not enough. When I’m away from you, I feel like I’m drowning.
But then I see you again and I can finally breathe right.
You have totally and completely consumed whatever sanity I had left, and I don’t ever want it back.
You’re my heart, baby. Every beat of it is yours. ”
“Jonas…” I wait for her to keep going because I know she has to form her words.
“You… are… mm… my sss… soul. I… I love you.” She says clearly.
She always says ‘ I love you’ so fucking clearly like it’s the only thing she’s ever sure of, and my heart drops and bounces and recoils and beats erratically, making every sinew and fiber of my being erupt and mend because I never tire of hearing her tell me she loves me. “Aw… always.”
“Always, baby?”
“Mmm.” She grins and crawls up my body, straddling me then lowering her head to mine, her lips so close that when she whispers, “ Always ,” I feel the soft skin of them against mine before she kisses me hungrily.
It takes no time before her oversized band tee and our underwear to get lost under the sheets and she’s notching me at her hot, slick opening. We both groan when I’m fully seated inside of her, wrapped in her perfect, tight, wet heat .
“That’s my beautiful fucking girl, Raven baby. Ride my dick.” Her hips undulate, her clit against my pelvic bone, seeking her climax. Though my eyes are closed, they still roll back, forever lost in a frenzy when I’m inside of her. “It’s so good. Fucking perfect, baby.”
“Jonas!”
My eyes cross at the rasp in her voice when she says my name.
It’s a war of tongues and lips, swallowing the other’s moans because I can’t fucking get enough of the feel of her under my hands, around my cock, her skin on mine, can’t get enough of the way she kisses me like she loves me.
Like she can’t fathom a life without me, and I return it tenfold, because I can’t either.
She’s my present and my future, I had no past before her, and I want no future without her.
I dig my heels into the mattress, finding enough purchase to meet her bounces with my thrusts until I hold her still with one arm, the other in her hair, eyes rolling to the back of my head.
“I fucking love your pussy, baby. It’s too fucking good.
You’re beautiful. Perfect. Always so ready for me.
Fuck, I love you, I love you, I love you. ”
“Jonas, please!”
“Always such a good girl for me, aren’t you, baby? Taking my dick like my sick little slut. Are you sick for me baby?”
“Yes!” her rasp sends chills throughout my body like shivers of electricity crackling and fuuucccckkk if that doesn’t spur me further into bliss.
“Arch your back a little more baby, let me hit that spot. I feel you, baby. So tight. So wet. So fucking perfect. Say it again baby.”
“I love you.”
Fuck yes. “Again.”
“I… ugh ! Love you.”
I can feel her pussy beginning to flutter, my balls aching for release, drawing up, every nerve ending frying and rewiring. “Again baby, I’m so fucking close.” I lick up her neck, loving the feel of her hard nipples pressed against my chest.
“I love you.” Fuck yes. “I love you.”
I go cross- eyed when her pussy strangles my dick – a hair-trigger for me and shudder, feeling her milk every fucking drop from me as I cum, cum, cum until I can’t anymore.
If her soul is mine, then mine is hers and I want her to take, take, take it from me until they’re woven together so I can find her in every lifetime.
I kiss her cheek, staying inside because I want my cum to stay inside, too even though I can feel it already leaking out around me. “I love you, too.”
We fall asleep like that. For the first time, since Paris, she doesn’t sleepwalk.
She doesn’t have night terrors. We sleep a full nine hours.
And when we wake up, I make sure to remind her with my dick, how perfect I think she is in front of the bathroom mirror with her bent over and her ass bouncing against my hips.
Because I love her enough to know exactly what I have – a fucking treasure, and I’ll never let her go.