27. Chapter 27
Chapter 27
Anastasia
G od, what the fuck was that?
Jake just openly admitted to murder in front of me, without a second thought, without hesitation. He’s tied to the very business Noah abandoned, the one he left behind to chase some semblance of a normal life.
So what the hell has Noah gotten himself involved in?
What the fuck did Noah do?
Leaning over the bathroom sink, I brace myself, waiting for the tequila to make an unwelcome reappearance. My reflection stares back at me, pale and shaken, my pupils blown wide with adrenaline. The bathroom is dimly lit, trendy, overstimulating, designed for drunk college kids who need a break from their poor decisions. A sleek couch sits against the wall, meant for those too wasted to stand, too lost in their own haze to function.
I splash cold water on my face, inhaling sharply, grounding myself.
Then the door handle turns.
Shit. I regret not double-checking the lock.
“Someone’s in here-” I start, reaching to shove the door shut.
But he doesn’t give me a chance.
Noah pushes inside, locking the door behind him with a sharp click. His tie comes loose as he tosses it onto the couch, his chest rising and falling with barely contained fury.
I straighten, holding my ground.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” he snaps, his voice low, heated. Like he has any right to be angry.
“Oh, I’m the problem?” I scoff, laughter bubbling up, sharp and humorless. “How about you explain what the fuck you’re doing? Associating with your psychopath of a brother and whatever the hell your clearly fucked-up family business is?” My voice shakes, but I don’t back down.
Noah’s jaw tightens. His fists clench.
“Antonov?” I sneer, throwing his real last name in his face like a weapon. “Is everything you told me a goddamn lie?”
“Yes,” he bites out, taking a step closer. “Every part.”
The words hit like a slap.
I swallow hard, the air thick with something I can’t name.
“Even what you said at your bike-”
“Especially what I fucking said at my bike,” he whispers. His eyes darken, the truth spilling from his lips like something he’s been forced to keep buried for too long. “Every fucking word. A lie.”
My pulse hammers in my ears. I try to make sense of it, try to rationalize, but my thoughts are too loud, too chaotic.
“No. No, you said-”
“I know what I said.” His voice is quieter now, but somehow, it cuts deeper. “I know what I thought I had to say to keep you away from Jake. From my family.”
My breath hitches.
“What did he do to you, Noah?” I whisper. “Those scar-”
His lips press into a hard line, his shoulders tense.
“A reminder,” he mutters. “Of what business my family is really in. Imagine my fear, knowing they still control me. That they now know who you are.”
A shudder rolls through me.
“You left-”
“To keep them away.” His voice drops lower, rough with something unreadable. “Away from the Briars. Away from you.”
The name sends a bolt of confusion through me.
“The Briars?” I whisper. “What the hell do they have to do with anything?”
Noah exhales slowly, stepping even closer, the air between us charged, suffocating.
“You don’t become a name like that in Spokehaven without sacrifice,” he murmurs. “You don’t have a name like Roman and Eden without stirring conflicts with families like mine.”
“And what kind of family do you have, Noah?” I swallow, my throat dry.
He lifts a hand, his fingers grazing my cheek, his touch burning against my skin.
“One that has done bad things,” he whispers, his voice haunted. “One that wants to do worse to the person I care about… to keep me in line.”
His fingers trail from my cheek, down my neck, leaving a path of heat in their wake.
“A family that makes me break promises that should have never been broken.” His touch stops at my collarbone, lingering there like he’s memorizing the shape of me.
“A family that will make me regret this.”
His gaze flicks to the couch, his expression unreadable.
“I’m tired of playing their fucking games.”
Noah cups the back of my neck, his grip firm but desperate, pulling me close until our breaths mingle.
“I need you, Ana,” he rasps, his voice raw, unguarded. “Not just now. Not in secret. I need you. God, I fucking need you.”
His hands. His voice.
It’s like his very existence has been woven into mine, a thread so tangled in my soul that I can’t tell where he ends and I begin.
But I can’t.
I won’t give in so easily.
Noah Ackerman submits to no one. That changes now.
“Then get on your knees,” I whisper, my voice laced with challenge. “And beg for me.”
His eyes widen slightly, lips parting as if he misheard me.
“What-”
“You heard me.” I push him back just enough to break his hold. “Get on your fucking knees and beg for me.” My voice sharpens, years of hurt, months of agony twisting into something lethal. “I spent two months miserable after what you did, and now you come in here pleading? Fucking beg, Noah. Show me this isn’t just another stunt.”
His jaw tightens, his hands flexing at his sides like he’s fighting against every instinct he has.
“Ana, that girl at the bar was just a fucking ploy from Jake,” he says, frustration bleeding into his tone. “Now I know why he forced her onto me. He knew you were there, he knew-”
“I don’t give a fuck about Jake.” My words cut through his like a blade, cold and merciless. “You want to be a fucking man, Noah?” I step closer, tilting my chin up. “Then show me how far you’re willing to go for me.” My voice drops, daring him, pushing him, “Show me, Noah Antonov.”
Something shifts in his eyes. Hesitation. Uncertainty.
But I don’t let him linger in it.
“Or,” I growl, leaning in just enough to let my breath ghost over his lips, “maybe you need a reminder.”
I move toward the couch slowly, deliberately, my every step calculated. Noah’s eyes track my movements, dark and heavy with something barely restrained. Tossing his tie aside, I lower myself into the seat, stretching out, making myself comfortable, making sure he sees exactly what he’s been missing.
“For two months,” I whisper, voice smooth as silk, “I tormented myself in your absence.”
My fingers trail down the front of my body, teasing my own skin, my legs parting with no shame. The air between us crackles, charged with something dangerous, something inevitable. He hasn’t even touched me, but I’m already slick, already aching for him in a way that would be humiliating if I wasn’t so damn determined to make him suffer for what he’s done.
“Two months of wondering what I did wrong,” I murmur, my hand drifting lower, grazing the curve of my breasts.
His breathing hitches. He fists his hands at his sides, like he’s fighting the urge to close the distance, to put his hands where mine are. But he won’t. Not yet.
“Two months of questions,” I continue, my fingers traveling further, stopping at the hem of my dress, playing with the fabric.
Noah swallows hard.
“Two months of missing your touch.”
I hike the dress up just enough to expose my soaked panties, my skin burning under his stare.
“Two months of imagining what it would feel like to have your cock ramming inside me again,” I whisper, my voice laced with sin, my eyes locked onto the way his body reacts.
His jaw clenches, his breathing rough. The blood rushes between his legs, his arousal evident, undeniable.
I have him.
“I would crawl into my bed,” I whisper, dragging my nails over my thigh. “Letting my hand trail down, just like this-”
Slipping my fingers beneath my underwear, I toy with my own slick entrance, teasing myself the way I know he wants to.
“I’d whisper your name into my pillow,” I breathe, tilting my head as I watch him, “wishing it was you touching me… instead of just me.”
A shudder rolls through his frame, but he stays rooted in place, his restraint teetering on the edge of collapse.
Then, with a slow, taunting push, I slide two fingers inside myself, my moan slipping past my lips in a sultry gasp. My heeled feet anchor onto the couch, bracing me as I start a slow, torturous rhythm.
I don’t break eye contact.
I want him to watch.
To see what he abandoned. To suffer for it. To break for me.
And judging by the way his fists tighten, his chest rising and falling in sharp, uneven breaths…
He’s already hanging by a thread.
My fingers work in and out of myself faster, deeper, the slick, obscene sounds filling the air between us. My breath turns ragged, little panting gasps slipping past my lips, teasing him, tormenting him.
I know he hears it.
“Do you hear that, Noah?” I whisper, my voice dripping with sin, my eyes locked onto his. “Hear my fingers fucking what’s supposed to be yours?”
A muscle ticks in his jaw. His grip flexes at his sides.
Then, with a sharp inhale, he palms his arousal, his restraint slipping.
He’s almost broken.
Almost.
Pulling my fingers from myself, I bring them to my lips, my tongue trailing over the tips, slow and deliberate, savoring every bit of my own slickness as I meet his gaze with a knowing smirk.
“Mmm,” I purr, eyes hooded. “Remember that, Noah?”
His breathing shudders, his pupils blown wide, dark with lust.
“Remember how sweet I taste?” I taunt, licking the last of my mess from my fingers, my every move designed to unravel him further.
His control snaps.
“I do,” Noah growls, his voice low, dangerous.
His hands move fast, his belt undone in one sharp pull, his eyes locking onto mine with an unmistakable promise.
“Time to take back what’s mine.”
Noah moves toward me with slow, deliberate intent, lowering himself to his knees between my legs. His eyes are locked onto the mess I’ve made, dark and hungry, his breathing shallow.
Then, glinting in the dim light, a blade appears.
He pulls a knife from his waistband, dragging it between his fingers before letting it hover dangerously close to my needy warmth.
“My family is bad, Ana,” he growls, his voice thick with something almost feral.
The tip of the blade kisses my thigh, a teasing whisper of cold steel against burning skin.
“I am fucking awful.” His eyes flick to mine, holding me captive as he rolls the flat edge of the knife over my damp underwear, pressing just enough to make me shudder.
“I’ve killed people,” he murmurs, his tone void of remorse. “So many.”
The words slither through me like a warning, like a promise.
Then, with one sharp flick of his wrist, the blade slices through my underwear.
A sting, a small knick against my hip, pulls a gasp from my lips, my breath catching as he tears the ruined fabric away, leaving me bare beneath him.
Blood wells at the tiny cut, a single drop sliding down my skin, trailing toward my aching heat.
Noah watches, his gaze darkening, pupils blown wide with something dangerous. Something ravenous.
“But knowing I couldn’t touch you,” he hisses, running the dull edge of the knife along my slick folds, teasing, torturing.
“Knowing someone else could be touching you,” his voice drops to a purr, velvet and wicked, “it was worse than any punishment they ever gave me.”
The mix of pain and pleasure coils in my gut, everything too much yet not enough.
Then, in one swift movement, he jams the knife into the arm of the couch, the blade sinking deep into the leather with a sharp thunk.
His eyes lift to mine, blazing with possession, with unhinged, reckless need.
“Because you are fucking mine, Anastasia Burns,” he snarls.
His fingers curl into my thighs, gripping hard enough to leave bruises.
“And I will fucking undo you.”
Noah’s mouth crashes onto me, his tongue devouring every inch like a man starved, desperate to claim what’s his. He licks me clean, his tongue flicking over the cut on my hip before sealing his lips around it, sucking as his fingers dig into my skin. My moans spill freely, the sound sinful and unfiltered.
Then, with a growl vibrating against me, he moves back, his tongue swirling over my most sensitive spot, relentless and unforgiving. A sharp gasp rips from my throat as his hand lifts, plunging three fingers inside me, stretching me wide without hesitation.
A strangled cry escapes me as he drives into me mercilessly, each thrust forcing my body to jolt, my breasts bouncing from the sheer force of it. My hands tangle in his hair, gripping tightly, pulling him deeper against me. My hips roll, grinding shamelessly into his face, lost in the intoxicating mix of pleasure and dominance.
Then, hesitantly, my fingers trail over his scars.
For a moment, I brace myself, ready to retreat, ready to pull away the second I feel them along his neck.
But before I can, his hands shoot up, gripping my wrists.
He doesn’t push me away.
Instead, he forces my hands back, pressing them to his skin, letting me feel every raised line, every mark of pain and survival.
“No more fucking hiding,” he growls, his breath hot against me, his fingers curling deep, sending a shudder through my body.
A sharp, desperate moan spills from my lips.
“No more lies,” I gasp, my head falling back, my fingers trembling against his scars.
His eyes flick up to mine, dark and smoldering, then without hesitation, he spits onto my already slick heat, his fingers driving in deeper, rougher.
“Keep fucking eating me,” I command, my voice wrecked, breathless.
A low chuckle vibrates against me before he obeys, his tongue lapping, his lips closing around me, sucking with brutal intent. My thighs quiver, my stomach tightens, and the pressure coils dangerously, pleasure building to an unbearable peak.
I’m going to break. I’m going to cum all over his face.
Then, just as I teeter on the edge, Noah rips his fingers away.
“No,” he growls, his voice thick with need, dark with possession.
I barely register the loss before he’s towering over me, his chest heaving, his lips glistening with me.
“You’re cuming on my cock,” he snarls, his grip bruising as he yanks me up.
Spinning me toward the sink, he leans in, his breath hot against my ear.
“Bend over,” he commands, his hands pressing against my hips. “I want you to watch me fuck you in the mirror.”
The knife clatters into the sink, forgotten, as Noah’s hands move with purpose. One grips my hair, yanking my head back just enough to keep me upright, while the other locks around my wrists, holding them firm behind my back. He controls me, keeps me exactly where he wants me as he finally allows me to brace myself against the sink.
And then he ruins me.
He drives into me with unrelenting force, each thrust sending fire through my veins, tearing desperate moans from my lips. Tears spill freely, not from pain but from the overwhelming, unbearable pleasure of him. The stretch, the depth, the way he fills me completely, without mercy, without hesitation, he gives me everything.
My climax creeps closer, tightening low in my stomach, twisting violently. I clench around him, my body on the edge of breaking, my moans growing louder.
“I want to cum,” I gasp, my fingers curling into fists, my body bowing beneath his control. “All over your fucking cock.”
His grip on my wrists tightens. His pace grows brutal.
“You want my cum, Princess?” he growls, his voice rough, dark, deliciously dangerous. His hips snap forward, punishing, relentless. “You want me to fill you up? Make you fucking watch as my cum spills free from your sore, used pussy?”
A shudder racks through me, my nails digging into my palms.
“Yes,” I whimper, my head dropping forward, my body tightening around him, desperate, so close.
“Then tell me,” I snap.
Lifting my head, my eyes meet his in the mirror, my face flushed, my lips parted in pleasure.
“How bad do you want me, Noah?” I pant, my voice thick with need. “How bad do you want to make me yours?”
His breath stutters, his rhythm faltering for the first time. He’s seconds from breaking, his body teetering on the edge just as much as mine.
But then he leans in, his voice rough, raw, dangerous.
“I don’t just fucking want you, Ana.” His cock twitches inside me, his grip punishing, unyielding.
“I fucking need you.”
He yanks my head up, forcing me to look at myself in the mirror, my reflection streaked with pleasure, with tears, with him.
“You wanna know why?” he snaps, his thrusts turning brutal, desperate, his control slipping.
“Why, Noah?” I whisper, teetering on the edge, my release so close it hurts.
His eyes bore into mine, his voice breaking.
“Because I-” His hips slam into mine.
“Am fucking-” His breath stutters, his whole body tensing.
“In love with you.”
That’s it.
There’s no stopping it.
My body shatters.
A strangled moan rips from my throat as my release crashes over me, my body trembling as I come undone around him. His pace stutters, his breath catching before a deep, guttural groan spills from his lips. He buries himself inside me, his release surging, filling me until I feel like I might break apart all over again.
The sound of our pleasure, our bodies still moving together, prolonging the bliss, fills the air, raw and unfiltered.
He doesn’t stop. Not until my legs give out beneath me, my body too spent to hold itself up.
As my knees buckle, he catches me.
Strong arms wrap around me, stopping me from collapsing onto the cold tile. His breath is ragged against my temple as he tucks himself away, his hands firm as they adjust me against his chest. Then, without hesitation, he lifts me, hooking his arms beneath my legs, carrying me effortlessly across the room.
Back to the couch.
Settling down, he keeps me in his lap, my body curled into him, buried in the warmth of his chest. My pulse is erratic, matching his, our breaths still uneven as we try to ground ourselves, to find something solid in the aftermath of what we just did.
I close my eyes, listening to his heartbeat, letting it lull me back to reality.
Then, barely above a whisper, fragile and uncertain, I ask, “D-did you mean it?”
His grip tightens around me, his chest rising and falling in a heavy sigh.
“Yeah,” he murmurs, his voice rough, raw with emotion. “I fucking meant it.”
Swallowing, I lift my head, shifting just enough to cup his face between my hands. His skin is warm beneath my fingertips, his gaze searching mine.
“Do you promise?” I whisper.
Something flickers in his eyes, guilt, hesitation, but then, he raises his pinky between us, a quiet, solemn gesture.
“The first time I promised you something,” he says, his voice hoarse, “I failed.” His lips twitch slightly, almost bitter. “Pretty sure you have to cut my pinky off if I break this one.”
A breathless laugh escapes me, and finally, finally, a small smile breaks across his lips.
I hook my pinky around his, pressing my thumb over his knuckle, watching as he does the same.
His promise is sealed.
His word is solidified.
Then, softly, as warmth blooms in my chest, I whisper, “Then… I think I love you too, Noah.”
His eyes flicker, something shifting, something bright, something alive.
He looks at me like I am the only thing in his world.
Then, with a slow, wicked grin, he leans in, gently laying me back against the couch, his body hovering over mine.
“Think?” he teases, his voice low, warm, dangerous.
His lips brush against mine, his breath tangling with mine, his hands already exploring, already claiming.
“Guess we’ll have to change that,” he murmurs, his grin widening just before his mouth crashes against mine.
God knows how long we were in that bathroom.
All I know is that he is exactly what I need.