4. Rowan
four
Rowan
Two weeks ago
I lie awake next to a warm, naked Dove in our colonial house in Washington, DC. The big willow tree in front of our bedroom whips shadows against the walls, and the midnight breeze seeps through the cracked window, entering my lungs. Dove’s leg is draped over mine, her ash-brown hair spread across my chest as her chest raises and lowers with quiet breaths.
My thumb swipes absently across her bare thigh. I’ve missed her. She’s always here, in our home, like she’s supposed to be. But after her apartment got broken into, I’ve spent most of my nights in the office downstairs, trying to figure out who the fuck is onto her. Whoever did it covered their tracks too well when they deleted that day’s footage from the security cameras.
Not to mention the orange she found on her glass table when I was away in London. I keep thinking about it, driving myself insane because there’s only one person I know who peeled his oranges like that when we were in the army together. But Cole is dead, and I feel fucking crazy for even considering the alternative. The only other option is that someone’s trying to mess with us. I just need to figure out who.
A soft whimper gets my attention and I realize two of my fingers have dipped inside Dove’s pussy. She’s wet, and the silky feel of her wrapped around my skin makes me hungry. I’ve already fucked her twice before she fell asleep in my arms, but it’s not enough. It never is.
The way this woman owns my heart is in no way normal or sane. One minute she’s Cole’s little sister and I leave her crying in front of her house, and the next I’m on my knees for her. She’s my drug. And my fucking kryptonite. She could ask me for anything, anything in this world, and I’d give it to her.
I nuzzle her hair out of her face and she nestles deeper into my chest. My body roars to life, my cock already straining against my gray boxers. Fuck, there’s nothing prettier than the sight of her naked next to me. The juicy crease of her toned thighs, the taut abdomen peaking with her soft and shaved pussy lips, her raspberry-colored nipples and the plump breasts rising up and down with her breathing… my mouth waters, begging me to have another taste.
“I’m going to need to use this pussy again, angel,” I whisper. “Awake or not.”
I wore her out earlier, so I don’t expect her to wake until I work her body. But I don’t mind it at all.
I pull on the sheet that covers her ass and leg, revealing her to me fully, then push her onto her back, her body limp with exhaustion. My thumb drags over her pink nipple as I cup the softness of her breast. I lower my head, taking her nipple into my mouth.
My teeth rake over it and my tongue wraps around it, pulling it away from her body. A moan slips past her lips, and I feel her hands digging into my hair. I smile with her nipple still in my mouth as I work one hand between her legs, putting pressure on her engorged clit.
I let her nipple pop out of my mouth, her breast swaying softly back into place. My tongue darts out, licking the side of it, eating her up like it’s my last meal on execution day.
“Rowan…” she mumbles, her body gently squirming under my shadow.
I pause, but only to grip her slender wrists and pin them above her head with one hand. She gasps, her big hazel eyes fluttering open before they melt into mine. I bring my finger to my lips, tapping them, asking her to be quiet. I love hearing her moan, but right now her voice is mine. And she understands that.
“Good girl,” I whisper the moment her lips close again. “You won’t need your voice until I give it back to you.”
I push my free hand between our bodies, shoving down the front of my boxers and pulling out my hard cock. Stroking it a few times, I then glide it up and down her warm pussy. Her knees bend in the air, giving me full access and a close-up look at the way she coats me with her wetness.
She feels like fucking heaven, and I’m not even inside her yet.
Her lips part, showing me a flash of pink tongue and white teeth, but no words come out, just her scattered breaths. I ease the tip of my cock into her hole and feel her soft muscles clench around me. I pump in and out of the entrance, not going any farther than that. Not yet.
Her eyes roll back, and honestly, so do mine. I’m high on this tight cunt, and nothing, nothing has ever come close to what I’m feeling now. The wet sound of her arousal fills the air, mingled with cute little whimpers that tell me she wants more.
My needy little slut.
Cock in her sweet pussy, my hand grips her hip as I work myself deeper inside. Her face scrunches as she’s still adjusting to my size. She’s so small there’s barely any room inside, but she can take me—she knows she can.
I give her one harder thrust, losing myself in her soft body and the smell of sugared strawberries and summer rain. Her bent knees part more, giving me the sight of her small asshole. I stare down between us, seeing my cock go in and out of her soaked cunt. It grows harder and is on the brink of being painful.
How can I want something so much when I already have it?
“ Fuck .” I let out a ragged breath, fucking her hard. Her breasts bob up and down. She whimpers and bites her lip, wanting to be a good girl for me and stay silent. Her eyes are hooded and glassy, and she tries to move her hands again and again. I keep them pinned down, not giving her the chance.
“A good little cum hole. That’s what you are, angel,” I whisper while panting.
My words spread from her ears down her spine and into her cunt. I can see it in the way she writhes and feel it in the way her muscles clench around my cock. I watch her squirm and plead with her eyes, savoring every second of knowing she’s mine.
I let go of her hip and use my now-free hand to push one finger into her ass. Instantly, her head turns and she hides her face in the mattress. She gets so embarrassed, but she can’t hide her body’s reactions from me. She loves having her ass filled—with toys, my hands, my cock—it doesn’t matter. One day soon, she’ll learn to beg me to fill it with my cum.
“Please,” she cries out, her voice husky from sleep.
I stop fucking her, leaving my cock unmoving in her cunt as I pump my finger in and out of her ass.
Her head tilts back, her body tenses, and her eyes squeeze shut.
There you are.
“Rowan—” she breathes out, her cunt and ass clenching around me at the same time.
I ram myself into her a few more times, feeling my cum spill inside her, claiming her for the thousandth time. I groan at the force of my release, making me loosen my grip on her wrists for a moment too long. She frees herself and brings her hands back into my hair, tugging hard.
I pull my cock out, slick with both my cum and hers, our breaths flowing together as I stare her down.
“Don’t move. Stay just like that,” I say, pushing myself away from her body.
She looks at me, confused, but she does as I say, her body spread out on the bed like a butterfly. I kneel in front of her cunt, loving the way it glistens in the moonlight with the residue of my claim on her.
“What is it?” she asks.
I don’t fail to notice the worry in her voice. As if she still fears I could change my mind about her. I stay quiet, tracing the lines of her pussy with my mind’s eye.
“What is it? Did something happen—”
There .
I bring both hands on either side of her pussy, spreading it more.
My cum slides out of her in gentle waves, dripping down to her ass. She gives me a few little whimpers at the sensation, her cunt pulsing through the coating as if it’s trying to pull it back inside.
Mine. Mine. Mine.
Present Day
One second. I turned my back for just one fucking second, and they took her from me.
Like a demon fresh out of the gates of hell, I haunt these empty hospital halls, looking for her. But with every door I slam open and every corner I turn, my blood only boils stronger and my rage simmers under my flesh and bones.
She’s not here. Not anymore.
I slam my palm on the receptionist’s desk, heart pounding against my ribcage, threatening to break bone. Her eyes snap to mine as she jolts upright, followed by a deep frown.
“Security cameras from this floor. Show them to me. Or lose your fucking job.”
I didn’t work my way up to this position to scare civilians into doing what I want. But at this moment, nothing else matters. Nothing except finding the soon-to-be-dead bastard who took what’s mine.
A few seconds pass—too fucking many—before she slides her chair over to the computer and starts looking for what I need. I rush around the desk, eyes shifting rapidly across the screen, searching for her.
Where are you, angel?
“ Stop ,” I tell the receptionist, pointing my finger at the screen. “Right there. Who the fuck is that?”
She leans in closer, narrowing her eyes at the video in which a man is walking toward the waiting area, where Dove and I were talking just minutes ago. A sharp pain tugs at my heart even saying her name in my mind. My fingers itch to touch her, to hold her in my arms like I did before I brought her here so she could see her dying mother.
“I’m not sure,” she says. “A doctor, but I’ve never seen him before. Could be a replacement.”
I step back, dragging a hand down my face as the realization dawns on me.
They got me.
After all this time, after all the efforts at being one step ahead, the EFW got me when I least expected it. Probably orchestrated it all while they distracted me with things I could never account for. Dove’s apartment break-ins. Her mother’s accident. The distressing news I got on the phone just now. And this fake-ass doctor pretending to be someone he’s not.
“Should I keep going then?” the receptionist asks, visibly annoyed. Her voice snaps me out of my thoughts.
“Yes. Follow him around. Show me where he went. Show me where he is right fucking now.”
She clicks around with her mouse until her head shakes and she turns to meet my eyes.
“This is where the recording cuts off.”
Of course it is.
Fuck!
I make her look up the security footage from every way out of the hospital, but once again, they’re all cut off. All of them—so that I don’t even get to figure out which way they took her. For all I know she could still be in the building, with the EFW hiding her until I leave so they can move her out.
I pull out my phone and bring it up to my ear, calling the one person I know I can trust.
“Say it quickly. I have the Prime Minister of France on hold,” Maddox Thorne, the President of the United States of America, answers almost immediately.
I don’t call the president very often. He and I both have a clear understanding of what needs to be done. Of what each of us expects the other to accomplish on our own. So when one of us reaches out completely out of nowhere, we drop everything and answer the fucking phone when it rings.
“They took her,” I say, spitting out the words.
The president pauses, cursing under his breath.
“Where are you?”
“St. Francis. Security footage is wiped out. I have no way of knowing if she’s even in the building anymore.”
“What about the attack on the Ridge this morning? Is it connected in any way?”
“A fucking ploy to distract me. How fast can you get a team here?”
“I’ll talk to Reid to see how we can do this quietly. But Rowan—” A plea of sorts emanates from his voice, and a feral, anger-filled smirk spreads on my lips at hearing him say my name like that.
This is the side of me he’s been afraid of from the very beginning, when we were training in the army together. The side of me that every tabloid across the country painted as a monster more times than I can count. The side of me I keep on a tight leash until it tugs so hard I’m forced to let it loose on the world, leaving dead, rotting bodies in its wake until I get what I want.
I sympathize with my friend, I really do. So when I go to war for my woman, I’ll do my damnedest to keep his presidency away from my crimes.
“Don’t worry, Mr. President. You know I hunt best when the lights are off.”