Chapter Twelve
Sierra
I watched the press conference three times last night. I rewound the stream so many times, focusing on his smirk when the reporter asked him about his plans for today. “Focus on the fight,” he’d growled, but his eyes, dark and hungry, stared straight into the camera, into me.
The bell above the door jingled, and my head snapped up so fast I nearly toppled the cart. It was a regular who squinted at the large-print mysteries, her walker squeaking against the tiles. Disappointment curdled in my stomach, sharp and acidic.
Then I heard it. The low purr of an engine that didn’t belong in our dusty parking lot. My pulse skyrocketed as I peered through the glass doors. A Black Audi. Tinted windows.
He came .
I was moving before my brain caught up, cardigan snagging on the circulation desk as I bolted for the front doors.
Mr. Jones called after me, something about donors and speeches, but his voice dissolved in my ears.
The sunlight blinded me as I shoved through the door, the asphalt rough through my ballet flats.
Connor Graves, title champion, leaned against his car, looking like sin in a tailored black suit that probably cost more than my yearly salary.
His dark sunglasses hid his predator eyes, but I didn’t need to see them to feel the weight of his gaze.
Or, to see his mouth curved in a smirk that said he knew exactly how fast my pulse was racing.
“Took you long enough, sweet girl.”
“You’re late,” I blurted, skidding to a stop. My chest heaved like I’d run a marathon, not twelve steps.
I stepped closer to him, my fingers fisting in his collar as he hoisted me up by my waist and held me in the air against him.
His growl vibrated against my lips as he kissed me hard, his lips devouring mine.
The world tilted as he lowered me onto the Audi’s hood, his hands sliding under my skirt to grip my thighs.
“Connor,” I gasped when he bit down on my lower lip. His thumb found the pulse racing in my throat. He laughed, low and wicked, and ground his hips against mine. The hard ridge of him pressed into my stomach, and I choked on air.
His mouth took mine again, ravenous and claiming. No tentative exploration—this was a predator’s kiss, rough and desperate, his hands dragging me closer on the hood until not a whisper of space remained between us.
“I’ve been craving this,” he snarled against my mouth, one hand fisting my hair to tilt my head back. “About bending you over my hood. Making you scream my name, where all your precious books can hear.”
Heat flooded my cheeks and lower regions. “We’re in public?—”
“No one’s watching us.” His lips trailed down my neck, sucking bruises I’d have to hide tomorrow. I was soaking through my panties.
His teeth scraped my collarbone, and my fingers dug into his shoulders.
Distantly, I registered car doors closing and voices whispering.
But they blurred into static, drowned by Connor’s ragged breaths and the slick sound of his tongue sliding over my throat like he wanted himself left on every inch of me.
“Lunch,” he growled, pulling me closer to the edge of the hood. His hands gripped my thighs, spreading them wider. “But first…”
His mouth found my neck again, his hips slotting between my legs as he ground against me.
The friction drew a whine from my throat, my nails raking his scalp.
I could feel his bulge rocking against my heat, and I leaned into it.
He groaned, the sound deep and feral, and bit down hard enough to make me squeak.
“Mine,” he growled against my skin. “Every fucking inch.”
When he finally pulled back, adjusting my cardigan with a tenderness that contradicted the feral look in his eyes, he kissed me softly. “Eat up, sweet girl.”
The bag in his trunk held still-warm croissants from a Parisian bakery I’d pinned, an iced chai with the exact ratio of oat milk I liked, and a single white rose tucked between the napkins.
“You—”
“Eat,” he interrupted, pressing the bag into my hands. He cursed when he checked his watch. “I have cryotherapy in twenty.”
I blinked up at him, my lips and throat still throbbing. “You’re leaving?”
His laugh was dark velvet. “You want me to stay, little librarian? You want me to bend you over right now and show your coworkers how I claim what's mine?”
Heat flooded my cheeks. “I—that’s not?—”
“I'll see you later, Sierra.” He kissed the protest from my lips, all promise and threat. “That’s when you'll be screaming my name.”
I had somehow found my way back into the library.
Two hours later, Connor sent me a link captioned: ‘ Guess we’re public, sweet girl.’
“CONNOR “KILLER” GRAVES SPOTTED WITH MYSTERY WOMAN!”
The headline screamed, a photo of us mid-filthy-kiss on his Audi, already trending. It was angled so you could clearly see my face and his suited body towering over my smaller frame. My face burned, and my stomach dropped at what this meant.
I stared at my phone screen, another article’s headline burning into my retinas.
“CONNOR GRAVES’ MYSTERY WOMAN: WHO IS SHE?”
My face stared back from the photo, lips parted mid-kiss as Connor’s hands gripped my hips like he owned them. Which, according to some of the comments, he did.
Four counts in. Seven held. Eight out.
The breathing exercise collapsed halfway through when my phone vibrated on my desk.
It was a number I hadn’t blocked, because blocking him would mean he still mattered.
Unknown
Saw the news. You’ve been busy, girl.
Ice flooded my veins. I knew that number—I had deleted it a hundred times, but the digits still haunted me.
Him. The man who’d called me “broken” before I knew the word.
The man whose voice had slithered through my nerves all my life.
The man whose face I’d scrubbed from every photo and memory until the library became my sanctuary.
Now, the whole world knew my name. He knew.
No. No, no, no.
Unknown
Dad’s proud. Let’s celebrate.
I was back in that house, the one with yellowed curtains and a front door that never locked. His house. His vodka-and-cigarette voice slithered through my memory.
“You’re just like your mother. Weak.”
The day I left, I’d counted my breaths until the bus station faded behind me.
Four—seven—eight?—
I stumbled into the staff bathroom, splashing water on my face until my cardigan sleeves were wet. The mirror showed a stranger: swollen lips from Connor’s goodbye kisses and bruises on my throat from his visit earlier. His marks. His mess.
The door creaked open. “Sierra?” Marissa’s neon nails tapped the sink. “Hot boxer daddy’s here.”
My stomach lurched. “I-I can’t?—”
“Relax, he brought the staff snacks.” She held up a bag from some fancy bakery. “Though if I were you, I’d skip the muffins and ride that man like?—”
“Not hungry.” I bolted, nearly tripping over the returns cart. Connor’s texts lit up the phone in my hand:
Connor
I’m here.
Connor
Sierra.
Connor
Sierra.
The library’s back exit beckoned, sunlight bright in the back parking lot. I’d hide in my car. Breathe. Pretend the world hadn’t cracked open. But the air smelled suffocating, and suddenly strong arms banded around my waist, lifting me off my feet.
My breathing stopped. “Let me go!” I screamed, panic blurring my vision as I thrashed violently.
“Easy, sweet girl.” Connor’s growl vibrated against my ear, his chest a wall of muscle at my back. “It’s me, breathe.” He tightened his grip on me like he didn’t want to let me go.
When my thrashing lessened, he gently set me down, turning me to face him. His sunglasses hid his eyes, but his jaw was a granite cliff, tension radiating off him like heat. The cryotherapy session he’d left for hadn’t chilled the fury in his voice.
“Who scared you?”
“N-no one.” I twisted away, but he crowded me against the brick wall, caging me in, trapping me.
“Don’t lie to me.” His thumb brushed my pulse. “It’s racing.”
Connor didn’t know. He couldn’t know.
His thumb pressed harder into the pulse point of my wrist, counting beats I couldn’t slow.
“Sierra.” My name sounded like a sin in his mouth, all darkness and smoke.
“Who. Scared. You.”
The bricks bit into my spine as I pushed backwards, but the pain was dull compared to the acid eating through my chest. Four counts in. Seven held. Eight out—the numbers splintered, collapsing.
Connor’s cologne, something dark, clogged my lungs, but all I could smell was him. That man. Vodka and cigarettes and the sour stench of a man who’d carved his cruelty into my bones for fun.
“Look at me.”
I couldn’t. My gaze snagged on the pavement—cracks in the asphalt, a crushed soda can, anything but the truth in his eyes. His hand slid from my wrist to my jaw, forcing my face upward. The sunglasses were off now, his black eyes threatening to pull me under.
“Sierra.”
My name was a plea. He shook me gently, and his hair caught the light as he cupped my chin.
“Look at me. Look at me .”
I couldn’t. The floor yawned wider, cracks spreading like veins.
“You’re just like your mother. Weak.”
Distantly, I registered the thud-thud-thud of his heartbeat against my palm, where he’d braced it against his chest. Or was that mine? The world tilted, colors bleeding into grayscale.
He had dropped to his knees now.
“Fuck.” Connor’s curse was raw and jagged.
He hauled me against his chest, and my knees buckled. But he caught me, his arms a cage of muscle and heat. “Breathe,” he ordered, pressing his forehead to mine.
I’ve never seen his eyes like this before.
“ Breathe , Sierra.”
I tried. God, I tried. But the air was syrup, thick and suffocating, and all I could see was Jerry’s face, my stepfather, leering from the shadows.
Dad’s proud . The text glowed behind my eyelids, haunting me. Let’s celebrate .
A sob escaped me. “Don’t—don’t?—”
The words shredded into hiccups, my body numb and trembling. His palm flattened between my shoulder blades, warm and crushing me harder to his chest.
“Sierra.” His voice cracked, a fissure in his granite growl. “Please.”
Panic took over. I forgot what he was even asking for. My fingers clawed at his shirt, nails raking down the fabric. “Stop—stop?—”
He froze. For one suspended second, his arms loosened, and I nearly bolted. But his hand cradled the back of my head, pressing my face into his chest.
“Okay,” he rasped, the word raw, unfamiliar. “Okay, sweet girl. I’ll stop.”
His other hand swept down my spine in slow, deliberate strokes, the way you’d calm a spooked animal. I hated how it worked. I hated how my lungs finally dragged in air that smelled like him, and not him .
“You’re safe.” His lips moved against my hairline. “I’ve got you.” Tears pricked at my eyes.
“Listen to my heartbeat,” he ordered, fingers threading through my curls. “Match yours to it. ”
I tried. Four counts in… Seven held… The rhythm steadied, his chest rising and falling like a metronome.
Slowly, the parking lot sharpened, sunlight glinting off his Audi, his muscular chest against mine, my cardigan’s wet sleeves against my wrists. His thumb brushed the tear I hadn’t felt slip free.
“Better?”
I nodded, my throat too raw for words.
For a long moment, he just stared at me, his eyes tracing every flinch, every tremor. Then, carefully, slowly, he reached into my cardigan’s pocket and pulled out my phone, watching my expression the whole time.
The screen lit up with the text again.
Dad’s proud .
Ice flooded my veins again.
Connor’s jaw tightened, a muscle ticking near his ear. But when he spoke, his voice was soft, soothing. “You don’t have to tell me.” He tucked my phone back, his hand lingering over my waist. “But if anything happens…”
“Don’t.” The plea tore free, sharp as broken glass. “Please.”
He held my waist tighter, as if afraid to let me go. “Don’t what?”
Don’t become him. Don’t make me small again. Don’t hurt me like he did.
I pressed my face into his neck, breathing him in until the world stopped spinning.
His arms tightened, a silent vow. “Please don't,” I whispered, the old script rising like bile as my mind focused on the past. “I’ll be quiet. Just… don’t.”
Connor went rigid. I thought he’d push, but his exhale gusted warm against my temple. “Never,” he growled, the word a vow. “You’re mine to protect. Never silence.”
The parking lot blurred again, but this time, the tears felt clean. His lips brushed my forehead once or twice before he stood, lifting me. I felt like I was floating. Here but not here.
“I’m taking you home,” he said, and it wasn’t a request.
Connor’s hands were everywhere and nowhere all at once—steadying but never restraining, present but never demanding.
His palm cupped the back of my neck as he guided me into the passenger seat, his thumb tracing idle circles that somehow synced with my shuddering breaths.
I counted the pattern against his pulse where his wrist brushed my knee, the rhythm anchoring me as the world tilted back into focus.
“Eyes on me,” he instructed, buckling my seatbelt with a soft click. His knuckles grazed my collarbone, deliberate and warm, and I realized my cardigan was damp with sweat.
It clung to my skin like a second layer of shame, but Connor didn’t flinch. He tucked a curl behind my ear, his calloused fingers catching on the frizz, his voice soothing.
“There you are.”