Chapter 4
Chapter Four
DREW
My ass tensed as I slowly rode in and out of Ayda, staring at her tortured and confused face.
That sex had been phenomenal, but the high of it was taken away the second I heard the gentle hums of her sadness try to hide her tears.
A cold chill spread up my spine, contradicting the toe-tingling high I was still coming down from.
I could feel the results of her orgasm coating my dick, as well as my own, but none of those dirty, delightful post-sex turn-ons were working for me as I held her in place and tried to catch my breath.
I swallowed with regret, the ball of pain like knives trailing down my throat.
I shouldn’t have gone too fucking far.
This was Ayda. The one thing, the one person, the one reason I had in life to keep going. Why couldn’t I stay on one straight path with her?
Because grief is the one thing that has always fucked you up more than anything, idiot, Harry and Pete cried to me in my mind.
Closing my eyes, I gritted my teeth and released her chin from my hold. As carefully as I could, I held onto her bright pink hips and slowly pulled out of her, feeling the way her body buckled in my grip.
“Stay there,” I told her with as much tenderness as I could muster, despite the hint of regret tainting the edges of my broken voice.
Ayda barely moved. Whether that was because she didn’t want to or because she couldn’t, I didn’t know.
I just knew I had to try to make things right before I got the fuck out of there.
Reaching around her, I turned on the faucet for the hot water, dipping a hand under it while my other hand held her hip in its grip. I didn’t know if it would help, but all I could see was her sadness and my hand and fingerprints on her skin.
She deserved a bit of tenderness.
When the water felt warm, I cupped some in my hand and gently trailed it down her spine.
The rivulets fell down either side almost immediately, so I repeated the action, collecting more water and pouring it down the lower section of her back, trailing my fingers lighting over her skin with reassurance.
I couldn’t bear to look at myself in the mirror again.
She was my focus. When I’d soothed her spine, rubbed my palm over every inch of flesh, including her stained ass cheeks, I cupped my final handful of water and brought it down between her folds.
Then I held it there, massaging the front of her as much as I could and rubbing my palm back and forth.
Her ass rose once before she let out a sigh and her legs began to shake beneath her.
“I’m sorry,” was all I said.
“I’m not.” Ayda lifted her head from her arm, sucking in a deep breath as her hands dropped below her to keep her body steady, her gaze meeting mine in the mirror.
I frowned at her, my hand still between her legs.
“I’m not sorry,” she said again.
My Ayda. It was so typical of her.
I gave her one final, tender squeeze before I slid my hand up between the edges of her ass cheeks and helped her rise to stand in front of me.
“You’re a crazy kind of something, you know that?” I said sternly.
“Why? Because I know my own mind?”
“Because I could literally put a gun to your head and ask you to enjoy it for my benefit and you would. You were crying, Ayda.”
“That’s not true. I know that for a fact.” She looked down and shook her head. “And you don’t even know why I was emotional.”
Swiping at one of the tears, she tried to push away from the sink and swayed a little.
I grabbed her without thought, holding her up by her arms and bending at the knee until our eyes were level. “I’m taking you to bed,” I told her. She looked like she was broken, yet her cheeks were the kind of rosy pink I’d always adored on her right after we’d made love or fucked.
“Will you stay with me?”
“Yes.” I swallowed the lie.
Ayda’s fingertips brushed my cheeks gently, almost a silent forgiveness as though she understood, without really understanding at all.
I hated myself at that moment. I picked her up, scooping her into my arms like she weighed nothing.
I kept my eyes on hers the entire time I walked her to our bed, and when I laid her down as carefully as I could, pulling the comforter over her naked breasts and running my finger down her arm, I allowed her to believe I might stay.
I wanted to stay. With her, even when I felt damaged and fucked up beyond redemption, I became lighter than air.
No one else could do to me what Ayda could do.
But there was a problem with having someone on such a pedestal.
There was a kink in the way it all worked.
To me, she was perfect. So perfect she didn’t seem real sometimes.
And when I was like this, consumed, vengeful, bloodthirsty and raw, the last thing I wanted to do was infect her and have her become some kind of fallen angel.
If this angel fell, the whole universe was doomed.
I climbed on top of the comforter beside her, me resting on my side, her resting on hers, the two of us looking into each other’s eyes as I ran a lonely finger up and down her arm.
“Sleep, darlin’.”
Ayda didn’t say anything. She just blinked and studied my face, those big blue eyes moving over my features as though she were etching the image of them into her eyelids. With each pass, her eyes grew heavier, and no matter how much she tried to fight it, her exhaustion forced her into sleep.
“Of all the things I’m glad he saw before he died, you’re the main one,” I whispered, knowing how much Harry loved her.
“I love you, Drew,” she breathed.
I sighed, the weight of my relief and frustration pouring out of me. “Someone had to,” I mouthed. I’m glad it was you, I added in my head.
I watched as she drifted off to sleep, her body melting into our bed sheets and resting, while mine became tenser and more desperate to flee.
I never thought I’d want to run from her again.
I never thought I’d get this dark, but I’d never thought I was going to lose Harry so fucking quickly, and the truth was, he’d been around a lot longer than this new life of mine.
He’d been around when Ayda hadn’t. He’d been the man to stick up for me, stick by my side, stick, stick, stick when every other fucker had given up, including my own father.
I no more knew how to let him go than I’d known how to let Pete fly free.
Guilt took over me when I thought about being happy while he was rotting away beneath cold soil and dark earth.
Revenge.
Revenge.
Revenge.
That was easier. It was all I knew.
I wished I wasn’t this person, but when I was certain Ayda had fallen into a sleep deep enough to consume her for a few hours, I leaned forward and kissed her forehead, pressing my words against her so they sank into her skin.
“You’re a crazy kind of something, Hanagan. My kind of crazy kind of something. Wait for me.”
Then I got up, grabbed some clothes, and I left, closing the door behind me as the urge to be a wolf in the night took over.
I knocked on Slater’s door and waited.
When he didn’t respond, I walked in anyway and crept over to his bed, praying he had some clothes covering his junk.
The light from the corridor poured in enough for me to see he was sprawled on his chest, his hands tucked under his pillow and that beard of his spread out on his bed sheets like it was a person in its own right.
The fucker was breathing so heavily, I was certain some chicks would class it as snoring, but it was the full spine tattoo of a wolf with gnarled teeth that caught my attention.
Slater Portman was a Hound to his core. More than I probably was at times. I’d been born to be king. He’d chosen to be a prince.
“Slate,” I whispered, nudging him with my fist. “Slate!” I hissed again.
“Fckff,” he mumbled, like what he’d said was even a word.
“Wake up,” I urged him.
Slater winced, sucking in a sharp breath through his clenched teeth. “Go away.”
I blew all the air out of my cheeks and went straight for honesty. “Buddy, I need you. Please… wake up, or I’m about to go out and do something real stupid, something that none of y’all will ever forgive me for.”
His eyes flew open immediately, the call to my brother answered as he scanned the room quickly and then sat upright in one swift movement.
I was grateful he at least had boxer shorts on when the bed sheet fell from his body, exposing him completely before his eyes focused on mine.
“Drew?” He squinted.
“Yeah.” I sighed. Slater was another person I’d been avoiding. Along with Jedd, Deeks, Kenny, Tate, the whole damn family. “It’s me.”
He rubbed his eye like he was a giant of a kid, trying to clear his vision to see if I was really there.
“What’s wrong?” he asked me, calm yet urgent.
“I need you, brother.”
“Who are we killing?’
I huffed out a barely-there laugh. “No one.”
“Okay.” He moved to the end of the bed, letting his legs fall to the floor as his fists pushed into his mattress. “Then why the fuck are you waking me up at…” He glanced at his bedside clock. “Five in the fucking morning? Seriously?”
“Because I’m a bit of a fucking mess right now, and I need to talk to you.”
He gave me a small nod of understanding. “Give me two minutes to get dressed.”
“I’ll wait in the bar.”
I left him alone and moved out into the center of The Hut.
I expected it to be empty. There was only one five o’clock in The Hounds’ day, after all, so when I saw Jedd sitting on a solitary stool, propping up the bar with a bottle of Jack Daniels and an almost empty tumbler in his hand, my footsteps faltered.
“Tucker,” he said without even glancing my way. His eyes were fixed firmly on the small remnants of liquid he was circling around his glass.
“The fuck are you doing awake?” I asked him, moving forward.
“Reminding myself I’m still alive.”