Chapter 26
Lucan
Ican’t sleep.
There’s a sweetly slumbering menace in my bed. Naked, I rise from the sheets to pace the length of the tall windows in my room.
Dawn will crack the sky open soon. Meanwhile, Sadie lies like a thing of danger, her silky hair draped over my pillows.
I lost control of myself, and that never happens. Through sex, she kept an essential, invisible part of me. She’s blissfully unaware, but I’m left unsettled and restless.
I felt like a fucking insane person, like I couldn’t get close enough to her. Like it burned me up that I couldn’t open my chest and sew her inside. Even then, I don’t think I’d feel better. She’s made me come undone.
What do I do now? Give in to that feeling? Neither of us wants that. I know she doesn’t. She barely tolerates my fixation already, let alone if I opened my actual heart to her.
But I can’t walk away from her either. Not while she’s in danger, and not as long as I have blood flowing through my veins. I’m going to have to figure this out.
Watching Sadie on the cameras sates the creature in me, but not for long.
I need the real thing. I need her. All the days and nights I fantasized about her didn’t prepare me for actually having her. I had no fucking idea.
Now that I know what it’s like, what if I lose her? What if she wants to leave, or someone hurts her?
What if she doesn’t want me once she sees all of me? It scares me to think what I’d do. The creature demands I lock her up and keep her safe, just for me, forever.
Running both hands through my hair, I stop pacing.
Look at her. God.
Her soft pink lips, her delicate features. The way her face creases slightly as she dreams.
What is she dreaming of?
The sheets are wound around her naked body, her arms resting above her head on the pillow, as though she feels completely safe.
Like a starved hound, I’m drawn to her, climbing onto the bed without shifting my gaze from her perfect form. The setting moon bathes her round breasts in a pearly light.
So fucking perfect. Like a picture I can touch.
Sadie’s still wearing her heels, because I told her to. I unbuckle each shoe and slide them off, so she doesn’t wake up with sore feet. I tug the sheet away from her hips. Her pretty little cunt is puffy and raw from being fucked so good.
Maybe I should’ve stopped when I was drilling her so deep, but I couldn’t. I actually fucking couldn’t.
My cock twitches as the lingering scent of her juices reaches me. Her folds still shine with the wetness of our combined cum, and the sight is enough to make my blood surge and race. Her clit is a pink pearl, begging to be licked.
I should let her sleep. She was attacked at the gala last night, and then fucked well past her limits. Her breath remains slow and steady, her pert tits rising and falling.
Adjusting myself on the bed to give my aching cock room, I brush my fingertips feather-soft up her calf. She gives a tiny moan, her head lolling to the side.
Her voice is raspy. “Lucan?”
“I’m here,” I murmur.
“What time is it?”
“Nearly morning.”
Blinking, she gazes at me. “What are you doing?”
“Waking you up.”
Her eyelids flutter closed and she bites her bottom lip. “Okay.”
That’s my girl.
I continue along the seam of her leg, over her thigh to her pussy.
“Fuck,” I mutter.
I press my forefinger half an inch into that inviting little slit. Her flesh is warm and slick, and her tight cunt hugs my fingertip instantly, making me want to thrust it inside.
She moans, her eyelashes twitching.
Withdrawing my hand, I lick her wetness from my finger. It’s a mistake, because immediately my hunger for her doubles.
I slide two fingers this time, nudging into her. I’m met with resistance right away, her swollen folds pulsing against me. Leaning forward with a moan of anticipation, I put the tip of my tongue on her clit and draw small circles while pushing my fingers deeper inside.
Sadie moans, louder this time. Wrapping my lips around her pink bud, I suck gently, urging my fingers in to my knuckles.
She’s getting wetter. I increase the pressure with my tongue, then slide it all around her delicate cunt.
My fingers stroke her smoothly, and I switch to covering her folds in light kisses. Then I take out my fingers and penetrate her with my tongue, pressing my lips to hers to taste her all the way inside.
Gasping, Sadie wraps her beautiful legs around my neck, her fingers winding into my hair.
In heaven, I drink her as her body steadily tenses. When she’s about to erupt, I concentrate my tongue on her clit, sucking and licking in a steady rhythm while cramming three fingers into her.
She comes, her gasps and moans filling the room like music, her cunt squeezing my fingers and drenching them. Before she relaxes fully, I keep thrusting, feeling another climax building in her. The second engulfs her in a more primal way, making her scratch at me and pant.
While her pussy still hums with the pleasurable aftereffects, I grab her wrist and ankle to flip her over onto her stomach. Soft from sleep and orgasms, she complies.
Her head turns, her cheek on the pillow. After pausing to brush her hair back from her face, so I can see her expressions in exquisite detail, I yank her hips up to put her ass in the air. I push her knees aside and take my place behind her.
I enter her fast and resolute, as if I can fuck away my addiction, even though at this point, I know I’m a fool for believing it. Who am I kidding? I’m doing this because I want her, plain and simple.
So I fuck her, holding her in place with one hand on her perky ass and my other in her hair. From here, I can penetrate her more deeply, the soft walls of her pussy caressing me with every frantic thrust.
“Good girl,” I grind out through my teeth. “Mine. You’re mine, Sadie.”
My breathing turns fragmented and irregular. Though I know I should go for longer to demonstrate a shred of self-control, I fucking don’t. I pump her swollen, wet little cunt without grace or restraint. Just pure, selfish need.
I make an inhuman sound as I come in her hot depths, holding her to me like treasure. The grunts and snarls that rip from my throat probably scare her. She whimpers and moans, gripping the ruined sheets, and my thrusts slow.
I gaze down at her, taking her in like this is my last night on earth. With my immediate physical hunger satisfied, a strange melancholy washes over me.
By bringing Sadie into my life and inserting myself in hers, what have I done? Maybe I’ve doomed us both, because I won’t rest unless she’s mine.
But what about what she wants? What if she doesn’t get over her doubts about me?
I run my fingers down her spine, some semblance of rational judgment returning to me. She quivers and sighs.
“Are you okay?” I ask, drawing letters on her back without lifting my finger.
For some reason, she laughs into the pillow.
She tilts her head to speak. “In the way you mean, yes. In the greater scheme of things, definitely not.”
So she has regrets already. Fuck.
Sliding my cock from her, I’m about to lie next to her when my operating system’s disembodied voice speaks.
“Ahoy, Captain.”
“Fucking hell,” I say with a groan. “My father’s here.”
I programmed the system to announce him after I got sick of him barging in.
Sadie sits up in alarm, pushing her hair from her eyes, suddenly wide awake.
“Stay here.” I draw the sheets to her chin and rise from the bed. “I’ll get rid of him. Put on some clothes if it makes you feel more—”
Snatching up the silky material from the floor, I remember I ripped her gown.
“Never mind,” I say. “I’ll lock the bedroom door.”
Her disheveled hair and bitten lips send a stab of protectiveness through me. She looks so vulnerable, clinging the sheets to her naked chest, her eyes on the door.
“I’ll organize clothes for you once he leaves,” I say, pulling on boxers and a T-shirt from a drawer.
“Okay,” she says, leaning back into the pillow uncertainly.
Wondering how strongly I smell of sex, I flatten my hair with my fingers.
Sadie flashes me two thumbs up, which makes me want to climb back into bed and kiss her.
“Lucan?” calls my father. “Are you still asleep?”
For fuck’s sake. The sun isn’t even up yet.
Giving her one last look, I exit through the door and lock it with a swipe of my fingerprint.
“I’m here, Dad,” I say, entering the living room.
The Stranger still lies on the coffee table. Down the hallway, I glimpse the scrap of torn fabric from Sadie’s dress. Is it too much to ask that he hasn’t noticed?
He wears pressed trousers and a knit sweater, with a fresh shave from his personal barber. A morning ritual for him.
“Don’t you mean Captain?” he asks with a wry smile.
Continuing past him toward the kitchen, mostly to draw him away from Sadie and the evidence of last night, I press buttons on the coffee machine to make espressos.
“I would delete the announcement if you called first,” I say.
“I’m not in the habit of wasting time, son. Nor should you be.”
Since he’s probably here with updates about the killer attacking Sadie at the gala, I let it slide.
“So what’s going on after last night?” I pass him a coffee. “Any breakthroughs from our security firm? Or the police?”
“I’m afraid not.” Dad downs the espresso like a shot of vodka. “Our agents swept the venue and reviewed surveillance tapes. There are a few flashes of the suspect in a black hoodie, but nothing identifiable.”
Disappointment cuts through me. “Fuck. Really?”
“I’m not shocked.” He shrugs. “We know the killer’s good at blending in.”
“Yeah.” I nod slowly. “He murdered Parker during the Founder’s Run, with everyone around. Stole car keys from the Darkbloom archives.”
“Exactly. He was probably on the gala’s guest list.”
I groan. “That’s hundreds of people, not including staff and plus-ones.”
A sick heaviness settles in my chest. I shouldn’t have let Sadie get away from me at the gala, even for a minute. That’s all it takes.
My diligence can’t lapse again. Maybe I need better surveillance tactics, just to make sure she’s safe.
Dad studies me carefully. “Now. Sadie Marlowe. Is it serious?”
Should I answer?
Though I wanted to spare her my father’s scrutiny at this early stage, I do like the idea of bringing her into the fold sooner rather than later. I like it a lot. What better way to feel in control again than to introduce her as mine to the people in my world?
She’ll get over her doubts. I feel more sure of that now. Once she sees how well we fit together, she’ll stop pushing me away.
Besides, Dad would’ve seen me leave with her last night, and I’m fairly certain her claw marks are peeking out from beneath my T-shirt collar. No point in denying that she’s here.
“It’s very serious,” I say.
“I’d like to meet her,” he says. “We’ll organize a dinner soon. Sadie can get the proper measure of us.”
And he of her, no doubt.
He’ll adore her though. My father’s less militant about arranged matches than many parents in our circles. Hales have enough wealth and influence on our own. Wives should be chosen for their attributes as a person, and for how they make us feel.
Fucking feral, in my case.
“Good chat, son.” He claps my shoulder. “I won’t keep you from your girl.”
“I appreciate that.”
I’ll wait to tell Sadie about the family dinner, or I risk scaring her off. I should take her on a date first.
Before the door has closed behind my father, I’m already on my way back to her.