Chapter Four. Asad
CHAPTER FOUR
Asad
That disrespectful mouth is going to be the death of her.
Literally.
Fuck the fact that I am sitting in a large leather armchair stationed in front of the floor-to-ceiling French doors in her living room. Or that I’ve been here, waiting on her to arrive home, for the past five hours. She left the study and the house nearly fourteen hours ago.
Also fuck that I broke in here to offer a proposition that I’ve spent literal hours analyzing and working all angles of how to deliver to her. And with each minute that’s passed, my patience has retreated, while my anger at not knowing where her current location is has advanced.
Anger. Irritation. Jealousy.
I’m here for a specific purpose, but that’s taking a backseat to my needs to know where she’s been and with who.
Knowing her workaholic habits as well as her usual schedule, I’m assuming she returned to the lab after leaving the house. But damn. This was long even for her.
Ember is usually self-aware and sharp. But this morning, she came in this apartment and walked through the room without noticing my ass sitting here.
The possible answers march through my head like well-trained soldiers.
And my blood grows colder and colder with each one.
Her ass better have been at the lab, because the alternative—that she might’ve been out up under someone and full of dick—has me battling the urge to put a hole in someone’s forehead.
Yeah, as soon as I leave her, I’m going to be putting a call in to the Castle to pull tapes.
If I’m not fucking her, no one else will be either. And I put that on everybody’s life.
I’ve been waiting here all these hours because she and I need to talk about the terms of Marcus’s will. What those terms mean for her immediate future. And yet … I shake my head.
Yet, I’m sitting here, slowly drumming my fingers on the arm of this chair, needing that deliberate motion to calm and divert me from going with my initial and instinctive urge.
Snatching her up, gripping that slender and delicate neck, and demanding the name of the person whose death would be on her conscience.
Shit.
Who am I kidding?
Ember Cross doesn’t have a conscience.
“I said, what the fuck are you—”
Before she can finish the question, I abruptly shove out the chair and cross the space separating us in three long strides.
And I don’t stop until my personal space is all up in the guts of hers.
Until that sharp and sweet citrus and fresh, crisp air scent invades me like a stealth bomber, exploding in my chest, my belly … my dick.
“That’s your problem now. Focusing on the wrong shit.”
Knowing my stepsister as well as I do, she would slit her own throat before admitting to the discomfort that flickers in her eyes.
But I see it. And knowing it’s because of me?
Because I’m so close I can taste the mint toothpaste on her breath?
Because the memories of our past and the pain I inflicted are probably playing in her head like a twisted reel?
Nah.
That attitude, the hostility and cutting sarcasm can’t completely disguise the uneasiness my presence stirs.
The knowledge that I can inspire that kind of vulnerability—any kind—in this woman is a narcotic more powerful than the one we pump out into the global community. And we have some good shit.
“Okay, I’ll bite.” She crosses her arms and edges back a step.
I don’t misinterpret that move. A retreat.
Smart on her part but still a mistake. Never let the enemy know they have an advantage, an edge.
Ember just did, losing a little bit of ground in this war between us—make no mistake; we are most definitely the fuck at war.
“What should I be focusing on other than you committing a little B and E first thing in the morning? Or do you start off most of your days with felonies?” She huffs out a small, dry chuckle.
“Look who I’m talking to. Of course you do. ”
“Go put some clothes on, ma,” I say, staring into her honey-brown eyes.
Her head jerks back, thick eyebrows arrowing down and damn near meeting over the bridge of her nose.
She’s a breathing distraction in these clothes. Nah, she’s not to blame for my body’s reaction to her perfect tits, juicy ass, and thick thighs. Still, I’m not hearing shit she says until I can no longer see her nipples outlined underneath that top. Or feel the phantom rub of them over my tongue.
“The fuck?” She laughs again, and it is just as humorless as the one from moments earlier.
“You broke into my house. I never issued an invitation. And last time I checked, this”—she sweeps a hand down her body—“is the appropriate clothing for working out. In case you don’t remember, let me refresh your memory.
We buried my daddy yesterday, and unless he’s pulled a Jesus 2.
0 between then and now, I don’t have one. And I haven’t voted you into the role.”
Men and women have lost their fucking lives talking less shit to me.
One thing I don’t play about is my muthafuckin’ respect, and her being my stepsister isn’t going to save her.
Shit, I’ll kill Kareem if he ever loses his mind and lets his mouth get loose.
Neither he nor Michelle is that fucking insane.
And Michelle is gotdamn certifiable. So, nah, it’s not a familial relationship that has her lungs still residing on the other side of her ribs.
It’s because she’s Ember.
She’s a cancer that no amount of radiation or chemo can eradicate.
She’s the secret enemy set on my destruction.
She’s my weakness.
I’ve lost count of how many times over the years I’ve stood beside her bed like some angel of death, watching her sleep even as the barrel of my Glock hovered only an inch above her forehead.
Even after I moved out of Marcus’s house and she remained there, I still returned and snuck into her room, convinced that this time—this time I would take her life and get rid of this sickness.
This vulnerability.
Obviously, since she’s standing before me, dark blond hair pulled up into one of those buns that should’ve looked sloppy but instead makes her look freshly fucked, light brown eyes narrowed and that fuckable mouth curled into a sneer, I failed to pull the trigger.
A part of me can’t handle that. I’ve never failed at anything I’ve set my sights on. And Ember Cross is my ultimate failure.
So if I can’t kill her, I’ll consume her.
“Let’s get one thing straight, little sister. If I wanted you to call me ‘daddy,’ you would, right after begging me to let you be my good girl.”
Funny how just yesterday, the thought of Aryn calling me that shit annoyed the fuck outta me.
But imagining Ember’s sultry, edged-in-barbed-wire voice wrapped around daddy as I punished that pussy?
That has my dick so hard, it’s a physical ache, and it’s taking every scrap of control not to bend her over the arm of that chair.
I step forward, eliminating the space she’s placed between us.
Confusion and that delicious anger she used to unleash like a raging wildfire flash in her eyes, and they’re both irresistible.
I trail my fingertips along the stubborn yet delicate line of her jaw, the flexing of the muscles underneath sending a bolt of heat straight to my dick.
She’s done a commendable job of learning how to cope and manage her IED; I’ll give her that.
But I’ve never been afraid of her fury, her explosions. Quite the opposite. I’ve wanted her to use me and let go. Slap the shit outta me. Scratch me. Punch me. Bruise me.
Mark me.
She’s always seen me as her tormentor.
Good. I want her fear. I need her fear. Because if she ever suspected even a sliver of the truth …
I slowly drag my caress down her neck and feel the soft catch in her breath before I hear it.
Satisfaction sears me seconds before I strike, gripping her slender throat …
squeezing it. Her eyes flare but not with fear.
Nah. I should’ve known her hardheaded ass wouldn’t give me what I want.
Those honeyed eyes stare back at me with hatred and a delectable defiance that has a beast rising up inside me, roaring and snapping to crush, to tame.
“Get your fucking hands off me,” she calmly says, the ice in her voice licking over my skin and leaving a coat behind.
“Is this your game? I guess you’ve forgotten that I’m familiar with all of them.
Intimately familiar.” She inches closer, and on pure reflex, my hand presses tighter against her windpipe.
Not that she seems to notice—nah, that’s a lie.
That flash of darkness in her golden eyes telegraphs full awareness of her actions and mine.
It’s a dare. A gauntlet thrown down. “Hide-and-seek, where you locked me in a closet, not fucking seeking me for six hours. Or musical chairs, where you tied me to a chair and blasted music so loud for so long, my eardrum ruptured. Or what about blind man’s bluff, when you forced me into your car, drove me to Topanga State Park, and dropped me off, making me walk home.
In the dark. And that’s just naming a few.
So this…” She taps the back of my hand with a nail.
“You’re going to need to come harder, Prince.
” She sneers the name that everyone calls me.
Everyone but her.
I shift my grip upward, and instead of letting her go like she demanded, I cradle her chin in a hard, bruising grip. Even when I lower my head until my nose bumps hers and her breath is heated, minty blasts on my lips, I don’t release her, don’t allow her to look away from me.
Was her reminder supposed to stir guilt inside me? Remorse?
If so, she should know better. Should know by now that she got the wrong muthafucka for that.
“You don’t think I’ve learned some new games in the last few years?” I murmur. “Promise, ma, you don’t know everything I’m capable of. But if you don’t watch that mouth, I can help you find out.”
“You can—”