Chapter 33
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
ELLIOT
She did it. She did it for me. For me. I watch as she goes up the stairs, and I look back to my brother. Well—
“She’s not Mother anymore,” I mutter, staring at the dead woman at the dining table. I’ve sat at this table so many times. Except my scars aren’t scars at the time. Instead, they are wounds—fresh, bleeding, bruised. Unshed tears lock behind my eyes, and I have a stomach full of regret and anger.
“We’re still brothers, though,” Enyo says, locking a hand on my shoulder and yanking me into a hug. It’s an odd feeling, something we’ve never done before, but I wrap my arms around my… my brother. I pat his back twice and we let go.
“We’re still brothers,” I confirm. Enyo was the only person I cared for, wanted to protect, wanted by my side for so long, and now… now I get to build my own family.
And so does he.
“We’re free,” I say.
“So is everyone else,” Enyo says, referring to the Strays under Mother’s Ownership. Mother collected them when they were desperate, alone, with no one looking for them. They were free now, too, though I don’t think they’d go anywhere.
I’m not.
I’ve never hated the Society, and I’ve never hated Strays. I hated the torture. I hated the manipulation, the blackmail. I didn’t like turning innocent people who have no one into killers.
“I don’t think they’ll leave. A few might,” I say with a half shrug. “But not all.”
“I guess the Society is like a home. A home for assassins, huh?” Enyo scoffs. “How iconic.”
“But let me make something clear, Brother,” I say, looking my brother in the eye.
“That’s my woman in the shower. She’s mine. You can’t try to get retribution for Mother—”
“Don’t worry about it. I’m just glad we didn’t have to do it.” Enyo sighs as he opens the door for the Strays who flood in to “clean up”. Enyo points to the dining room, and we listen to the gasps.
“Mother!” one of them, a younger boy around the age of seventeen, rushes in and starts stammering.
“We know,” I say. I stroll back to the living room and take a seat on the brown couch. I have no idea how long Diora is going to take in the shower, and I probably shouldn’t leave the Strays here, either, so I might as well get comfortable.
“And let it be known, we don’t deal in skin. Ever. No matter what level you are at,” Enyo says and directs him to get back to clean up. “I’m going to headquarters. We have a will to draft and a funeral to plan.”
“A funeral?” I ask. We normally dump bodies and move on, since none of us are known people. We set up our lives to easily disappear, so there isn’t a need for a funeral.
“Well, she had friends in government,” Enyo says, rolling his eyes. Ahh, right, I forgot about her greed for power in the Litchfort government. Well, I’ll let him deal with that.
“As first Son, I’m sure you’ve got this under control,” I say, turning the TV on.
“Elliot,” Enyo says, hand on the front door as he stares at me. I turn my head to look at him, raising my eyebrows.
“Good luck with her. You’re gonna need it,” he says and dodges the throw pillow I throw at him by dashing out the door.
Yeah, like I don’t know he’s got the hots for her sister. He’ll have fun getting past her serial killer little sister, that’s what I know.
Turning down the TV, I listen for the shower, making sure she’s still here, as what went down tonight flashes through my brain. I read the digital clock on Mother’s fireplace mantel, it reads three a.m.
Diora Rose Moss killed for me. She killed the one person I didn’t think I could kill, and she did it without knowing whether I would be mad. She didn’t care.
She saw a threat and just… eliminated it.
Running a hand through my hair, I can’t help the heat coursing through my body as her words play like a loop in my mind.
I hope you know, when I say you’re mine, I mean it.
They burn through my skin like liquid gold. Cementing around my heart, my lungs, to the point my chest gets tight and I can barely breathe. I need her more then my next fucking breath.
Fuck. I launch up from the couch and follow the sounds of the shower to her.
I need her. I love her. And I need her to know that.
To feel it, to breathe it. I press my hand on the door and find it unlocked.
What the hell? Scrunching my eyebrows, my head darts around the hallway, as if anyone here would try to come into this bathroom with my little killer in it.
Opening the door and sliding into the steaming hot bathroom, I shut and lock it behind me.
“Anyone could have come in here, you know,” My voice echos in the near empty bathroom.
The long bathroom has a large double basin skin, followed by another door to the toilet, and lit up like a runway, is the shower.
Brown and white titles decorate the floor and are continued up the back wall.
White light illuminating the room, this hundred grand bathroom lacks any sort of natural beauty.
Not a window, not a plant, just stone, title and marble.
I watch her body tense for a second before relaxing under the steam of the shower. Toeing my shoes off, the steam covers parts of the glass door, covering her beautiful body from my view. I cut on the bathroom vent knowing we’ll be in here for a while.
“I was hoping you would,” she says, smiling at me through the glass shower door.
“What if it wasn’t me?”
“I doubt you’d let anyone else see me naked, handsome,” she says, her voice dripping with want. “I’m all yours.”
I play right into my Crane’s hand. She knows I’d kill anyone before they saw what was mine. Especially if she was naked. I’m a possessive man, Diora Moss is all mine.
My eyes track the water droplets racing down the curves of her body through the patchy areas of the glass that aren't covered with steam. Between her swollen breasts and down her smooth brown skin.
My cock fucking loves this view, hardening as I stand at the door. I haven’t even touched her yet. But I want to. I need to so fucking bad.
Diora Moss is a crane in this house of dogs.
I am a puppet whose strings have been cut free. As much as my freedom may taste good, I’d gladly give her the ends of my broken strings if it meant staying with her.
It’s an odd feeling, being the one protected. That’s a job I’ve always had to do for myself. No one’s ever protected me. Not in the way Diora has.
Not Mother, Not Enyo, not any of the other foster kids, and damn sure not my birth parents.
Diora Moss is my crane. My good fortune. She’s my protector as much as I am hers.
I fucking need my Little Crane.
She stands naked under the warm shower water with her arms crossed over her stomach and her hip jutted to the side. My impatient bird raises both her eyebrows in waiting with a smile on her lips.
I rush towards the shower door but she tuts at me, wagging a finger and I freeze.
“Shirt,” She commands with a smirk on her perfect lips. Taking the edge of my shirt, with one swift movement my shirt is off and I try racing toward her but she wags that damn finger again and I stop.
“What now, Crane?” I ask, tilting my head, keeping my eyes on her and awaiting her next command.
“A good boy doesn’t rush,” She says. Just barely to hear her over the shower water, it’s like my senses are acutely tuned to her.
“What if I’m not feeling very good?”
She hums and sharpens her gaze. “Only good boys get their prize.”
I scoff, a smile undeniable as I raise my eyebrows.
“I’m ready.” I croak the words out as my throat tightens at the mere sight of her.
“I can very clearly tell.” Diora takes her time. Uncrossing her arms her eyes rake across my body in the most delicious fucking way. My blood roars in my ears. Wanting to feel her skin under my touch but also loving being under her gaze. “Pants and underwear, don’t move forward.”
I’m quick to follow her command, unzipping my pants.My cock hard and needy as I push my pants past it. The brush of the fabric made my heart jump.
“This view makes me so… wet,” She moans and I feel the rumble in my chest to get to her. The glint in her eye lets me know she's testing me. Teasing me. My control is holding on by a fucking thread and that alone has me harder then fucking ever.
Her hands follow the curve of her body. Down her stomach and round her hips, just where my hands wish they were.
“Can you help me handsome?” Her delicate fingers dip between her legs and I drop to my knees, refusing to touch myself, as she didn’t give me the command to do so.
The steam fogs the glass, right over where her hands are, and my chest aches as she moans.
God Fucking damn.
“Yes, Crane. Fucking Yes.”
“Then come–” She doesn’t have to finish the command. I’m already up and taking the two steps to the shower.
The glass door slams open and the hot steam attacks my face as my hands find the sides of her face and my lips capture hers.
The water pouring over us makes her slippery in my hands, I drag my hands from her face down her body.
Pulling her closer to me, I’m more desperate to keep her to me as the taste of her lips consumes my every thought.
My fingers dig into her thighs as I sandwich her between the wall and myself. “Are you wet for me Crane?”
My fingers trace the water droplets across her stomach and over her hip, The water pouring between us, I slide my fingers over her sex and lightly bite her shoulder at what I find.
Her prefect fucking wetness, stickier then water gracing my fingers. I lift them to my lips, her eyes tracking my every move as i suck her off my fingers.
“Fucking delicious,” I murmur and she smiles at me. She huffs, her chest raising with each breath as she relaxes against the title wall.
“Take me Handsome. Your reward is to take care of me, anyway you want,” She says, pecking my skin with wet kisses and wandering hands. She grips my back, her nails digging into my skin, as I kiss her.
I lift her slightly so her pussy meets my cock, but I don’t enter, and by god, do I fucking want to. I grind once into her, eating her moan into my mouth as reward.