22. Venom
22
VENOM
L ily is in the shower when I finally make it back to our room to catch a few hours’ sleep. I hear her humming to herself, happy as she can be in the midst of the shit flying at us, and it takes my legs out from under me.
How can I risk her like this?
I stumble to the edge of the bed and plonk my arse on the mattress. Every way this convoluted game I’m about to initiate could go wrong hits me all at once. The stakes are high. Deadly. For me. For Slash, Toker, Cub, and Hunter. Most of all, for Lily.
To successfully pull this off, I have to entrust her safety to the man I trust the least.
Brutus.
And that scares the living shit out of me.
Jamming my fingers through my hair, I yank at the longer strands until it hurts.
The sharp pain snaps me out of my head.
This is going to work.
It has to.
I’ve got to protect it all.
My club. My position as VP. Most importantly, my woman’s life.
Everything depends on me.
Forcing myself to ignore the niggling worries that hang over my head, I retake my feet and strip. Once I’m naked, I quietly open the bathroom door and slip inside the steamy room without Lily realising.
She’s standing under the water, hands in her hair as she rinses it. Her back is arched. The shower streams over her face. I run my gaze over my woman, starting at her closed eyes and ending at the blue polish on her toenails.
Lily is a fucking goddess.
Every inch of her body is flawless. As if she was ripped from the deepest recesses of my imagination and designed with only me in mind. It’s like her creator took every fantasy I’ve ever had and assembled the perfect woman. Blonde haired and blue eyed. Smooth, almost porcelain skin that takes on the barest hint of colour when she spends time in the sun. Her limbs are long and gracefully curved. Her tits are well beyond a handful. Full lips, pink and pouty.
She takes my breath away.
Always has.
Even with our seven-year age gap to contend with, the mistakes made while I spent her teenage years watching her grow from the tomboy who hung on my every word into the woman she is now, I regret only one thing.
That I didn’t fight harder to have her.
My dad always warned me my pride would be my downfall.
He cautioned me that life had a way of fucking things up.
I told him he was wrong.
Buoyed by the stupidity of youth, I’d scoffed at him. Didn’t believe him. Told him he was full of shit. Declared I was too much of a villain to fail to get what I wanted. With the same confidence I approached everything, I pushed Lily away when she kissed me as a fifteen-year-old. Content to crave her until she was legal, I watched her from afar. Forced her onto a pedestal as I remained celibate. Kept her untouched but never unloved.
I thought she was safe.
From me.
From everyone.
I believed I was the ultimate antihero.
Undefeatable.
Always one step ahead.
Only my dad was right.
Still, I never expected the downfall he’d predicted to come in the form of Lily’s blood.
But that’s how I discovered for the first time that I wasn’t invincible.
Holding my hands in front of my face, I swear I can still feel the warmth of her life force as it coated them that night. Her body broken, eyelids fluttering open and shut as she struggled to breathe, terrified me. The only thing that kept me sane long enough for the ambulance to arrive was the presence of Lily’s blood streaking my hands as I wiped it from her mouth every time it bubbled from between her lips. Her fight to live kept us connected. Kept me tethered to earth. I couldn’t lose my grip on sanity because Lily needed me. Her pain forced me to hold her together, hold myself together at the same time, when all I wanted to do was lie down on the floor with her and die if she did.
When her heart stopped and the paramedics pulled her away from me so they could attempt to bring her back, the dried blood that stained my skin became a damning indictment of my ruin.
It was the same colour as my damaged soul.
Black and flaky at the edges with pools of blood-red in the middle.
I didn’t wash my hands until the doctors informed us she would survive.
Twenty-one hours of wearing my failure for all to see.
Curling my fingers into fists, I fight to stop myself from falling into the black hole that threatens to swallow me every time I think about that night. It doesn’t work. My control slips as the reminder that I compounded my disgrace by allowing Alex to live five and a half years ago invades my head. Our current reality derides memories of that failure.
Alex is back, has already hurt Lily again, and I’m stuck helplessly staring at the beautiful woman who owns every part of my humanity through a pane of glass.
At least, this time, there’s a door I can use to reach her. The glass that separated us while she was in intensive care didn’t offer me that kind of access.
Quickly opening the shower cubicle, I join Lily under the torrent and clutch her to me with the same hands that once felt her pulse fade to nothing.
She turns, eyes lighting up at the sight of me.
Lily’s smile is wide until the expression on my face registers. “ Venom .”
“Little Cherub.”
Our greetings are stilted, words that we rarely use to address each other, as we individually battle our response to what we see in the other’s expression. The unfamiliar. The foreign. The alien. Although she does her best to hide it, I spy the uncertainty that flickers in my woman’s gaze as I stare at her without blinking. Lily closes her eyes when I turn her to face away from me and wrap my arms around her from behind. Her curves fit my body like we’re matching pieces. I press a kiss to the tattoo between her shoulder blades.
My club mark.
Venom and She-Venom.
That’s who we need to be tonight.
Anything less, anything softer, will break us.
My cock hardens against her arse. Lily glances at me over her shoulder. Expectation that’s tinged with the perfect amount of wariness is etched in her expression. She knows what tonight will bring, and she’s as game as I am to bask in our depravity.
“Tell me your safe word?” I circle my fingers around her throat, squeezing in warning as she looks away from me. When she swallows, I feel every movement beneath my palm. “You know how this works… say it.”
“Carnage.”
“Good girl.”
Despite my grip on her neck, Lily turns to face me. I allow her to press her tits to my chest, but I don’t let go of her throat. She kisses me, just a peck, before she pulls away. As Lily’s gaze scans my face, I watch her take in my dishevelled state—the bloodshot eyes, the extra growth on my chin, the tight line of my lips—then she attempts to drop to her knees in front of me. I squeeze my fingers around her throat and force her to hover, breathing hard as her triggers makes themselves known, for a few seconds before I let her down.
“Open your mouth, sweet thing.”
Kneeling before me, water rushing over her face, Lily parts her lips and sticks her tongue out. Grasping my dick at the base, I slap the head against her least bruised cheek, then thrust all the way inside her mouth to the back of her throat before she can relax it. When she makes a strangled noise, I pull back an inch or two. Without allowing Lily time to catch her breath, I force my way back in, choking her as she works to tolerate my thick length.
“Fuck, you feel good.”
Again, I withdraw.
This time when I surge forward, I make her gag.
Blinking fast, Lily stares up at me with tears streaming from her eyes. They mingle with the warm water, sticking to her long lashes before they run down her cheeks. I brush my thumb over her bruised jaw, gently stroke the stitches in her eyebrow, and shake my head. “Gonna kill him for puttin’ his hands on you again.”
Agreement rumbles in her chest. I thrust my cock between her swollen and bloodied lips, hitting the back of her throat when she’s too slow to swallow my length. Eventually, Lily slaps her hands against my thighs to push me away.
“You callin’ carnage already?” I ask as I free myself from her mouth with a low groan. “Thought my woman was tougher than that.”
Lily shakes her head, an evil glint lighting up her eyes when she drags her teeth along my dick. I hiss. She smirks. We glare at each other for a heartbeat as the darkness that haunts the pair of us pulses to life. Blood runs down her chin from the split in her lip that I can’t seem to make myself allow to heal.
“You’re playin’ a dangerous game tonight,” I tell my woman in a flat voice. Hands in her wet hair, I drag her back to her feet. “And we both know you’re not gonna like the consequences.”
“Yeah?” Cocking a hip to one side and matching that movement with the tilt of her head, Lily sasses me, “I don’t believe you.”
I grab her arse and pull her hard to me. My mouth slams against hers. Our teeth clash. I nibble on her plump flesh. Her top lip starts to bleed faster as I harshly thrust my tongue into her mouth. Lily kisses me with the same ferociousness, sliding her fingers into my hair and tugging hard enough to make me curse. I drag my fingernails down her back, marking her before I hook my hand under her left leg and loop it around my hip. Her back slams into the wet tiles, and I press my other hand between her legs. Driving two fingers into her heat, I work her over hard.
“Is that the best you’ve got?” Lily moans against my mouth.
She sinks her teeth into my bottom lip. The skin breaks. A separate metallic tang mingles with Lily’s blood. I swipe my tongue over the wound, testing the depth of the cut, then bite down harder to make it bleed more. When I mash my mouth to Lily’s again, I feel the blood run over my chin. It drips to her heaving chest, and I swipe a hand over her tits to mark her as mine.
Every time the water washes the blood away, I bite down and bleed over her again.
I wrench my mouth from hers to ask, “You ready?”
“Bring it.”
Grinding my dick against my woman’s thigh, I press a third finger inside her pussy. I finger fuck her with a lack of finesse that speaks to my loss of control. As Lily’s hips buck and she wobbles to stay upright on one leg, I use my thumb to work her clit.
“God, I’m gonna come.” Lily’s walls pulse around my fingers. I take her to the edge, right to the cusp, then I withdraw from her tight heat. “No. No. Please.”
Her begging fall on deaf ears. I wrap her hair around my wrist and turn her to face the wall. Using my grip on her wet locks, I force Lily to arch her back until her arse is dick height, then I glide my cock between her legs. Over and over, I brush her clit with the head of my dick until her pleasure is peaking again.
The feral sounds escaping her lips are a fucking turn-on.
As soon as I’m positive she’s on the cusp of coming, I pull back.
“No. Please. Oh. ” I’m rough when I fill her in one thrust. Lily’s feet scramble for purchase on the wet floor, and she slaps her hands to the wall to keep her balance. “God. Yes. God.”
“Do you feel that?” I ask as her pussy grips me tight. “I’m deep as I can be, Cherub, but your hungry little cunt still wants more.”
“Give it to me, Venom. Make it hurt.”
Lily hisses when I pull out and drive back inside her. Over and over, I fuck her like I hate her. There isn’t an ounce of love in my actions, yet we both know that’s what this is. The purest kind of love making. The type that rips your soul to shreds, breaks you, bleeds you out, then puts you back together.
Rough sex is our way of proving that we can withstand anything. Lily’s PTSD. Her triggers. My lack of control. The rage that stalks me. Alex’s reign of terror. Brutus’ betrayal. The Shamrocks’ potential demise. While we have the ability to accept the other’s weaknesses, our ugly shortcomings, both physically and mentally, nothing can break us apart.
“You’re gonna come now, aren’t you, little Cherub?”
“Y-yes.”
I slide my hand around her hip and over her lower belly until I reach her clit.
My touch is harsh while I work her into a frenzy.
“F-fuck. Fuck ,” Lily curses, slapping the wall with one hand.
After readjusting my grip on her hair, I force Lily to arch back as far as she can. Her thighs must be screaming, but that doesn’t stop me from pumping into her faster. She’s on her tiptoes, doing her best to absorb my savagery while I use my dick and my fingers to wring every last ounce of ecstasy from her body. When her walls clench around me, a guttural groan is wrenched from somewhere deep in my chest.
“That’s it, metukà shelì. Come hard. Milk me, sweet thing.”
We climax together. Her pussy spasms around my length, squeezing me tight, prolonging my orgasm until my legs are shaking, and I slump over her with a shout. Trapped between me and the wall, Lily wobbles on her feet. Her chest rises and falls as she pants through the aftershocks that wrack her trembling frame. Once I’ve caught my breath, I unwind her hair from my wrist, wrap my arms around her waist and drag her out from beneath the water. I set her on the bathroom basin then wrap a towel around her. Once the shower tap is flicked off, I dry myself. Lily hasn’t moved. Her chin is close to her chest, and her eyes are closed. I knot my towel around my waist and approach her.
“What’s wrong?” I ask when I notice that she’s trying not to cry.
Lily sniffs. Her gaze is watery when she meets mine. “I don’t want tomorrow to come.”
“Me neither. But the only way out of this is through it.”
“Still sucks.” Lily hits me with a wobbly smile that stabs me straight in the heart. “Still makes me sad.”
Rather than comfort her with lies like I would’ve mere days ago, I simply nod, then towel her off. Once I’ve worked the wide-toothed comb through Lily’s long locks, it takes two attempts to secure her hair into a bun on top of her head.
“Let’s get some sleep, sweet thing.”
“Okay.”
Lily hops off the basin and takes the hand I offer her. Without a word, she lets me lead her to our bed. I spoon her from behind, burying my face in the crook of her neck to inhale her scent. She laces her fingers with mine and pulls the arm I have over her waist tighter.
“It’s not forever.”
Her voice is small when she asks, “Promise?”
“Promise.”