Chapter 43
TIANA
My mouth tastes like Griffin Hayes.
Which is extremely inconvenient, considering I’m supposed to be angry with him.
Not mildly irritated or annoyed, no.
I am supposed to be furious. Righteously furious. Woman scorned. Trust betrayed. Boundaries trampled. Burner-account-catfished-by-my-boss enraged.
Instead, I’m sitting in the driver’s seat of his rental car with my thighs pressed together, my lips swollen, and my dress twisted somewhere around my hips.
I hate that minutes ago, Griffin’s hands were gripping my hips as if I were the only solid thing left in his world, and I let him. I more than let him. I melted into him like a woman who hadn’t just learned that the person she trusted was also the person who lied to her.
And I need… more.
I hate him for making this harder by not being defensive and not giving me an easy enemy. For standing here with his remorse and that stupid face I’ve been trying not to love for months.
Trying and failing.
Griffin told me he loves me.
Griffin-fucking-Hayes said he was in love with me.
And I didn’t say it back.
Not because it isn’t true.
I love him so much it has started to feel like a bruise I keep pressing just to make sure it’s still there.
I love him in the kitchen when he’s half-awake and scowling into his coffee.
I love him when Sylas climbs him like furniture and he pretends to be annoyed while one hand stays protectively on his son’s back.
I love him when he forgets to eat because he’s lost in a design.
I love him when he looks at me like wanting me is the first selfish thing he’s let himself have in years.
I have loved him quietly. Stupidly. Hopelessly.
And I never thought he would love me back.
I thought I was an interruption in the sad, beautiful museum of his grief.
Something temporary. Something warm he wanted until guilt dragged him back into the cold.
I thought Lila would always stand between us, not because she did anything wrong, but because Griffin built her memory into a wall and then hid behind it every time I got too close.
Then tonight, he told me he took off his ring.
That should make me feel better—and it does. But it also makes me want to scream into the nearest decorative hotel pillow. Because none of that erases @built2last.
None of that erases the fact that I poured pieces of myself into a stranger who wasn’t a stranger.
That I flirted and vented and trusted someone I thought had no power over me, only to find out it was the man who employed me.
The man whose child I love. The man in whose house I felt wanted without having to perform for it.
That is not something a kiss fixes. Even if it was a really, really good kiss.
My hand is on Griffin’s belt buckle. He’s been quiet, letting me come to terms with the many, chaotic thoughts in my head.
“I want you to fuck me. But not soft, like I’m made of glass. You broke something in me tonight, Griffin, and I need you to fix it.”
At this point, I don’t even care that we’re in a public parking lot, where anyone could walk by and catch us at any moment.
The risk should probably be enough to stop me, but it isn’t.
Not when Griffin is looking at me like that.
Not when every rational thought in my head has already been drowned out by the way he makes me feel.
I watch the corner of his mouth twitch as I say it, as if I shocked him out of self-pity and into pure, unadulterated lust. “Is that what you need, baby girl?”
My body answers for me, a rush of heat pooling low in my abdomen. But I say, “Yes, Daddy,” because I know that’ll get the reaction I want.
The growl that comes out of him is almost feral. His mouth finds mine, his body crushing into me until the dull pain in my chest is replaced by a feverish, urgent need.
“You want to hate me so bad, but you can’t stay away. Can you, Sugar?”
I kiss him again, biting his lower lip in response until I taste copper. I want to hurt him back, make him feel every fucked up thing he made me feel, and I want him to take it like it’s his due.
Griffin hisses when I lick the blood from his lip, his hand sliding up to my nape and fisting my hair. The sound that comes out of me isn’t gentle.
“You want to punish me, don’t you, Tiana?” The words barely land before he’s already moving, unhooking his belt with one hand, the zipper following, and then his cock is out, hard and slick at the tip. “Say it.”
I meet his eyes. “I want to make you regret it. I want to make you beg, Hayes.”
Griffin grins, teeth bright. His hand closes over my jaw, a little rough. His pupils are so wide his eyes look black. “Then make me beg, baby.”
I palm his dick and stroke him once, squeezing hard enough to draw another hiss. I lick my thumb and swirl it over the tip, then lower my gaze and watch him twitch for me. Now I’m grinning, even though my body feels like it could split open from how badly I want him.
“You don’t get to come until I say.” I drag my fingers up and down, just enough to tease, not enough to satisfy. “You want to apologize with your mouth? Go ahead. But your cock belongs to me.”
“Fuck, Tiana. I’m already losing my mind.”
“Then say please,” I whisper. “You want to fuck me? Ask nicely.”
Griffin’s head drops and he laughs, but it’s mostly a gasp. My hand works slowly at the base of his cock, thumb smearing the bead of precum over the crown; part of me wants to bite him there just to see if the pain is enough to erase the hurt he left in me.
He buries his hands in my hair and pulls my mouth to his, and when we break apart, his voice is ragged. “Please, Tiana.”
“Say it.”
“Please, baby. Let me bury my cock inside you. I want to feel your tight pussy strangle me.”
Oh, God.
Every fiber of me screams with the need to punish him and to be punished in return, to blur the line between vengeance and surrender until neither of us knows which is which. I stroke him harder, and he unleashes a guttural moan from deep in his chest.
But I am not done with him yet.
Griffin bites down on my earlobe, the pain sharp and perfect, and his hands find the backs of my thighs, scooping me forward, to the edge of the seat, my legs still dangling outside of the car.
I line him up between my legs, daring him to move first, to take what he wants. Instead, he holds himself still, the tension in his body vibrating through me like a live wire.
I dig my nails into the back of his neck. “Tell me what you want,” I demand again.
“I want you so goddamn bad,” he growls. “I want to fuck you until you forget your own name. I want to fill you up and watch you break on my cock.”
The obscene poetry of it is almost enough to make me come, even before he’s inside me. I yank on his hair, loving the ragged gasp it pulls out of him. I want to shatter him, to make him feel the way he made me feel —helpless, exposed, addicted.
Griffin’s mouth crushes into mine, hungry, our teeth clacking, and then he’s maneuvering, finding the bundle of lace at my hip and yanking my panties to the side. The tip of his cock nudges my entrance, but I make him wait, just to hear him beg again.
“Please, Tiana,” he whimpers. “Please.”
“You’re such a good boy when you beg for me, Griffin.”
He shakes, just a little, and I feel the effort it takes for him not to just slam into me and make me eat my own smugness.
But he doesn’t. He waits. His hand finds my jaw, thumb resting on my chin, and he looks at me like this is a holy moment —a confession, or maybe a punishment, or maybe just the only way he knows how to ask for forgiveness.
“Please,” he says, softer now, and the sound is almost a sob.
I let him in, just the tip, and clamp down hard, making him gasp again and buck his hips. I set the pace: cruelly slow, rolling my hips so the head of his cock just barely parts me before I slide back, denying him, again and again.
My own control is hanging by a thread, every movement making me ache, but I won’t let go. Not yet. Not until I’m sure he understands.
He tries to thrust deeper, and I raise my palm to his chest. “No. You don’t get to move. Not until I say.”
Griffin groans, hands fisting in my hair as if he can anchor himself to me and keep from flying apart. “You’re going to kill me, baby.”
One hand finds the swell of my ass, pulls me tighter against him, but I keep him caged, my hand working him with slow, lazy strokes. His breath is hot on my throat, his teeth nipping at the sensitive spot behind my ear, and every time I rock my hips, I feel his restraint unraveling.
“Tell me how much you want me,” I demand, feeling every twitch and pulse of him inside me.
“I want you more than I’ve ever wanted anything,” he rasps, the words guttural and raw. “I want to fuck you until you forget why you’re mad at me.”
I almost laugh, but it comes out as a moan. I want him, too. I want to own him, to mark him from the inside out, to be the only thing he thinks about for days. My thighs tighten around his waist and he shivers, sweat slicking his temple.
“Try harder,” I whisper, and slide forward until he’s buried inside me, so deep it feels like I’ll never be able to get him out.
“Please. I need you, Tiana. Fuck, I need you.” His voice is a whimper, and I grin, victorious, even as my own body trembles, on the edge of collapse.
I dig my nails into the curve of his ass and pull him flush against me.
“Please, sugar. I’ll do anything. I’ll never lie to you again. I’ll tell you every fucking secret you want. Just let me fuck you.”
It’s not mercy —but the need to have him, to erase the distance between us, finally wins.
“Okay, Daddy. Fuck me then.”
Griffin grins, wild and wolfish, and in one motion, he rips the panties clean off my body, seam snapping, lace burning against my skin. I yelp.