She understands me, so she knows what’s coming and her hand lifts to her chest in preparation.

“What do I want from you?” I rasp, my eyes hard, hers tense and tangled, even more so when I slowly slip away. “Absolutely nothing.”

There it is.

The sting she can’t hide.

It’s only fair she feels it when I do.

Who is she to make me ache?

Nobody. That’s who.

Chapter 23

Brielle

Freshly showered, mind muddled, and emotionally spent, I step from my bathroom.

I don’t get a foot onto the carpet when a hand slaps over my mouth, shoving me back into the wall.

The sudden surge of panic has my vision blurring, but after a long, hard, blink, it returns. Panic has my heart rate climbing, but I quickly focus on the familiar face shoved in mine.

Royce stands in front of me, body pressed to mine, alcohol blanketing his breath and hazing his brown eyes. Eyes that grow darker the longer he stares.

His hand slides down the wall near my side, and then it’s wrapping around my left thigh.

In one quick move, he dips and lifts me, pressing me into the wall with his hips.

I lock my legs around his back, my robe falling open slightly around my legs, and he groans, running his fingers along the soft skin there. He squeezes, growing against me, hardening, stabbing at my stomach and creating heat within it.

His arms come up, fingers gliding along my neck and throat.

“Baby girl,” he rasps, and his eyes slam into mine.

Anguish, absolute and complete, stares back.

I want to take it away, always.

Royce’s focus falls to my lips, a hostile glare written across him and knotting inside me.

His tongue slips out to wet his lips, and when I do the same, every muscle in his body locks.

He fights it, his want, and he fights it well.

But I don’t want him to, and he came here for a reason.

Because just as I felt tonight, his kiss of anger wasn’t enough.

We need more.

We need real.

I want him to kiss me again, to devour me.

I want him to break me.

It’ll be worth it.

So, I dare pull his chain from beneath his shirt, my fingers gliding along the expensive item.

He instantly slaps my hand away, but there’s a sense of wonder in his eyes almost imploring me to push him further. To take what I want.

Demand and receive he once told me.

So when his eyes fall to the silver around his neck and hold, I ever so slowly try again.

I slip my fingers behind it, allowing it to rest on my palm, and read the inscription etched into it, his family’s motto.

My palm closes around the crest, the strength of the words now locked inside my fist.

My grip is tight, and his chest expands.

I tug it toward me, tug him toward me.

Chest to chest, my legs wrapped tight around his hips, I press down, my ass meeting the head of his swollen cock. And my god... does he respond.

His breaths turn ragged, his hand shoving into my hair, and then the world stops turning.

The sun meets the moon.

And my soul, it wraps around his.

Royce takes my lips in a deep, devilish, exhilarating kiss.

There is no anger in it this time.

It’s a pure, thrilling—terrifying—need to drown in one another.

It’s intoxicating.

He is intoxicating.

Royce’s mouth molds to mine, his tongue sweeping in greedy, hungry grazes.

He moans, and groans, and growls against my mouth, pressing his body into mine and when he slopes a little lower, his cock rubs right along my center.

I gasp, my eyes slamming closed, my head falling back, and he dips, sucking and biting on my neck.

An unfamiliar, exotic sound seeps past my lips and he tears back, looks me in the eye and then slams his lips into mine again.

His kiss is hard, rough, and so so good, but after a few moments, something shifts.

His hold loosens, his lips growing lax.

Royce kisses me slow, lazy, and long. And somehow, this kiss is more than the ones before.

It’s honest.

It’s an apology.

It’s us.

It’s him.

It’s more.

When he pulls away, he rests his head in the crook of my neck, and my fingers come up to glide along his fade.

“My little Tink,” he rasps. “Help me fly...”

An unquenchable tingling stirs low in my stomach as he brings himself closer.

“Help me fly, ‘cause this lost boy is on his way down, baby girl...” He quiets, his hold tightening.

Those tingles, they turn into fireworks.

He’s on his way down...

He’s falling.

My pulse thuds wildly in my ears, anticipation of what this could mean and fear of what will likely follow sending a shudder through my heated body.

What would he say if he knew I hit the ground long ago?

He hums against my skin, his tongue flicking me there, and I feel him grin against me.

Slowly, he lets my legs drop, his hands coming up to cup my face and hold my eyes on his.

He stares a long moment, and then leans in, his lips pressing into the corner of mine. He doesn’t let go or pull back, but a strangled, whispered, and maybe even unaware, “What are you doing to me” follows.

My breath lodges in my throat, and I don’t respond. I don’t think I’m meant to.

And then he’s gone.

I go to bed having no clue what tomorrow will bring, but knowing one thing for sure.

Royce Brayshaw has the ability to feed my soul... or feast on it.

And me?

I must be as sick as my mother was... because I’m pretty sure I’d let him do both.

Chapter 24

Brielle

Holy hickey!

I gape at the mirror, pushing my hair aside and lean closer.

It’s big, like the size of a freaking baseball big!

How?!

He was only there for a few seconds, right?

But he has skills, Brielle.

I turn my head more.

Okay, maybe not the size of a baseball, but definitely a golf ball. It starts farther back on my neck and higher up, almost to my hairline, and comes down like a jacked-up J, right into that sweet spot he found.

My core heats at the thought of last night, at the taste of his lips, the strength behind them.

He was all in, giving me a taste of what he can do to me, and I gladly accepted, begged on the inside, not that I’d be opposed to begging on the out.

I’m starting to realize, though, Royce can only work off what his mind allows.

No one can dictate his next move for him, maybe not even him half the time. To try and force something on Royce messes with his mind and leads to frustration. Annoyance. And that’s when the hardheaded, foul words follow.

He’s kind of like a child in that way, unsure of what’s coming at him, so he acts out, but not for attention.

It’s the opposite really.

“Oh, you think you see me?” —fires a missile, straight to the jugular— “well how about now? Did you see that coming?”

It’s the only way he knows how to keep out what he’s afraid to let in.

Possibility.

Hope.

Love?

He’s afraid to feel. Afraid to hurt once he does because he believes that’s all that follows. So, he spends his time with gorgeous girls he has no desire to know, who have no wish to know him either, and he tells himself he’s okay with it.