“Relax, Lexi.” His voice sounds calmer, satisfied. “You’ll see it was meant to be. Just don’t fight me next time and everything will be fine.”
“There won’t be a next time!” I shriek like some kind of animal.
Chuckling, he opens the door, and some of the light spilling in through the hallway windows makes it into the room. I see the deep gashes I left along his cheek and swear to myself it’s only the beginning.
One day, I’m going to do so much worse to him.
“There will be a next time . . . if you want your mother to live. You’ll see.” And with that he closes the door, leaving a broken, damaged husk of a woman in his wake.
chapter 29
d rew’s trembling in my arms, his face hidden in my neck. At first, he cried into my skin, nearly shredding my resolve to see the story through, but now it’s just the shivers wracking him.
His madness, the storm rising in his soul, demanding blood.
Demanding death.
I remember the first time I felt that, the night Stephen raped me. Sure, I wanted Andrew’s father dead long before that, but it was nothing compared to what Stephen unleashed in me that night.
And now I’ve taken that disease and infected my Drew with it. I can feel his struggle as he physically fights to work through the onslaught.
“Drew, I’m sorry—”
“Don’t you fucking apologize to me,” he snarls into my skin, hugging me tighter. “I’m going to end him, Lexi, like no one’s been killed before. I’ll take everything from him first. Then I’ll make sure he suffers all the pain humanity has to offer before finally finishing him.”
I push at his chest, making room. Sliding my legs around his waist, I latch onto him with everything I have. “We’re going to do it together, baby. Always together from now on.”
He inhales sharply, the sound watery from his residual tears, and if his hold gets any tighter I won’t be able to breathe.
Unlike with Stephen, I love it. Everything Drew does to me is different, glorious, and I finally understand why.
It’s because with him I want it, while as with Stephen it was always forced on me against my will.
Drew’s limp between my legs, a fact that both surprises me and doesn’t. Every time I’ve ever gotten close to him, his body’s reaction has been immediate and visceral, but who can blame him right now? My story isn’t sexy. Not in the least.
Yet, regardless, I remain on fire for him as I was earlier. Perhaps even more so now that I’ve been forced to recall what happened to me and I’m remembering the utterly opposite experience of being with him.
Of being eaten by him, owned by him.
“Drew,” I whisper into his ear, running my lips along it and wiggling on his lap.
Tensions spirals through him, bunching his shoulders. “Lexi?”
Cupping his neck, I try to tug his face away from my neck. “I need you, Drew.” I punctuate the statement with a slow lick of his ear.
In a split second flat, his dick twitches beneath me, elongating, making my mouth water.
My gut tightens as another flood of need hits me right between the legs.
“Lexi, you can’t—we can’t . . . not after having to relive—”
“But it’s so different with you,” I whine into his ear, licking my way down his corded, delicious neck. “It makes me forget everything.”
Hissing a curse, he clutches my thighs. Seemingly of their own volition, his hips jerk, rubbing his now fully hard length against my bare pussy beneath the t-shirt. He freezes, realizing that very fact . . . “You’re fucking naked under my shirt, aren’t you?” he groans.
I force one of his hands off my thigh and slide it between my legs. “Uh huh. All ready for you.” The tips of his fingers make contact with my wet slit.
The world tilts and suddenly I’m being slammed diagonally onto the bed, with Drew working his way between my thighs. His eyes blaze with a million fucked-up, dazzling emotions. “Damn it, Lexi, we shouldn’t be doing this right now.”
“Shut up and kiss me, Drew.” I tug him down to me.
Our lips meet in an urgent explosion, everything we’re feeling pouring out into that union. We make out hot and heavy, all teeth and tongue, as I shift impatiently under him and mewl for more.
Grunting under his breath, he reaches between my legs, cupping my pussy in his possessive palm. “This is mine.” He sucks on my bottom lip and I feel it all the way down to my toes. “Was always mine. Should’ve only ever been mine.”
In a daze of sexual need, I slip my hand past his waistband, finding his straining erection and fisting it. “Ditto, Drew. I want to kill every one of them that got to have it while I was gone.”
Predatory obsession floods his gaze and he slides two fingers into my pulsating core. “I didn’t want anyone but you.” His soft whisper tears at me, but it’s the words left unsaid that gut me. You left me and you were all I needed.
“Now,” I groan, working my hips against his fingers and pumping my fist on his dick. “Give this to me now.”
He slams his lips on mine for a quick, rough kiss, then he jerks back. Quicker than I can keep up with, the t-shirt is pulled over my head, leaving me naked beneath him. Biting his lip at the sight of my tits, he leans down to suck one swollen, aching nipple into his warm mouth.
I cup the back of his head with my free hand, thumbing his slick tip. “Hurry, Drew. Hurry.”
Sucking me hard enough to hollow his cheeks, he moans my name around my nipple and reaches for his waistband. The pants are tugged down to his thighs, freeing his swollen dick and balls.
I catch a glimpse of the mess of scars along his left thigh, a roadmap of agony ten times worse than the one along his obliques.
My mind’s reeling from yet another round of evidence of his suffering, of what he endured to survive for me, as he lifts himself on straightened arms and positions himself against my entrance.
“I love you, Lexi,” he growls, brow furrowed with intent. As if he’s willing the words inside me, demanding I feel the truth of them.
I do, so much that my eyes flood instantly and I’m crying as I reply, “Oh God. I love you, too, Drew. I never got to tell you, but I love you more than anything.”
Expression pained, he whispers my name . . . seconds before slamming inside me with his full length.
chapter 30
i barely have time to adjust to the invasion, to process the mind-bending pleasure of him inside me, when Drew sets a pounding rhythm. “Yes,” I gasp, eyes rolling back. “God, yes, yes, yes.”
“Holy fuck, when you moan like that.” Hooking one of my legs over his arm, he splits me again, each thrust sending me sliding up and down the bed. “Want to take this slow for you but you’re so fucking good, Lexi.”
He throws his head back, muscles bulging, veins stark in contrast along his skin. He isn’t looking at me, so he doesn’t catch how my eyes trail over the damaged beauty of his physique, the scars my absence left on him.
It breaks my heart.
At the same time, the picture he makes drives me crazier, pussy tightening, his dick glistening with every retreat from my core from how wet he has me. “Harder, Drew. Give me everything.”
He snarls, obliging, sending my body sliding across the bed—
I gasp as I feel air on my back, seconds before I’m falling off the bed onto the carpet, his dick slipping out of me. Only the backs of my bent legs remain on the bed on either side of him.
“Shit, Lexi!” Concerned, Drew leans over the edge of the bed.
Before he can reach for me, I scoot backwards on the soft cream carpet, until I’m flat on the floor. Holding my arms out, voice husky with need, I say, “Come down here, baby.”
When it looks like he might deny me, his worry over hurting me taking control, I spread my legs, letting him see the glistening, wet flesh between them.
Brow snapping low over those toffee-colored eyes, he bares his teeth, that sexy, rough sound leaving him
. He’s off the bed in an instant, between my legs again—
His return thrust leaves me arching clear off the floor, his name a harsh rasp. Glorious relief spirals through my core, followed by the insane tension of wanting more. Always wanting more.
His large hand wraps around my nape, lifting my head to me. I barely catch his burning eyes, how he’s trying to consume me with his stare alone, then it’s his lips owning me again, his tongue feeding me the most delicious taste I’ll ever fucking have.
He gives me exactly what we both need, his thrusts forceful, commanding, the tip of him hitting as deep as he can go, and yet this desire burns brighter in my pussy. Punishing, hot coal, ready to consume us both.
Drew let’s my head drop back onto the floor, diving for my neck. He makes love to it with his mouth, hitting all my sensitive spots, chanting. It takes me a bit to pick up on the words, the repeated proclamation he’s trying to sear into my soul. “I love you. I love you. I fucking love you.”
I lift my hips, feeling electric. Needy. Alive. Kissing any part of him I can reach, I dig my nails into his back, giving the words right back to him, until we’re two mindless beings trapped in the same endless prayer.
Groaning, Drew intertwines his fingers with mine and slams my hands above my head, holding them there. His thick dick swells even more, hips picking up speed.
Our gazes cling to each other, lips a centimeter apart, the words “I love you” forced through his breathless grunts and my whimpers.
His face fierce with harsh longing, as if he’s not already inside me, his cock stretching my tight pussy to its limit, Drew pounds into me. “Fucking love you. Will never let anyone take you from me again. Now even you, Lexi.”
I shiver with bone deep pleasure, feet digging into the carpet, my ass leaving the floor with the tension knotting my muscles.
His hands tighten on mine. “Ah fuck. That’s it. You look so fucking gorgeous taking my cock like that, baby.”
“I love that cock,” I mewl, lost to everything, almost lost to him, the primal beat of my blood coalescing on that one spot where he’s thrusting, thrusting . . .
“Yeah?” He gives it to me with another hard shove that nearly sends me flying away from him once more. “You love it in that pretty cunt? That juicy, needy, insatiable pussy?”
Oh, God. I never knew. Never knew I could feel like this.
“Huh, Lexi?” Another brutal thrust.
I’m flung into the stratosphere, incapable of speech. “Uhhh.”
“Answer me, Lexi.” He releases one hand, reaching between my thighs, his thumb doing things to my wet clit that my mind struggles to understand. “Tell me how much you love this dick.”
I’m swallowed whole, consumed, shattered and rearranged by the craziest fucking orgasm of my life. “I love you. God, I love you, Drew!”
“Holy shit!” He loses himself in the act, thrusting, growling, lifting me off the floor and piercing my pulsating core with his spurting dick. “Shit yeah. Yes, baby. Fucking take it.” Clamping his teeth around my neck, he rides me hard, his own orgasm lasting so long that I’m forced right back into another.
My breath hitches, wide, unseeing eyes locked on a spot past his shoulder.
Drew clutches my ass, trembling and jerking against me. He releases my neck to pant into my ear and I swear just feeling his breath sends my post-orgasmic shivers into overdrive. “We’re going to end both of them. They’re all that’s left of the ones responsible.”
My psyche is broken. Damaged beyond repair. I’ve known this for years. Knew it the first night Stephen raped me. Yet the way my heart thumps with excitement, sending goosebumps racing through my skin at that, leaves absolutely no doubt.
Drew runs his lips along my own, giving me that groan I live for. “Your pussy jumped at that. You like that baby? Knowing I’m killing them for you?”
I throw my arms around his neck, hips rotating, grinding on his soaked, still hard cock. “We’re killing them, Drew. They’ll pay for hurting my man.”
“Fuck. Call me that again,” he demands harshly against my lips.
Giggling at how crazy we are, I do.
It unleashes something in him, something even more ravenous. Suddenly I’m back on the floor, his insane stamina blowing my mind as he starts fucking once more.
“I mean it, Lexi.” He throws my legs over his shoulders, muscles rippling in a dazzling, unbelievable display as his hips work me. “They’re going to fucking pay.”
“Yes, Drew,” I sigh, arching, giving into his possession. “They’re so going to fucking pay.”
chapter 31
m ateo is waiting for me in the living room the next morning, reading through a newspaper as he lounges on the couch facing the flatscreen and fireplace.
Behind me, past the glass divider wall tucked under the second-floor landing, someone’s moving around the kitchen. I’ve barely had time to investigate it the two nights I’ve spent here. When I turn to investigate where the sounds are coming from, I see a woman moving around, busy cooking.
“Mr. Drevlow instructed you to have breakfast,” Mateo says calmly, not looking up from his newspaper.
“Did he now?” I mumble, shaking my head. I did wake up to a text from him alerting me that he’d left early.
Two nights falling asleep on his arms and both mornings he was gone when I awoke. Not tomorrow, I promise myself. “Good morning to you, too, Mateo,” I throw over my shoulder, heading to the kitchen.
“Good morning, Ms. Berkman.” The smile in his tone makes my lips twitch.
Half-hour later, after the cook—a sweet, Ukrainian lady named Ulyana—has served me one of the most delicious breakfasts of my life, I rush by Mateo on my way to the elevators. “Coming?”
The rustle of his newspaper as he drops it and starts hurrying after me leaves me smiling once more.
My good mood is obscene, a fact I’m reminded of as soon as we arrive at the lobby. A few people are milking about, all discussing the possible “terrorist attack” yesterday and wondering why anyone would target a residential building in Jersey City, of all places.
I’m high off Drew, off the relief of us finally being free to love each other, but the reminder activates the never-dormant fury in my cells. In the car on the way to Drevlow Systems, Inc., I play the news on my tablet, confirming what I already suspected.
Almost toxic radiation levels are being reported from the wreckage. Enough to cause harm with long-term exposure. The entire block surrounding ground zero has been evacuated.
Stephen didn’t need to use a large nuke. The nanobots carrying the mininukes only had to work their way to the weakest point of the foundation. I have no doubt he knew the plans of the building inside-out before he activated them.
“That man that hurt you . . .” Mateo stops at the light, hands tight on the steering wheel. His dark eyes are hidden by his black shades, his severe jaw tight. “He’s responsible for that, too. Isn’t he?”
I wonder how much Drew’s told him about what Stephen did to me. Not that I don’t trust him. I do. I know he’d never give away the darkest details, the ones I’ve barely begun to even give him, regardless of what he threatened Stephen with over that email.
And I don’t really mind Mateo knowing some of it, I realize. He’s genuine, his concern born of a deeper emotion that I don’t understand but I appreciate regardless.
“Yes. He’s the one that did this,” I confirm as we take the turn leading down into the parking lot of the building.
He nods. “We will make him pay then.”
We. “I like the sound of that,” I tell him softly, confounded by the gratitude I feel but also understanding it.
When did I become the kind of woman that plans murder and appreciates others helping her?
During the years I was separated from the love of my life and constantly abused by Stephen, I remind myself.
Once upstairs, I slam to a halt in the reception area.
It’s the second time in a
goddamned week, but my stuff has once again been moved.
Ms. Rhines smiles sheepishly and points past the glass wall. Inside the interior, I see my desk has been moved to a prominent place.
Right beside Drew’s.
He’s already spotted me, sitting on his massive, leather desk chair, fingers steepled. He’s staring at me from beneath his brow and I can tell he’s re-calling what happened last night.
Need him again. More than ever.
But I can’t let him distract me.
Heading into the office, I waltz past the glass door as it slides open, heels clicking. “Again?” I motion to the desk next to his.
“The final time,” he rasps, sending those all-consuming shivers through me.
“I had an idea on the way over here,” I say, heading straight for my desk.
Drew wheels away from his desk, swiveling in his chair to face me. “Uh-uh.” Shaking his head, he presses the button to frost the glass and motions with his finger for me to go to him. “Come say good morning to your man.”
What woman alive could ever fucking resist that deep, husky voice—attached to that rough—powerful man saying that to them?
I drop my purse on my desk and head to him. “I wouldn’t have to say good morning now, if you’d just stay in bed with me.”
Drew tilts his head back along the seat and spreads his legs to make room for me. The vicious hickey I left him sits proudly at the base of his neck, the edge of it peeking past the graphite collar of his dress shirt. “Tomorrow morning, baby. I promise.”
“Good.” I cup his jaw and lean down to love on his mouth, taking my time. He reaches for my hips, getting lost in our kiss, but I break his hold before either of us gets to the point of no return. “It occurred to me in the car in the way here that we can beat Menahan at his own game.” I rush back to my desk, nearly giggling at his low, displeased growl. “The software for the nanotech wasn’t my best. None of the work I ever game him was. And I have a lot of it saved on my drive.” I hit the button to fire up my computer.
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