Cold Dark Souls : A Dark Reverse Harem Romance (Cruel Black Hearts Book 2)

by Candace Wondrak

  I wasn’t as good of an actor as Killian. People thought I was weird, because I was. These last few days proved it. I was the opposite of normal—maybe that was why my family had pretty much disowned me the moment I was born.

  I was born a freak.

  Chapter Twenty-Three – Lincoln

  Ed wasn’t happy. Stella had left him a vague voicemail, saying she needed to be picked up. Something was obviously wrong with the tone of her voice, he told me, and he wanted me to go right there. Which was fine, because I was off work anyway. Still in my uniform, as tight and constricting as it was, metaphorically.

  I had to type in the street corner where she said she was. It was over half an hour away. I hoped she’d still be there by the time I arrived.

  I pretty much white fucking knuckled it the whole way. Why the hell didn’t she try calling me? Did she not have my number? Did I forget to give it to her? Ed put his number in her phone but didn’t put mine in? I’d have to change that. He shouldn’t always be the one she ran to. She should come to me, too. We were…whatever the fuck we were. We were one. A team. A three-person relationship, a thruple? Whatever the hell it was called.

  Stella needed to learn she could rely on me.

  The street corner was in an unassuming neighborhood a lot like Stella’s but with newer homes, every other house looking the same, putting a new meaning to the phrase cookie-cutter. The only things different about them were the color of the siding and the cars sitting in the driveways. I could never live in a neighborhood like this. Too clean. Too quiet. I much preferred where we were at. Plus, our basement was kind of special.

  Stella was pacing back and forth, clutching her phone in her hand, looking…freaked out. Genuinely freaked out. Actual emotion on her face. I knew instantly something huge was wrong. It took a lot to break her expressionless exterior.

  When I pulled up, she quickly got in the car beside me, clicking on her seatbelt slowly. I didn’t speed off right away; I stared at her. “Well? Are you going to tell me what the fuck is wrong? How’d you get here?” I swore, if this had something to do with that fucking Killian, I would find him, wherever he was, and strangle the pathetic excuse of a life out of him. It wouldn’t be hard. I was bigger and stronger than he was. He might’ve caught Ed off-guard, but he wouldn’t ever catch me like that.

  Stella said nothing, her mismatched eyes glancing out of the window. Shaking her head, she only said, “Drive. Please.” Was it anxiety in her voice?

  How the hell could I have disobeyed her? I put the car into gear and drove off. The next time we were at a red light, I said, “Give me your phone.” When she made no moves to hand it to me, I said again, this time meaner, “I said give me your fucking phone, Stella.” She handed it over, and I added myself to her contacts before handing it back. “Now you have my number, too. You don’t always need to call Ed. I’m here for you, too.”

  “Are you jealous?” Stella asked, causing me to glare at her. Quickly, because the red light was over and we were once again driving.

  Jealous. Was I jealous? What a dumb question. What a stupid—okay, so maybe I was a little jealous, but she’d never catch me saying it out loud. My jealousy would live and die inside me, unknown to everyone but me.

  Fuck.

  I wasn’t the type of man who got jealous. About anything. Ed and I had shared women since we’d met each other, though they were more like girls back in the day. I never once got jealous, even if they liked Ed better than me.

  But, fuck it, I wanted Stella to depend on me the same way she clearly depended on Ed. I wanted her to know I was here for her, no matter what strange things happened in her life. She needed us, the both of us. Not just Ed. Did it make me a pansy to want her to know that?

  I did a lot of stewing on the drive back to the house. I was bringing her back to our place, because I knew Ed wanted to cook for her again. It was the only way we could be sure she was taking her meds. I’d probably have to distract her while he cooked, but that was something I could do easily. What would be more difficult would be finding out what the hell had her so freaked out.

  Honestly, before now, I didn’t even know Stella got freaked out. That fucking ginger had kidnapped her and set her before the body of her coworker, and she’d acted happy—so I sure as shit had no idea what was so traumatizing it would freak her out.

  I pulled into our garage, turning off my car. I was the first in the house, turning to watch Stella following me. She was biting her lower lip, a tempting gesture, if the expression on her face had been nearly anything else than what it currently was.

  “Stella,” I said, practically begging her—something I never did. I didn’t beg any woman. Or man. I simply took what I wanted when I wanted. But this, she—this whole thing had me fucked up. Weird eyes or not, I cared about the woman in front of me. “What is going on?”

  “I don’t…” She stopped, turning her head up to look at me. She was so short beside me. Her face reached my chest. She looked good too, wearing jeans. Actual pants, for once. “I don’t want to think about it right now. I want to forget.” She went to the island, setting her phone down before turning those big, mismatched eyes up at me.

  Fuck. I hated when she looked at me like that.

  I hated it, and I loved it.

  Fine. If she wanted to wait until Ed got home, I’d distract her. I’d distract her so hard she wouldn’t be able to talk once Ed got here. Whatever Stella wanted to forget about, I’d more than happily help her.

  I gestured toward the stairs, and Stella turned without a complaint. As I followed her, I could tell whatever it was weighed heavily on her shoulders. Thin as they were, they sagged a bit more than usual. She looked worn. Tired. Psychologically beaten. I came to a startling thought.

  Had she remembered what she did to Callie? Her roommate, her best friend, dead at her hand? Had that fucker Killian tried to show her? I swore, if this involved him, I would kill him with no hesitation.

  Stella went into my room, throwing herself on my bed. She didn’t take off her clothes, but she did curl into herself, making her body appear even smaller.

  Oh, no. If we were in my room, we were going to fuck.

  I started taking off my uniform, dropping the clothes on the floor. My badge made a clinking sound as it hit, and I slipped off my shoes before I undid my pants. My dick was already growing hard. And of course it was—I was going to fuck Stella whether she was freaked out or not. You didn’t come into my room just to cuddle. Cuddling was not my specialty. Fucking was.

  I moved to the bed, rolling Stella to her back. She made no moves to stop me as I worked to take off everything below her waist. Once her legs and her cunt were free, I sent my hands up beneath her shirt, under her bra, cupping her breasts. Her nipples were already hard, a small sign she was horny, even if her face didn’t show it.

  What I would give to be inside her head for only a minute. I never knew what she was thinking; her eyes didn’t help the situation.

  I leaned into her neck as I fondled her breasts, tweaking her nipples here and there, feeling her body start to move under mine. She might play the stoic, emotionless woman, but deep down, I knew there was real feeling in there. A monster like mine waiting to emerge. I just never thought she’d actually be a killer.

  Before Destiny, before meeting us. Stella was a killer, whether she’d done it by accident or not. Whatever the truth was didn’t matter. Not in this moment. I knew I’d find out sooner or later. Now was the time to drown in her body, to make us both forget the other things on our minds.

  Her small hands cupped my face, and she astounded me by bringing her face to mine, turning slightly to meet my lips. Kissing wasn’t something I enjoyed too much, but when it came to her, I was finding I liked a lot more than I realized I did. The way she tasted, like honey and sweat, made my cock ache with a yearning I couldn’t say I’d ever had. I wanted to be inside of her unlike anyone else before. I’d always been eager to fuck, but this—this was different.

>   If I was a better man, I might’ve proclaimed this was love.

  But I wasn’t a better man. I wasn’t even a good man, so that thought died inside me the moment I pushed my tongue into her mouth and devoured her whole. Touching her, feeling her under me, her legs drawing up mine, having her fingers run through my hair—it was a sensation unlike any other. A fire burned inside of me, and I knew that flame could only be put out by her wet, slick pussy.

  As much as I wanted to remain in place, our mouths locked and our tongues entwined, I had to have her. Now.

  I pulled myself off her, reaching between my legs, gripped the base of my thick shaft as I guided it in. The pleasure that shot through me as I pushed inside of her, feeling a slight resistance only until I was fully in her, made me moan. I would never get over how tight she was, how perfectly she fit around my cock. It was the best feeling in the world.

  My hips rocked, and I held myself up with my arms, watching her squirm under me with each and every thrust. It was almost like she’d forgotten what my dick felt like inside of her, and she had to get used to it all over again.

  The expression on Stella’s face was anything but anxious, now. With me inside her, I knew her mind was blank. If I had to fuck away all her worries, I would. It wasn’t that difficult of a sacrifice to make. We would both find our release here.

  It was strange to think how far we’d come in so little time. To think, that first night I could barely look down at her while screwing her. I’d made her turn her head to the side, made her stare at the wall as I pounded into her with all the strength and violence I could muster. And now—now it was hard to look away from her, almost like I had to stare down at her, watch her every reaction as I changed my rhythm.

  Stella moaned, running her hands up my back, tiny shockwaves every place her fingertips touched. No other woman had ever held such power over me or my body. This was righter than I knew, and I’d be damned if I let that Killian get in between us. No one would step in between Stella and me, unless it was Ed. Ed was the only one.

  I lost track of time as I rocked her body, made her temporarily forget whatever it was that had brought her to Ed’s voicemail. My body grew sweaty, and I came twice before I brought her to her precipice. The short moan, the cry of pleasure that escaped her slender throat was one I’d never forget. It was all mine—something I wouldn’t have to share with Ed. That sound belonged to my ears alone.

  Ed could take his time coming home, because Stella and I were occupied in the only way we could be.

  Chapter Twenty-Four – Stella

  Lincoln was very good at helping me forget what I’d seen, the truth I’d faced. But even his stamina didn’t last forever, and soon I grew so out of breath I couldn’t think to continue, at least not without a short break and some water. I was spent up, used in the best of ways, and yet there was still something missing inside of me.

  Killian.

  My Angel Maker.

  How could I have been so blind?

  I slowly rolled off of Lincoln’s bed, feeling some of our spent juices running down my leg. I’d have to go to the bathroom to clean myself up, but first I wanted a shirt. Something of his to wear, to smell, to make myself forget about the third killer in my life. I went for the dresser in the corner of the room while Lincoln watched me with dark, heavy eyes.

  “You really aren’t going to tell me?” he questioned, running a hand through his black hair, the sweat on his scalp helping to stick the lengths straight up. His naked muscles glistened with moisture, his chest rising and falling with ragged breaths.

  I found a black T-shirt and slipped it on, bringing the collar to my nose and inhaling. Even washed, it smelled like him. A scent I couldn’t put to words, but one my body and my brain knew. A scent I was addicted to.

  Turning back to him, I said, “I’d prefer to tell you both at once so I don’t have to keep repeating myself.” I started to walk to the bathroom. “Don’t be jealous, Lincoln.” I almost sounded playful, but not quite. Too tired for that, and still too freaked about the whole Killian thing.

  “Stop calling me jealous,” Lincoln said, getting up. As I cleaned myself off, he got dressed. When I emerged into the hall, I saw he’d changed into sweatpants and a hoodie. And I could honestly say not once in my life had I ever found the outfit he wore attractive.

  But on him? On his tall, wide frame and his huge, muscular body? Lincoln could make rags look hot.

  “Why? Getting mad?” I taunted him, heading down the stairs. He followed me, his black eyes watching as I got some water. Sex with Lincoln made me thirsty. My body was sore. Not once in my whole life had I ever thought sex was so exhausting—but then, maybe sex with Lincoln wasn’t exactly like sex with other men. It was clear Edward and Lincoln weren’t normal.

  They were my crazies. My psychopaths. And now that I’d found them, I wasn’t going to let them go. I wanted to experience everything life had to offer with them, no matter what ended up happening with Killian.

  Killian was…confusing. It was too hard for my mind to reconcile the fact Killian was the Angel Maker. I thought of Killian no more than my boss, and the Angel Maker—I would be a liar if I said I didn’t have a tiny crush on him. Crush, obsession, whatever you wanted to call it. Finding out they were one and the same? How the hell was I supposed to cope, and how the hell was I supposed to move on from this?

  “Not at all,” Lincoln muttered, shooting me a glare before meandering to the living room, plopping himself down on the couch and turning on the TV. Mindless news. Nothing about the Angel Maker, because he hadn’t made his newest victim known yet.

  Was that what Killian wanted, for me to help him make his newest angel? I felt a strange burning in my lower gut and wondered if I would’ve enjoyed it. Probably, if what I did to Destiny downstairs said anything. I was just as fucked up as all the men around me, drawn to their demons, to their monsters and their beasts. We were all one with our inner freak.

  Why couldn’t this be simple? Why did the Angel Maker have to be Killian?

  With a glass of water in my hands, I moved to the couch beside Lincoln. As I sipped the glass, I had flashbacks of the first time I was on this couch. Edward was making breakfast. I was watching the news, because they were reporting about the body found in the basement of that abandoned house. Lincoln had yanked down my clothes and fucked me while I watched the newscast. The newscast about Killian.

  Everything always came back to Killian, my Angel Maker.

  I had to get him out of my head, I knew, but I just couldn’t. It was physically impossible for me to stop thinking about Killian. The sex had been a great distraction, but now it was over and my body felt worn out, my mind was back to thinking about him. The look on his face when he’d traced his finger along John’s neck, the sparkle in his eyes when he talked about sharing Sandy with me.

  Oh, God. How fucking spectacular that would’ve been. Cutting into Sandy, making her shake with pain. Hearing her screams ring through the air and reverberate in my ears. My body grew warm just thinking about it. I never hated the woman, but she did annoy me. It would’ve been one of the best moments in my life, had it actually happened.

  But it didn’t. Because things weren’t so simple.

  This was my life, and of course it was going to be as complicated as possible.

  I tried shutting my mind off as I watched whatever was on the TV, but I just couldn’t force myself to think of nothing when there was one huge thing still nagging on me. I either had to face the fact that I didn’t like the Angel Maker because he was Killian, or that I actually liked Killian now that I’d seen his true face. Honestly, neither option felt like a good one. Both of them seemed wrong.

  Ed came home sometime later, shutting the garage as he came inside the house. His white shirt was a little dirty, his blonde eyebrows tugging together as he spotted me on the couch beside Lincoln. He said nothing about the fact that I wore Lincoln’s shirt, sitting on my other side, blue gaze concerned.

  �
�What’s going on?” he asked.

  The glass in my hand was empty. With a shaking hand, I went to put it on…the floor? Where the heck was their coffee table? They had one—I knew they did, because I remembered putting a plate on it before. The carpet had indents where the table’s legs used to be, so I knew I wasn’t making it up.

  “Where’d the coffee table go?” I felt my mouth frowning, and I wasn’t certain why a small table was so important. I looked from Lincoln to Edward, once again noticing the bruises on his face. My stomach twisted, and I was pretty sure my gut knew the reason.

  “It broke,” Edward spoke, reaching for my hand, his fingers entwining with mine. “Now tell me what happened.”

  I only stared at his face. Killian looked beat-up, too…

  When I said nothing, Edward glanced around me at Lincoln. “What happened?”

  Lincoln shook his head. “I don’t know. She wouldn’t tell me anything until you got here.”

  “Stella,” Edward spoke my name, a warning on his lips.

  I looked at him harder, at the bruises. They weren’t as bad as they were two days ago, but they still marred his handsome face. “How did you get those bruises, Edward?” If he could speak my name with disapproval, I could do the same to his.

  When was everyone going to start telling me the truth? I had no idea why all the men in my life thought it was a good idea to lie to me. It made me…upset. Mad. Enraged. Furious in a way I’d never felt before. The indignation, the annoyance—I felt myself drowning in them, strange feelings I never remembered having before.

  No one said anything, so I felt like it was my job to speak. To explain, to come clean, even though I was not the one who had to come clean. It was the men around me. “I know,” I said, my jaw tight. Every muscle in my body hurt.