by Ally Vance
My head aches and I feel weak. My whole body is shaking, and I can’t tell if it’s the raw emotion shattering me right now or the lack of sustenance from the past couple of days. I’m not unused to hunger and thirst, but it doesn’t mean I'll choose to suffer through them when there are other options available to me.
I slide my legs out from under the covers and ease off the bed onto my feet. My limbs are shaking, and I worry they will buckle beneath my own weight. When I finally feel as though I’ll be able to move without collapsing, I edge my way through the cabin. Throwing out an arm when I teeter dangerously, I use the wall to support myself as I head toward the kitchen. The scents of coffee and pancakes reach my nose; my mouth waters and I can’t ignore the way my stomach rumbles in anticipation. I push the door open and step over the threshold. Emmett is sitting at the table with a book, and he looks up in surprise when I enter.
“What are you doing up?” he questions, placing the book face down on the table but still open to mark his place.
“I was hungry.” I shrug not looking at him, because my eyes have locked onto the steaming pan on the stove.
Emmett chuckles before he stands up, and moving over to the pan, he removes it from the heat.
“I was about to come in with a plate of food to save you getting up,” he says, tipping three chocolate chip pancakes onto a white plate and bringing them over to the table.
I’m frozen in place, staring at him as he moves around the kitchen. I don’t know what to say to him. I ought to confront him, but the white tendrils of steam rising from the food brings the scent of my favorite breakfast into the air, and it’s all I can do not to grab the plate and ravage the food like a starving animal.
I slowly make my way over to the table and sink into one of the wooden chairs before pulling the pancakes toward me. Without hesitation I dig in, not caring that they are burning my tongue while I chew them ravenously. A small clunk next to me draws my attention to the steaming-hot mug of coffee that has now been placed on the table.
“Slow down, you’ll make yourself sick,” Emmett chastises. I throw him a filthy look, and he has the grace to actually look somewhat apologetic.
I swallow and glare at him before saying firmly, “Don’t you dare try to father me. You lost any right to do that first of all when you let your brother raise me, and then again last night when you hunted me down and fucked me in the woods like a wild animal.”
I can feel my cheeks heat at my own words, so I refocus on my food, hoping he hasn’t noticed the flush I’m sure is coloring my face right now. I glance at him out of the corner of my eye in time to see the corners of his mouth twitch with a smile. Damn. I can’t have managed to hide my reaction to him as well as I’d hoped.
I fidget in my seat, clenching my ass, as the memory of Emmett taking me from behind last night, sweeps through my mind and ignites my body. I grab the mug of coffee and bring it to my lips, blowing softly to cool it down before taking a mouthful.
“I may not have the right to the title of Dad, but it doesn’t change or remove the connection we have. You may be my own flesh and blood, but you’re also so much more than that to me, Kade. I knew from the moment I laid eyes on you that you belonged to me, and damn it, a little thing like being related isn’t going to stop me,” Emmett rumbles, glowering at me.
I drain the mug of coffee, and slamming it back down on the table, the dregs splash tiny droplets onto the wooden surface from the force.
“Little thing? Being related isn't a little thing. It’s huge, and it’s wrong. It’s so fucking wrong I can’t even wrap my head around it. You also lied and led me to believe there was nothing more between us than a friendly connection. I was slowly falling in love with you. It’s sick, Emmett,” I hiss. He opens his mouth to interrupt, but I continue before he can respond, “Being in love with my biological father is wrong on so many levels. But do you want to know what the worst part about this is? I don’t even know how to stop myself from having these emotions.”
I look up at him, and when I meet the steady gaze he’s leveling back at me, my vision blurs with unshed tears. My chest aches, and I want these feelings to stop because I can’t stand how conflicted he makes me feel inside.
A few tears slip free, and my voice cracks along with my heart, “How can I make it stop?”
Chapter 12
Emmett
Kade’s pain cuts into me, but I’m just as bound to him as he is to me. I was caught up in him from the moment I first laid eyes on him. I did everything I could to make him mine, and a small part of me regrets what I did to get him here, but the most dominant part of me knows I’ll never be able to let him go.
Apart from when I initially found out about Ellis being pregnant, I’ve never really had fatherly feelings toward him. We were never given the chance to develop that kind of bond. I could’ve walked away or tried to do the right thing by him. Truthfully, I never expected his feelings to develop in the way they have when I took him, but I’m not sorry about it.
In a messed up way, I’m happy to hear that he’s feeling as tortured about this as I am, and that he’s falling for me. This is a huge clusterfuck, but it’s also the best feeling in the world because I’m not alone in this mess. Our relationship is completely immoral and insane on every level; at the same time, it couldn’t feel any more right.
“Kade, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have lied to you. But when you’ve been shunned, blackmailed, and had your life left in tatters for loving the wrong person, you want to stop caring about what everyone else thinks because it hurts too fucking much. My whole world was shattered when Preston turned his back on me. Why should loving someone be defined by what blood runs in their veins? I didn’t fall for you, because you were my kid, and it was never about my feelings for Preston or your mom. It was all about you.”
Kade remains silent and avoids my eyes. The hand he still has wrapped around his empty coffee mug is shaking, and his whole body is trembling. I don’t know what he’s thinking, and it feels like my veins are filled with lead as I wait for him to speak. He may decide he wants to leave, and contemplating that possibility makes my heart want to stop beating. I don’t know if I have it in me to let him go, and even if I did, how could I let him return to Ellis when she can’t even take care of herself?
“I don’t know what to think, Emmett. How can we continue this with the full knowledge that we’re father and son?” he says finally.
My heart jumps in my chest because he’s not denying the possibility of us having a relationship. Maybe he’s willing to give this a chance. I walk toward him taking slow, measured steps, and he looks up at me, facing me head on. He doesn’t back away from me, and even though there’s so much uncertainty in his eyes, there's also a flicker in them that sets my soul ablaze.
Kade gets out of his chair, and leaning with his back against the table, he watches me as I close the distance between us. I pull him into my arms, and he wraps his own around me, and while we stand there holding each other, he buries his head in my chest.
“I’m scared of how much I feel,” he mumbles, and I give him a reassuring squeeze.
“Me too,” I tell him honestly.
Unable to hold myself back, I crash my lips down on his. Kade gives as good as he gets, and our mouths and tongues clash together.
Bang! The sound vaguely registers, but I’m so used to the noise branches make when they hit the cabin during the storms that I don’t pay any attention to it. When Kade attempts to break the kiss, I deepen it, pushing him against the table as I move even closer to him.
“What the fuck?!” a familiar voice shouts, and jerking away from me, Kade ducks out from within my arms.
“M-Mom?” he stutters, and his whole face pales as he looks between me and Ellis.
“Get your filthy hands off him!” she snarls at me.
I slowly turn to face the poor excuse of a woman who gave birth to my son, and I glare at her for calling herself a mother when she doesn’t even put our s
on before her own desires, yet she dares to try and interfere now.
“How the fuck did you find this place, Ellis?” I ask without skipping a beat
“Preston brought me here a couple of times,” she sneers, “But that doesn’t matter. What matters is that you’ve dared to corrupt our son with your disgusting perversions!”
“Oh, so suddenly he’s our son? Funny how that didn’t matter when you and Preston ran off into the fucking sunset after ruining my life!” I hurl back at her while clenching the table behind me.
“You ruined your own life when you brought Preston into our relationship, so you could fulfill your sick and twisted fantasies about fucking your own brother, and now you expect to do the same to Kade!” she screams while rushing toward me with her arm raised ready to hit me.
Kade steps in front of me at the last second, and her hand connects with his cheek in a resounding slap, knocking him off balance.
“Kade! I'm so sorry,” she gasps and reaches out to him, but he backs away from her, shaking his head.
“No, Mom. Stop,” he tells her as his hand finds mine and squeezes it.
“You’re coming home with me, right now,” she orders, grabbing him by the hair and yanking him away from me.
“It’s not my home anymore, not since Dad died, and you stopped caring about me,” Kade grits out, grimacing in pain.
Reaching up, he pries her fingers loose with one hand and tightens his grip on me with the other, using me as an anchor to stop her pulling him away when she grabs his arm.
“Don’t say that,” she cries, “ You know I love you.”
“Do I?” he responds, “Because it feels like you give more of a shit about Shane and whatever you can use to drown your sorrows than you do me. You let him hit me, Mom.”
“Don’t you dare try and turn this around on me. I’m not the one engaging in disgusting acts with my own family,” she says, her lip curling as she turns her gaze back to me.
"Ellis, control yourself!" I bark, not faltering when she glares at me hatefully.
"You mean control myself like you did when you abducted Kade and did God knows what to him? I should go to the police," she shrieks.
"And tell them what exactly? You've no proof, but I'll be sure to tell them how underfed and hurt Kade was when I found him," I fire back at her.
She lets go of Kade and takes an unsteady step backward, shooting daggers at me with her eyes before narrowing them at Kade and hissing, “If you stay here with him, then you aren’t welcome home anymore. I don’t want your filth in my house.”
“Just go, Mom,” Kade pleads, and the pain in his voice stabs at my chest.
“You’ve ruined my boy!” she shouts, making a move to hit me again, but I catch her by the wrist before she connects with my face.
“That’s enough,” I tell her, and she steps back, nostrils flaring with unconcealed anger.
I release her when she starts to yank away from me, and she staggers backward.
“Last chance, Kade,” Ellis says, pursing her lips together as she narrows her eyes at him.
“I’m staying with Emmett,” he reaffirms, and with a final glare at the both of us, she turns her back on him one last time and walks out of our lives, slamming the door behind her.
Kade slumps in my arms and sobs wrack his frame while he clings on to me.
“Don’t leave me,” he begs brokenly.
“I promise I’m yours, and I’m not going anywhere,” I tell him.
We're bound by our blood and our love, and nothing in this world could tear him away from me.
Epilogue
Kade
I still can’t believe it’s been nearly two months since Mom turned her back on me when I made the choice to stay with Emmett. Watching him now as he cooks my favorite pancakes barefoot in our kitchen, I can’t imagine being anywhere else but with him. It’s still hard for me at times to wrap my head around the fact we’re father and son.
“Stop thinking so hard; you’ll go gray,” he teases, running a hand through his own hair that’s already spattered with silver.
“Like you, you mean?” I hurl back at him.
Eyebrow raised he picks up the plate of pancakes and walks straight past me and into the living room.
“Hey! Bring those back!” I call out to him but he keeps going, taking my breakfast with him.
Laughing, I jump out of my seat and chase after him. I’ll always follow Emmett…just as I know he’ll do the same for me. We’re closer than regular couples because we have a bond that runs deeper than anything they could ever experience or share.
It’s in our blood.
About Ally Vance
Ally is an International Bestselling Author who writes in the Dark Romance genre. Ally has been writing since she was a teenager, and studied Professional Writing at University. It has been a long time dream of hers to finally become a published author. She finally achieved this in 2018 with her Bestselling debut book, Flower in the Dark. Ally also co-writes with her close friend Michelle under the pen name Ally Michelle. Ally lives in Kent, in the United Kingdom with her husband and stepson.
Also by Ally Vance
Flower in the Dark
Just Breathe Anthology*
Love is Strange Anthology*
Fractured Darkness
Because He's Perfect Anthology*
Delinquent: Cavalieri Della Morte
Thou Shall Not Anthology
Kiss Me, Kill Me Anthology
A Family Affair Anthology
*Denotes as Out of Print
COMING SOON
Something Wicked Anthology
Cracks (A Dark MM Story)
Burned By Desire Duet
Stonewood Saga
BOOKS BY ALLY MICHELLE
Hatter & His Alice (Naughty Ever Afters #1)
In Plain Sight
Find Ally Vance Online
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VII
Illicit
A. A. Davies
Illicit
Copyright © 2019 Abigail Davies.
All rights reserved.
Published: Abigail Davies 2019
www.abigaildaviesauthor.com
No parts of this book may be reproduced in any form without written consent from the author. Except in the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This book is a piece of fiction. Any names, characters, businesses, places or events are a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to persons living or dead, events or locations is purely coincidental.
This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book may not be resold or given away to other people. If you are reading this book and have not purchased it for your use only, then you should return it to your favorite book retailer and purchase your own copy.
Thank you for respecting the author’s work.
Proofreading: Judy’s Proofreading
Cover Design: Pink Elephant Designs
Chapter 1
The blanket wrapped around me somehow made me feel safer as I stared at the TV and the latest horror movie I’d rented. I wasn’t the kind of person who did this often, but sometimes I felt the need to just be...scared. I wanted the rush of adrenaline and the spike in my pulse I would get when I was surrounded in the darkness and watching a serial killer chase a girl through the woods.
My fingers tingled from holding the ice-cream tub for so long, enthralled with what was happening on the screen, and just as the background music drummed faster and the serial killer got closer, my cell rang out. I jumped so high the ice-cream tub went flying into the air and all over my blanket.
“Dammit,” I whispered, my hand flying to my chest and covering my heart which was beating like crazy. I frantically searched for the remote then paused the movie and looked down at my cell
. My brows lowered into a frown, but my lips pulled up into a smile. I was fully aware I probably looked crazy, but there was a reason.
My sister hadn’t called me for nearly a month now, and although we hadn’t grown up together in the literal sense, she was still my big sister. Her mom and my mom hadn’t gotten along at all, and there was no need for them to. They were the complete opposite. Her mom was scrappy and stuck up for everything she believed in, my mother was meek and a classy high-society lady. And yet, my dad had loved them both equally—that was what he said the day before he died of lung cancer anyway.
That had been the same year I started my senior year in high school, and Mom had moved us out of the area and into another state, the same state she’d grown up in. But my sister and I had managed to stay somewhat close.
My cell stopped ringing just as I picked it up, but it was only a couple of seconds until it started back up again. I didn’t hesitate to answer it this time and bring it to my ear. “Hey, Jenifer,” I greeted, pushing up off the sofa and grabbing my now empty ice-cream tub.