by Autumn Karr
She said I hadn’t hurt her with my belt. She lied. I drew blood, for fuck’s sake. And I lived in a constant battleground, fighting the delicious satisfaction at her pain against my morality and horror at hurting her.
I never knew where the black urges came from. They were as much a part of me as my genetic code.
Tess didn’t deserve to be hurt—no woman did. But she was willing to sacrifice her screams for me. For the promise of something I wasn’t sure I could give.
I fucking shouldn’t want to beat the ever-living daylights out of her, but I did. Oh, shit how I did.
“Q. You can’t keep all your thoughts locked up now you’ve let me into your life. I see the torment in your eyes. You promised you’d talk and let me in.” Her voice bled pain while her tiny fists clutched the sheets in annoyance.
We’d both made promises, and so far, neither of us had lived up to them. Not that it mattered—I had every intention of breaking my end of the bargain. She wasn’t strong enough. I wasn’t strong enough.
Ce sont les premiers jours, idiot. Détends toi. Early days, idiot. Just relax.
But I couldn’t relax. I wasn’t strong enough to fight the urge to be such a manic bastard if I didn’t keep a tight rein at all times. Look what I did when Tess first arrived as my slave. I had no choice but to hunt her, hurt her, devour her.
If I had been a better man, I would’ve walked back up the stairs and ordered Franco to remove her immediately. Now I stood on the precipice of a dream come true—a woman who saw the real me, accepted me, and wanted a future with me—and all I could do was drown in nightmares of killing her.
“I’m exhausted,” I murmured. Did she hear the ulterior confession? That it hadn’t even been a week of accepting this relationship, and I was already fucking frayed. I needn’t have asked—of course Tess saw the truth. She saw too damn much.
“Stop fighting then. You haven’t touched me since I came back to you. We may share a bed, but you hardly look at me apart from when I flinch if I sit on a sore spot on my ass. You’re more remote than when I was sold to you.”
I growled deep in my chest at the sold remark. I hated the cunts who’d stolen and sold her. Every time I thought about what might’ve happened to Tess if she’d been given to another, I wanted to turn feral—to strip the falseness of businessman and paint my walls with their blood. Screw having civilized business meetings with criminals. I was done with that shit.
Images of Tess bound and beaten, raped and ruined, constantly assaulted me. The ironic thing was—now I was the bastard responsible. But by letting me use her, I found myself wanting to offer everything I had in return for her gasps of fear and whimpers of pain. I didn’t feel worthy and didn’t think I’d ever repay the debt of her gift.
My hands curled, and I trembled with pent-up rage. Anger directed at myself.
I’m fucking insane.
I sighed deeply, sucking in courage to give Tess a little of what she needed—a tiny insight into my rotten core of a mind.
“I can’t be tender with you. And I hate that I got carried away with hitting you.” There? Was she fucking satisfied? I opened up to her about things I wished I could vomit out of me. Hurl this darkness from deep inside; purge my heart so I could be sweet and kind and the perfect man for her. Not the savage, sex-hungry beast.
Her breath caught, and a soft finger trailed along my forearm. “Thank you. You don’t know what a relief it is for you to talk to me. Can you tell me about your nightmare now?”
I glared at her and sat upright. Pushy woman. She’d successfully freaked me out and pissed me off with her questions.
Rolling to the side of the huge bed, I perched on the edge with my head in my hands. I didn’t want to be a coward and run, but this was all too new. My tower room with its massive fireplace and ocean-sized white carpet still looked the same, nothing outward had changed, but Tess wreaked havoc on my soul. I didn’t know if I’d survive allowing her to dig deeper into my world.
The nightmare roared back to full colour. All that blood, so bright with a coppery tang, almost sweet.
No. I couldn’t do this. I wasn’t strong enough, and somehow the evilness of my father would make me do the one thing I’d run from my entire life. I lived my life with rules, shackles. I wasn’t prepared to let a delicate, fragile little bird taunt me to untwine myself and chase her.
I’d win.
And I’d lose when I killed her.
Being Kalli
by
Rebecca Berto
(available now)
prologue
There are two things you should know about me:
One, I’m afraid of being alone with a guy.
Two, I’m certain I love my little brothers more than our mum does.
1
There are sweeping coloured lights patrolling the party, and a disco ball glittering over people swaying to the music, the pumping speakers, and the bar workers. It’s eleven on a Saturday and people are either drunk on alcohol or drunk from the wickedly mixed tracks, courtesy of the DJ. It’s a decent party, but it never matters. I’m with my pick for the night.
Donovan Xander.
He’s hot, and I can appreciate a hot guy. Army buzz cut, almond coloured eyes, and arms that can sweep a girl clean off her feet and into his. Lucky for both of us, I don’t get swept off my feet by the likes of him—the type I hooked up with last weekend, or the one I made out with in the dorm hallway mid-week when all the normal people were sleeping. There’s something about my disinterest at impressing a guy that interests them.
But Donovan, he’s just like the rest. This one pulled my thighs onto his and I bent my knees back, settling onto his crotch, which grew a groan from him. When he starts talking too much I tell him I get called Kalli and not Kallisto. He starts layering me with kisses along my mouth and down my neck instead.
“That’s real good,” he mumbles, nibbling on me.
I don’t know if he means my name or the sweet spot at my neck because he’s been sucking my skin between his lips for these last five minutes on and off. And, yes, it’s been five minutes, because I’ve counted.
“But why ‘Kalli’?” Donovan asks when he parts with my skin for air.
“Because she was high at the time,” I answer.
Leaning in, I taste him back and suck on a spot. Unfortunately for me, Donovan has chosen to drown this part, just under the protrusion of his jaw, with a full bottle of aftershave, but I have too much pride and even more secrets to continue with the conversation. So I suck his skin in and around my tongue and fight the urge to pull away.
“Your mother?”
I’m not stupid; I hear the incredulous tone to his voice. Everyone has it. You expect trash when my usual dress code is, a) skirt or shorts at least three inches above my knee, and b) at least my cleavage, arms or the bony bits of my hips exposed. But even slummers have standards and people expect a mother to stay away from a glass of wine, let alone illicit drugs, when pregnant.
Mine thought naming me after astrology was awesome.
“Am I fine to continue sucking on your body, or do you want a history lesson?”
To explain what I mean, I lick a trail from a spot under his ear to the V of the neckline of his T-shirt. He understands, clearly. Or at least his dick does. It springs up against his jeans, which pushes at my inner thigh. I shift, so if his jeans and my G-string weren’t there, he’d be cradled between me.
Donovan doesn’t reply this time. He wraps his arms around me, dropping his hands to the small of my back. There, he reaches the tip of my long hair, and he tugs slightly. Soon, his hands dip inside the strap of my G and he groans when he realises how very small the material is.
We make out for another few minutes and this time I do lose count. I usually count when I kiss guys. Scout’s the only girl I’ve ever kissed, but it’s always for fun when we are holding hands and stumbling around parties drunk, looking out for each other the whole night. I don’t count with her. It nev
er usually goes long enough.
My G is sliding between Donovan and I, and I have to wonder if my wetness is on his pants. Probably. I couldn’t care less. I’ve seen Donovan around campus and parties; we frequent the same circles, no doubt, but I’ve never spoken more than a handful of words with him before tonight. Probably won’t again.
It’s now, as I begin to get into this make-out session on our couch, that Donovan shatters everything and replaces my excitement with a pounding sense of dread, one I’ve always felt since I was a kid and a guy asked to be alone with me: sex or no sex involved.
He breathes into my lips between kisses, “Come back to my room.”
“I can’t.” I say it firmly, forcing us apart with my hands against his chest.
about the authors
Sienna Lane and Autumn Karr are two friends with a joint love of reading, writing, candy, and Disney heroes (and Disney songs, of course.)
When they aren’t scheming against fictional characters, or talking about their favourite books, you can find them ogling tattooed models and trying to figure out how to get them to do a cover shoot for their next book.
Together they wrote VENDETTA, releasing this December, and hopefully many more books to come. They love to hear from readers, so don't hesitate to contact them through their Facebook page (http://on.fb.me/18TGRU9).
Table of Contents
acknowledgements
prologue
one
two
three
four
five
six
seven
eight
nine
ten
eleven
twelve
thirteen
fourteen
fifteen
sixteen
seventeen
eighteen
epilogue
Quintessentially Q by Pepper Winters preview
Being Kalli by Rebecca Berto preview
about the authors