Wretched (Never After Series)

We leave before the auction is over, and I don’t wait around to tell anyone we’ve gone. My insides are going wild, my brain trying to slot new pieces of the puzzle into appropriate places. Dorothy murdered Vanessa Westerly, and I had to keep Eveline from murdering her.

She doesn’t fight me when I carry her off the back deck of the boat, and as soon as we’re on solid land her body relaxes, the debilitating fear she was carrying washing away like memories drawn in sand.

“I’m still going to kill her,” she states calmly.

I grin, placing her in the passenger seat of my car and reaching over her front, buckling her in place. “I know.”

It doesn’t bother me the way it probably should.

Eveline has years of wounds that haven’t been healed, just bandaged with sarcasm and sadness, forming mutilated scar tissue that still oozes when pricked.

And maybe my morals are dulled when it comes to her. Because as long as she’s taken care of, it’s hard for me to give a damn what happens to anyone else. I lean in and press a soft kiss to her forehead, breathing in her earthy, floral scent.

“Take me home,” she whispers.

I nod, sending a text to Zeke telling him to grab my stuff from the hotel room, and then I drive us back to Kinland. We don’t talk on the way, and I let us sit in silence because sometimes words can’t help. For two hours, I hold her hand and don’t let go, my thumb rubbing methodically over her knuckles, and it isn’t until we pull into the front gates of the Westerly estate that I loosen my grip.

I’m not sure how to handle this part of her. This vulnerable, sad girl who misses her sister and hates the people who took her away.

She doesn’t look at me as she exits the car, moving to walk up the front steps to the large double oak doors. I follow behind her, unsure if she wants me to stay or go.

“Eveline.”

She pauses, twisting around to look at me. Her hair is mussed, frizzy strands falling haphazardly around her face. Mascara streaks down her cheeks, black tears reflecting the stains marred on her soul.

And through everything, she’s still the most stunning thing I’ve ever seen.

“Do you want me to go?” I move up the stairs until I’m standing in front of her.

 She sighs, running the back of her hand over her mouth, smearing some of her already muddled red lipstick. “I don’t want you to leave.”

I thread my fingers through the roots of her hair and tilt her chin up with my thumb, my stomach flipping when I soak her in. “Damn, you’re beautiful.”

She’s on me in a flash, her mouth meeting mine. I press into her, grabbing her waist and taking everything she has to give.

She’s overwhelming.

Devastating.

She’s going to ruin my fucking life.

Breaking away, she reaches blindly behind her to open the door, dragging me in with her. My hands are wild, unable to stop touching her skin for a second, all of the possessiveness from before—when I saw another man think he could have her—roaring back.

We stumble in through the foyer, the mansion empty and dark other than the sparkle from the unlit chandelier hanging high above our heads. There’s a large round table in the center of the room, wedged between the split stairwell, and I throw her down on top of it, not caring that the vase of flowers falls off the edge and shatters on the floor.

I skim my teeth along her jaw, my lips already swollen and bruised from her assault, but I don’t care. I want her to brand every piece of me. My hand roams down her throat, and I press my mouth against hers.

“Tell me you’re mine,” I demand against her lips.

Her hand jumps up to my face, scratching the stubble as she stares into my eyes. “I’m yours.”

My fingers grab the front of her dress and pull until it tears, her perfect breasts on display just for me. I dip down and draw a nipple into my mouth, feeling it stiffen under my tongue.

She moans and I suck harder before releasing it when her fingers tug on my hair and pull me back up to her mouth.

We’ve already fucked countless times. I’ve taken her in every position, filled her with my cock in a thousand different ways.

But right now it all pales in comparison to the way kissing her feels.

It’s all-consuming, as if she’s ripped through my middle, and placed her heart inside my chest, forcing it to beat.

I move down her body, pressing my lips to every bare inch of skin I can find, and then I sink to my knees, sliding the green fabric up her legs until it’s bunched around her hips.

She’s not wearing any underwear, and my cock pulses when her dripping cunt is in my face, needy and demanding, begging me to devour her fucking whole. I waste no time dipping between her thighs. I stare up at her while I lick her out, her taste flooding my tongue and making desire tear through me.

“That’s right, baby,” she moans, propping herself up on her elbows as she grinds her pussy against my face. “Lick my clit.”

She comes violently, clenching around me as she cries out, her body collapsing on the table. And then I’m moving to a stand, diving into her mouth so she can taste herself on me, the way I know she loves to do. She groans as we kiss, and her hands roam down my shirt until she grabs my belt and clumsily undoes my slacks. Her feet move up, resting on the waistband and she pushes them down with her toes until my cock bobs free, the head almost purple from how fucking hard I am for her.

Her hand grips me and she strokes from base to tip, making my body jerk into her, arousal racing up my spine. She sucks on my tongue and then breaks away, hopping from the table, spinning around and pushing my chest until I’m the one flat on my back, my dick throbbing as it stands straight up in the air.

Grinning, she grabs her tits, rolling her nipples between her fingers, her eyes rolling back in her head.

“You’re so fucking sexy when you touch yourself,” I pant, stroking my cock while I watch her.

Her lips purse as she spits, saliva dribbling out of her mouth and dripping down, hitting the top of her cleavage, rolling along the curve until it sinks between the valley of her breasts.

Goddamn.

Leaning forward, she wraps them around me, her hands pushing them together as she starts to move her chest up and down.

“Oh, fuck.”

She spits again, this time letting it fall onto the head of my dick, and the feel of it slipping down the side of my shaft while her sticky skin slides up is enough to make my balls tighten.

It’s one of the hottest things I’ve ever seen. She bends her head and sticks out her tongue. My hand grips her jaw and I sit up until her face is beneath me, my cock still wedged in her cleavage. I let my own saliva dribble down until it hits her mouth, and the filthiness of it all turns me on so fucking much I can hardly breathe. I capture her lips with mine, her breath hot and sweet as she moans, moving her breasts to jerk me off. Heat collects at the base of my spine, and I know if I don’t stop, I’ll come all over her tits.

“Tell me again.” I thrust into her.

“Yours.”

Fire blazes through me, dulling everything except the need to get closer. I let go of her face and flip her over until she’s prone beneath me. Fisting my cock, I line up to her entrance, both of us still half-clothed and fucking desperate, and I sink deep inside her, my dick jerking as her walls contract around me.

Shit.

This feels different. This feels like more.

Rough and messy and a thousand different shades of wrong.

But if I’m her calm, then she is my chaos, and if I can’t live with her forever, then I don’t want to live at all.

I capture her lips as I start a punishing rhythm, my hips slapping against hers with every stroke. I feel insane, completely overwhelmed by everything she is, by whatever the hell she’s doing to me. She’s changing me. Or maybe she’s simply making me feel alive.

She arches into me, her nails digging into my skin as she comes apart, the pulses of her cunt making me swell and explode inside her.

My vision goes black and my body gives out as I paint the walls of her pussy, and I collapse on top of her, sweat dripping down the side of my face, my cheek resting against her breast. She runs her fingers through my hair, and I close my eyes, trying to catch my breath while I listen to the rapid beats of her heart.

My body trembles with aftershocks.

“Brayden,” she murmurs.

I freeze, my chest splitting down the middle and falling to the floor.

Brayden. 

She’s Brayden’s.

Which means she’ll never be mine.