Page 82 of Black Sheep

“I know what you did for Finnan. I always knew even though you lied every time I asked you. Those runs with your brothers? Bashing people’s heads in? Destroying people’s livelihood? I knew. It turned my stomach. I never thought…”

What the fuck are you doing?

I pull myself back from the brink. I note my shaking hands and brimmed eyes with a removed bemusement.

“You never thought what, Cleo?” One fist is balled tight within the other, the ferocious hold turning his skin pasty white.

He’s barely holding himself together, this Beast Son formed from the rib of his father. I should be terrified, but terror is noticeably absent.

Maybe taking the beast inside of me, taking his cursed essence into my womb has rendered me immune? Numbed my instinct for self-preservation?

I shut my eyes and shake my head. This isn’t about me. It never was. Everything I’ve done has been to ensure my mother’s safety. “What does it matter? There was a time when I was foolish enough to believe I was in love with you. But that was before the scales fell from my eyes. Before I realized you’re a Rutherford through and through. That every single one of you is incapable of change. You see what you want and you take it. The slightest wrong demands retribution the Rutherford way. It’s that simple for you. No matter what the consequences for everyone else.”

The breath that punches from his throat is searing and raw. The look that glazes his eyes threatens to stop my heart. Muscles thicken in his neck as if he’s holding every single emotion he possesses locked down tight.

It’s fascinating, this glimpse into the man I let fuck me not ten minutes ago. Fascinating and so hypnotic, his beautiful face frozen in that captivating, almost vulnerable mask. I could watch him forever.

“So you never loved me?” His voice is sandpaper rough, oddly subdued, as if each word chills him. I wonder if it’s the worst bruised ego in history or whether he’s reached the zenith of rage.

My tormented heartbeat screams that this isn’t sustainable. Barely twelve hours after he claims me, my center is crumbling, my perspective shifting in the false quicksand beneath my feet. Because why else would I imagine I just caught a glimpse of the boy I knew in those gray eyes, heard the vulnerability of that same boy in his voice? “I loved a figment of my imagination who was never going to live up to reality. This room is both a reminder of that blinkered stupidity and a caution not to wear those particular shades ever again.”

“And just so I’m clear on this, you made this earth-shattering discovery that you didn’t love this particular Rutherford while you were in Boston those three weeks with my father?” he asks.

This one is easy. Heart-crushingly easy. “Yes.”

His fists bunch tighter until I’m terrified his knuckles are going to pop. His frenzied gaze sizzles mine in the fraught silence. Searching. Searching. Then it drops, as if he can’t bear to look at me. He stares down at his fists in fascination for a minute, his lips a thin, ruthless line. “Did you fuck him then too?” A hushed, white-hot demand.

I barely hear it over the hammering of my heart. “No.”

His head jerks up, and he’s back to probing my gaze again. Whether he finds what he’s looking for or not, his fists unclench, and his torso straightens. “So you decided I wasn’t a good bet on account of being my father’s son. But my father was a better one?”

The shrug I attempt is probably one of the hardest things I’ve pulled off. “Something like that.”

“I see.”

No, you don’t, I want to say. With Finnan, I walked into the devil’s cesspool knowing exactly what to expect. With Axel, I never saw it coming.

“Are we done here? Is there something else you want to know or can I go take a shower?”

My questions draw his gaze down, over my throat, my chest, the expensive but inadequate sheet covering my body. Even without looking down, I know my skin bears his marks from last night and this morning. In his own way, he’s branding me.

His expression slowly morphs until he looks almost human again. Almost. The beast always lurks just beneath the surface.

“No, baby. You can shower later. For now, you stay right where you are. Until I’m ready to fuck you again, I want my sweat on your skin and my cum inside you.”

I smash down the dizzying thrill and shake my head. “You can’t—”

“I think we’ve established conclusively what I can and cannot do.”

“And that includes keeping me permanently naked? Why?”

His teeth flash in a display of cruel mirth. “Maybe your clean, un-fucked body is my kryptonite. Maybe sullying you at every opportunity is how I’m going to deal with this fucked-up situation. I haven’t decided yet, but let’s go with that for now, hmm?”

“I still need clothes, Axel. And I need my—”

A knock on the door halts my speech.

Axel rises, his powerful frame dominating the room as he strides to the door and pulls it open. A short, muted conversation later, he’s pushing a multi-shelved trolley into the room. Without glancing my way or resuming our conversation, he starts lifting domed lids off dishes.

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