Page 37 of The Brutal Arrangement

And with how good it felt—when it should’ve only been a traumatizing hell—I wasn’t sure how to move forward now.

14

DAMON

Another ragged breath left me as I shot one last spurt of cum deep inside her.

My wife.

I would never get used to thinking of her as mine.

But with how I had just taken her, I had made her mine. I’d only fucked her to show her that I was in power. With how good it felt, though…

No. It meant nothing. It was only to show her I’m in charge.

She dropped toward the bed, so limp and sated. Unable to stand at all, she fell onto the mattress.

I hurried to follow her down, unwilling to lose this perfect fit inside her tight cunt.

But as she bent further from me, I had to ease out of her eventually. I’d crush her if I hovered. Mentally, I wanted to break her until she’d adhere to how this would be between us. She would bow to me. She would answer to me so I could get the intelto protect my family from any enemy. Physically smothering her wouldn’t get me anywhere now, though.

She breathed slower, almost sluggishly. With how fiercely she’d come, I wasn’t surprised.

I refused to dwell on and acknowledge how damn good she felt. There was nothing sweet or rosy about this. I’d taken her as part of my duty. My brother counted on me to show her that she would heel to me so we could get our answers. Taking her like that was one more tool to make her forget about playing games.

Before I could wish I were back inside her, though, I needed to stake some distance from her. Now. Because the longer I stayed, the more I was tempted to admit I hadn’t come that hard in a long time.

Without turning on a light, I backed away from her. The absence of her tight heat around me irked me, but I didn’t look back at her as she lay still on the bed.

In the bathroom, I cranked on the shower and ignored the lights again. All the drinking throughout the day had given me the start of a headache, and I sought the dark, steaming comfort of a shower as I cleaned up and caught my breath. Mellow and relaxed after a while, I gave a voice command for the lights to come on dim.

What the hell?

I frowned at the sight of blood on my hands as I washed myself. I had worn blood when I married her. I knew I hadn’t cleaned it all off. But it almost seemed like my dick was coated with it.

No. There’s no way she was a virgin.

It wasn’t expected in every arrangement, and for some reason, with a woman who was usually as opinionated as Katerina had always seemed to be, I highly doubted it. She had felt tight, but that didn’t have to mean she was a virgin.

Even if she was, she wasn’t one anymore.

I refused to let that bother me. It didn’t. Because she wasn’t supposed to matter as anything more than a source of intel about her uncle.

She wasn’t a person, just a pussy to fuck. Someone to get answers out of before I ditched her.

She couldn’t matter.

And it sure as fuck couldn’t matter that I wanted her again despite just coming so hard.

This lingering thread of desire was only because it had been a while since I’d gotten any. That was all. Nothing more than ending a drought.

After I cleaned up, though, I hated the fact that I’d have to face her again and again. Because if I did and I thought back to how damn good she’d felt, I would struggle to keep my head on straight and view her as a target to question, not?—

No. She isn’t anything more.

She wasn’t mine. Not like Sloane was to Maxim. Not like a real wife should be connected to a husband.

I threw on some sweatpants and returned to the bathroom only to grab a towel. She wasn’t due any comfort or pampering from me, but I bet she would be disoriented and lost. Giving herthe means to clean herself up wasn’t any fashion of aftercare. I wasn’t coddling her. And I wouldn’t try to.

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