Page 111 of Through the Flames
“They gave him twenty-five to life. And I,” I chuckled darkly, pulling her even closer, “I shut every door in my head and didn’t let anyone in. Not all the way, never all the way.”
I pressed my mouth to her hair, breathing her in like a starving man.
“Until you.”
The truth was setting me free, while every word snapped the lock on her cage shut. I loosened my hold to turn her so I could meet her gaze, gray colliding with green.
“Now you’re in here—” I pointed at my chest, her gaze glued to the movement “—and I can’t let you out. Iwon’t.”
Another laugh ripped out of me, dark and twisted, as she stared up at me, her lips parted.
“You think this is still about the deal? You think you’re walking away from this?” My lips brushed her ear, low and rough. “You’re not. You’re mine now.Mine, Ella. I’d burn the whole fucking world down before I let you go.”
Her breath ghosted over my jaw, breathless.
“Then don’t. Don’t let me go. You think I don’t feel this?” she whispered, like she was handing me a weapon I could destroy her with. “You think I don’t want you?”
The sound tearing out of my throat didn’t even feel human. I crushed my mouth to hers, savage and starving.
My hands locked on her hips, dragging her into me like I could fuse her bones to mine. Ella was the cure to everything wrong inside me.
“Say it,” I growled against her lips, my tongue claiming her mouth. “Say you’re mine. Right now.”
“I’m yours,” she breathed, the words filled with emotion. “Fuck, Hunter. I’vebeenyours.”
Something split open in my chest, so violent it almost hurt. My body caged hers in, not gentle, not pretending I was anything less than the beast I’d tried to keep chained.
The mattress groaned under us as I tore at the shirt hiding her body from me, yanking it over her head as if it offended me.
“You wanna know another truth, baby?” I rasped, voice wrecked, forehead pressed to hers like I was about to confess to murder. “You were the first.”
Her eyes blew wide. “What?”
“I’ve never …” I licked my lips nervously, searching her face. “I’ve never touchedanyone. I, um, I never wanted to. Until, well, until you.” My chest heaved like I’d just sprinted the whole length of the field. “You were my first. My first kiss, my first time. My firsteverything.”
Her hands slid up my back, nails biting into my skin like she wanted to leave her mark on me. “Hunter …”
I kissed her hard enough to bruise, my voice breaking into her mouth.
“There’s only you and me now.” My fingers dug into her thighs, spreading her open for me like she was made to fit here, under me,onlyme. “For the rest of this life, and the next one, as far as I’m concerned.”
Her breath hitched, pupils blown wide, but her voice cut through everything:
“I don’t want anyone else.”
She tore me apart and put me back together with just five little words.
I surged inside her in one brutal thrust, and her cry shattered the last shred of control I’d been clinging to.
My body towering over hers as I fucked her deep, relentlessly, like I could brand her from the inside out. Her nailsraked down my back, a jagged burn, only spurring me on even harder.
“Hunter! Oh my God!”
“That’s it,” I rasped, my lips ghosting over the curve of her throat as I sucked and bit and marked every inch I could reach. “Say my fucking name. Let the whole world know who owns this pussy.”
She whimpered, a desperate, needy sound, and I lost it.
My thrusts went feral, hips pounding, every slam of my cock inside her like a brand, a promise. I spread her legs wider, so wide her thighs shook, forcing her to take every brutal inch.
