My cock throbs in my pants at her old nickname for me. It’s been so long since anyone called me that. It was only ever her. Now, it feels like we’ve come full circle.
“If you don’t want me to track her down and slit her throat, I suggest you make it clear that you’re going to take care of the issue,” I whisper, and despite the light volume of my words, I mean every single one.
Megan White attacked what is mine and the need to stomp her into the dirt is riding me hard. The only thing keeping me in place is this woman wrapped around me.
Juliet’s lips quirk at my words as if she’s amused by them. Her eyes glitter with something dangerous and happy. I blink.Happy?My head drifts back and I take in her expression more fully. Yes, I realize. She’s happy in this moment. Her expression is open and it reveals more than I think even she knows. My heart hammers against my rib cage.
“You’re not allowed to hit a woman,” Juliet murmurs, her hand cupping my cheek and trailing down. A shiver cascades down my spine as her short, blunt nails scrape lightly against the stubble there.
“I don’t give a fuck.” I bend a bit more, pressing her lower back into the edge of the counter as her body is shoved more insistently against my own by the movement. “I’ll slaughter a hundred women if it makes you smile at me like that.”
She laughs, the sound echoing off the ceiling and walls. “I wouldn’t like you touching that many women even if it was to kill them.”
“I’d wear gloves,” I say absently, and she laughs again.
“No,” Juliet says with a light shake of her head. “I want to take care of this. Ineedto take care of it myself.”
And I get it. I know exactly why she says as much—Juliet needs to prove not just to us and the rest of Silverwood, but to herself as well, that she’s not someone that needs protecting. That she is strong enough to stand on her own. She doesn’t stand behind us, she isn’t shielded by us. She isone of us.
“Baby…” A groan rumbles up my throat as her cunt brushes against my rock-hard cock. The clothing that keeps us separated is agony. I can practically feel the heat of her burning through me. I shift my hips, grinding into her.
“Do you want something, Alex?” More scraping from her nails as her hands drift up to my head and burrow into my hair. Gooseflesh rises up all over my body and I shudder under her ministrations.
Fuck me, but I whimper at the question. Needy. Pulsing with hunger for her. “You,” I say. “I want you.”
She presses a chaste kiss to the corner of my mouth. I turn my head quickly, trying to capture her lips with mine, but it’s too late. She pulls back and grins. Devious little sadist.
“I want to fuck you.” I pant, feeling out of breath. It’s like I just ran ten miles in under ten minutes when the reality is I’ve spent all day in my damned office. Adrenaline races through me as I meet her eyes.
Juliet shifts her expression and glances over my shoulder. “Perhaps you should take me somewhere I want to be fucked.”
The second the words escape her lips, I’m on the move. I heft her higher up my body and swing around. She latches on to me, arms going around my shoulders as the counter disappears from her back and she has nothing to hold me to her but my strength. I carry her out of the shoebox of a kitchen, past the living room, and down the hall.
When we reach the bedroom, I carefully deposit her onto the black silk sheets. Her eyes are glittering dangerously. I go to my knees and she stops me with a foot on my shoulder. Her sneaker digs into the muscle there.
“Ah, ah, not yet.”
A growl rises in my throat and she arches a brow. I stifle it. A thought occurs to me and I turn my head in the direction of my closet. It’s been a long time since I opened that box, but maybe…
“Are you getting distracted?” Juliet’s question brings me back around and I shake my head.
“No, but I have… something for you.”
“For me?” Her brow furrows. “What is it?”
Something I made a long time ago when she was just a memory, just a girl I followed and tracked through cameras and pictures. Just an unattainable hope and dream. Not living flesh and blood before me—inmybed.
“I can show you,” I say, rising back to my feet.
Juliet peers back at me, curiosity tipping her head. My throat opens and closes as I swallow roughly.Will she accept it?I wonder.Will she accept me?
I don’t know, but I won’t know until I give it to her.
I move towards the closet. Each step that carries me away from her tightens around my throat like a noose.
I lost God a long time ago. I stopped believing in some magical man in the sky looking out for me when my father brokemy jaw for the third time and my mother just cried and tried to make excuses.
Now, though, I step into the small wardrobe area and bend down to find the dust-covered box I put there my freshman year when Silverwood Public had an actual shop class teacher who knew what he was doing—a man who worked with more than just wood and metal machines. I blow the layer of grime off and lift the top.
