Total pages in book: 134
Estimated words: 125962 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 630(@200wpm)___ 504(@250wpm)___ 420(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 125962 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 630(@200wpm)___ 504(@250wpm)___ 420(@300wpm)
“Are you going to be a good girl from now on?” Cristian asked evenly, the first time he’d spoken since downstairs.
That caused me to pause.
I turned my body so I could look at him. His face was still tight with fury, with warning. His cock was hard against me.
“A good girl?” I repeated.
He nodded once.
I sat up. I wasn’t sure if he was going to let me do that, since he’d made it clear that I was not in control here. But he did. He fell back on the bed, and I climbed on top of him until I was straddling him.
My lips traversed his neck, tasting him, inhaling the scent of us clinging to him. “If you wanted the good girl,” I murmured against his mouth. “You would’ve chosen someone else.” I positioned myself so he was pressing against me, rubbing myself against him. I didn’t fully seat myself on him, despite how much we both wanted it.
“If you wanted the good girl, you would’ve found someone who wore dresses like that. Someone like her.”
Cristian froze underneath me, showing me everything I needed to know. He had the power to throw me off now, having heard the bitterness and ugliness in my voice. When he understood what a wretched person I truly was.
But he didn’t.
That’s when I impaled myself on him, his hands settling on my hips as I started to ride him.
I settled my hand around his throat, unable to exert as much pressure as he could, but I thought the message got across.
His hands tightened on my hips, but he did not try to stop me, try to snatch back control, unusual for a dominant alpha such as Cristian.
“Say it,” I demanded.
His eyes burned into mine, his muscles taut as I continued to ride him. “You said it yourself,” I continued, my voice straining as my climax approached. “You own me. And you know I’m bad. So say it. I’m your bad girl.”
My hands tightened around his neck, and his body tensed even more. He was seconds away from release, I knew that. We both were.
“You’re my bad girl,” he confessed through his teeth, eyes burning with fury.
I exploded after that, seeing the hate and anger in his eyes. He came with me soon after.
Over the edge.
Into the abyss.
“Tell me what happened to her.”
The words punctured the thick silence that had settled over us. It was late. Or early, depending on your perception. Every inch of me throbbed in pain and pleasure, mixed deliciously together. Reality of what Cristian had done to me, opened inside of me had not settled in yet. I was sure it would in the daylight.
But night still surrounded us. And I was going to suck every inch of darkness out of it.
Cristian didn’t answer for a long time. I knew he was awake. I was sprawled on top of his torso, his arms tight around me, I could feel the intensity of his energy. We were both wired after what happened, my ass hot and tender, my soul electrified.
I was a glutton for punishment, it seemed. As much as I wanted Isabella to stay buried, decaying and decomposing in the ground, she was still very much alive. I needed to understand her. What she meant to Cristian. How utterly her death destroyed him.
“She was murdered the day after her eighteenth birthday,” Cristian said finally, his voice tight, betraying no emotion.
I held my breath, waiting for more.
“It was the day of her party. The day after I put my ring on her finger,” he continued, building the tension in the room further. “Her and Lorenzo were here alone. With guards, of course. Vincentius would never leave his children unprotected.”
Cristian’s voice was even. Detached. But the tightness of the words, the clipped tone in which he spoke them communicated to me he was unused to speaking about it. I was pulling this story from somewhere deep inside of him. A place he’d locked up tight.
Until now.
His hand moved up my spine to squeeze the back of my neck. Too tight. But I didn’t complain. Didn’t whimper. I was too fucking ravenous for more.
“Whoever it was, was close to the family,” Cristian said. “Knew the layout of the estate, the amount of guards. Knew exactly when to strike.”
“Whoever it was?” I repeated. “You didn’t find them?”
Silence pulsated after I spoke.
More pressure at my neck.
“No.” The single word filled up the room, sucked up all the oxygen. It was bursting with fury, frustration, guilt.
Though I might not know everything about Cristian, I knew that he was the kind of man who would not rest until he found vengeance. And it had been twenty-five years without it. He blamed himself.
“We looked at everyone in the family,” he said. “Everyone. No one was immune to scrutiny. We killed hundreds looking for a shred of information. Nothing.”