Total pages in book: 146
Estimated words: 147801 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 739(@200wpm)___ 591(@250wpm)___ 493(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 147801 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 739(@200wpm)___ 591(@250wpm)___ 493(@300wpm)
He rounds the desk and grips me by the collar of my shirt, turning me in the chair so I’m looking up at him.
The brush of his knuckles against my neck sends a zap down my spine, and I want to touch him, to grab his waist and pull him into me, but I can’t.
I won’t.
He needs to leave before I lose control.
I flex my hands on either side of me to stop myself from reaching up.
“Who the fuck are you to tell me what to do?” The bite in his deep, slightly husky voice rolls off my skin and settles in my gut.
Fuck. I missed his voice.
“Whether I go to school or sabotage my whole fucking life is none of your goddamn business.” He tightens his grip on my collar, his rage mounting, but so does the pain tucked underneath.
Gareth has always been mentally strong. I know because I attempted to break him in the beginning, but he kept bouncing back again.
And again.
But now, he’s in pain and it rips at my chest.
“You shouldn’t throw your future away for me.” My tone remains neutral.
“It’s not for you!”
“Then why are you here, Gareth?”
His beautiful defined lips set in a line, and I want to press my mouth to them, taste him.
Just…for a moment.
But I force myself to drag my gaze to his eyes. “Because you feel sorry for me? Pity my pending death?”
A flash of darkness strikes his pupils again, blowing them up, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisper. “Your life is mine, remember? You’re not allowed to die without my permission.”
“Ah. So it’s that.”
“Yes, it’s that! Are you not going to keep your promise?”
“Of course I will.”
“Then…you won’t die?”
“I won’t.”
His chest rises and falls faster, his lips parting just the slightest bit, the smallest opening that will allow me to slide my finger in—
“Are you mine?” His voice wavers, a crack of vulnerability slipping through.
“Always.”
I reach for his hip—I can’t help it—and a rough breath spills out of me as his breathing stutters. Just the slightest bit, telling me how much he also missed my touch.
I sneak my fingers beneath the hem of his T-shirt, and a shock of electricity bursts between us. Gareth’s chin wobbles and he sinks his teeth into his lower lip until it’s discolored.
“Since you’re mine…” His fingers wrap around my throat, squeezing hard. “I’m going to fucking erase her from under your skin. Piece by piece, I’ll carve her out and sink myself so deep, there will be no one but me.”
His lips crash against mine, biting, splitting the skin. Blood coats his tongue as he thrusts it into my mouth, letting me taste his fury and pain.
His longing and despair.
His rage and anguish.
I take it all.
His anger. His torment. His insatiable hunger.
I let him consume me, devour me, and light me on fire.
I grab his face and kiss him deeper, pressing him harder against me, fusing him further into me until I can’t discern his groans from mine.
Until all I can do is feel alive.
For one last time.
37
GARETH
Ifree fall into the kiss, melting into his arms.
His touch.
His scent.
His breaths.
Everything.
I’m falling and rolling and unable to hit the ground.
My kiss is pain and frustration and bloodlust. It’s the only cocktail my fucked-up brain can conjure, and yet he’s welcoming it.
Grunting into it.
Into me.
Because he meant it when he said he’s like me. It’s why his darkness spoke to mine from the very beginning. Why his touch electrified me to the core and still does.
It’s beating in the hollow of my heart. Filling up the void slowly but surely.
I’m sitting on his lap now, sucking his face, drinking his blood, not wanting this to end.
Needing this not to end.
God, I missed him.
And I need him.
And I want to erase fucking Cassandra from him. I don’t care if that seems deranged, but I want her gone. Completely.
His erection nudges against my ass and I rub myself all over him, my own cock straining and shoving the fabric of my pants, gliding against his abs. A strangled noise leaves me when he digs his fingers into my ass through the jeans.
“Mmmff…” I moan in his mouth, biting on his tongue because I still want to hurt him.
Still want to sink my teeth into his skin and cause him pain, make him pay for the hole he dug inside me. Or more like for tearing the stitches he slowly but surely closed the void with.
He rips his lips from mine, and I jerk forward, my mouth chasing his.
Kayden drops his forehead against mine, his harsh breathing mingling with my own. Then he inhales me deeply, as if he wants to engrave my smell into his memory. As if, like me, he built me a shrine in his mind that he visits every day for a hit.
Like a goddamn junkie.