Total pages in book: 163
Estimated words: 157491 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 787(@200wpm)___ 630(@250wpm)___ 525(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 157491 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 787(@200wpm)___ 630(@250wpm)___ 525(@300wpm)
“Yes, hearts.” I press her fingers over mine, over the tattoo she sees but refuses to ask me about. Hands under her thighs, I drag her closer and the dresser screeches in protest. “You own my heart and every time you leave, you tear it from between my ribs.”
“Van, the noise—”
“I don’t give a fuck.” I press my cock to her heat, her fingers tightening as I thrust inside. “Because my love is selfish. I cannot breathe without you.”
“No.” She gasps and turns her head even as her insides seize around me, milking and pulsing and threatening to take my knees out from under me.
“Don’t look away.” My voice is rough as I grasp her chin. “You’re mine. I want to see that in your eyes when you look at me.”
“Stop.” She arches against me, her body denying her words.
“This will never stop.” I press my promise to her skin. She was once my secret darling and I let her get away. It won’t happen a second time.
By any means, foul or fair, this woman will be mine.
14
Isla
You’re mine, milaya. I won’t let you get away again.
A door slams somewhere, pulling me forcibly from my trance and causing me to spill the coffee from my cup.
“Dammit.” Setting the cup on the kitchen table, I use the sleeve of my sweater to scrub the stain spreading across the moleskin cover of the old sketchbook I’d uncovered this week.
I shouldn’t have gone to him last night. I should’ve known, but Hugh could barely function for the excitement of his sudden upcoming trip. I hadn’t the heart to deny him such a treat, but I thought I should make it clear to Van that this would be the first and last time. I appreciate his sentiments—we can all relate to being let down by our parents—but I can’t help thinking his sentiment is just a ruse. I often get the sense that, while the rest of us are playing checkers, Van plays chess. With the calculation of a grand master, unfortunately.
I scrub a little harder at the stain, hating that I’m thinking about him again. Hating that I’d gone to his room. I was there on official parenting business, and he’d made some comment, did I want to have this conversation out in the hall for others to see? So I’d stepped over the threshold, but not because of his goading. I stepped in because I can’t help myself. I haven’t heeded the lesson. He didn’t let me go fifteen years ago. There is no dignity in being discarded.
But there is still a terrible thrill in knowing he still wants me.
Spend the night with me. A lifetime.
Be mine, darling. Let me do it properly this time.
He might even think he believes it and it was thrilling to hear, but I’m not the girl I once was. I know love, like people, brings nothing but disillusionment. I won’t risk my heart again, and I won’t disrupt my children’s lives for anything.
“Bugger,” I mutter, scrubbing at the coffee stain a little harder. “Just go away!”
“And good morning to you, too,” my brother, Sandy, says, appearing in the doorway. He doesn’t remark on what I’m doing in his kitchen. Considering I spend almost as much time here as I do in my own home, it’s not surprising.
“What do you look like?” I ask, my scowl immediately displaced by a giggle.
“What?” he asks, glancing down at his bare feet, completely missing the state of his badly buttoned shirt. Sandy is conventionally handsome and always well pulled together. It’s a rare sight to see him less than pristine, so to see him in wrinkled jeans and a shirt that looks like a three-year-old child buttoned it is very strange. And very entertaining. And just the distraction I need.
“What’s that saying? You look like you’ve been ridden hard and put away wet?”
“What a charming visual,” he mutters, making his way into the kitchen.
“You do know this isn’t your actual honeymoon week.” Despite last night’s shindig, he and Holly married on Christmas Eve three months ago. It was a small family affair because they couldn’t wait. Last night was just an excuse for a party and an opportunity to show off his new bride. Ah, to be in love. To allow yourself to be—
No, that’s not for me.
“I just happened to have had a late night,” he murmurs, a smile touching his lips.
“Not good for a man of your advanced years.”
“Watch it,” he mutters, ignoring the very expensive Italian coffee machine in favor of filling the electric kettle from the tap. “You’re calling yourself old, twinny.” A flick of the switch and the kettle begins its quiet task.
I chuckle at the sight. It seems Holly has domesticated the lofty duke. I knew he could use the coffee machine without someone to work it for him, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen him use anything else in this kitchen. Except for a corkscrew.