But she’s given me her vulnerability. Again and again and again.
Time for me to give her a shard?—
—and see what she does when it’s in her palm, cutting her open, bleeding the truth.
“Truth.”
She falls against me, collapsing, heaving, and holding onto me. Shivering and shuddering from utter relief.
I let her fall apart. And build herself back together again.
I won’t hold her. It’s taking too much of my strength to force down every predatory urge I have, channeling it, saving it. My cock swells and thickens, throbbing with more blood.
“Truth, Briella.” I offer her any question.
And my Queen is clever.
“I want…”
She raises herself until she’s right before me.
She touches my eyes.
Yes. I should have known she would do this. Not just words. She breaks me with her fingers like hot coals. Because eyes are windows to the soul.
“I want what’s inside here. Tell me, Raphael.” She kisses my left eye. “Show me.” Then, my right. “Give me your deepest, darkest secret.”
Her kiss is devastating. I take control before I lose it all.
Mouth hardening. Tongue burrowing. Teeth sinking in. I grip her hair, but hold her with the strength of my jaw.
“Briella,” I begin. “I must hurt you now. I will give you my trauma, my abyss. And you will take it, feed on it like it’s your last supper, and I’m the body broken, and blood shed for you. But I cannot open the scars without showing you, making you feel them, too.”
“What do you need from me?” she wonders softly, fractured, beautiful.
Gods, this girl. This goddess.
I reach beneath her and sink my fingers between the line of her ass until I touch that puckered hole. Her eyes turn wide, her breath careening through her nose as I show her exactly what I will do. She passed out that night of the arrow after Rory took her cunt. She does not know how Vincent took her ass that night.
Her pained features confirm the trauma she still feels from Rory’s violence.
Then, she softens. She melts. Touches her brow to mine.
“Okay. But only like this. Face to face. Eyes to eyes. Soul to soul.” She places her palm on my chest above the pounding of my heart, but she knows better than to say ‘heart to heart’. I have none. It’s hollow as the void.
“Yes. I’ll have nothing less. Nothing,” I assure her.
I want to see every expression, every micro-expression.
I want to lick her tears and devour her cries.
She will be written in my scars tonight. And I will haunt hers forever.
“Rory,” I order without breaking my focus on her. “Get the lube.”
58
Rory
