“I’m sorry—” I moaned, tears pricking my eyes from the mix of pain and overwhelming pleasure. “I belong to you. I’ve always belonged to you—”
“Good girl.”
He reached under me and rubbed my clit in tight, ruthless circles. My next orgasm hit me like a freight train—violent,shattering, my walls clamping down around his thick cock as I screamed into the mattress.
He didn’t stop. He fucked me through it, chasing his own release with short, brutal thrusts until he buried himself deep and came with a low, guttural sound, flooding me.
For a long moment, the only sounds were our ragged breathing.
He stayed inside me, softening slowly, his hand still loosely around my throat. His lips brushed the shell of my ear.
“Next time you feel guilty, this is how you apologize. Not with words. With this pussy. Understand?”
I nodded weakly, still trembling around him.
“Yes.”
He pressed a kiss to the side of my neck—almost gentle, except it was right over the fresh bruise he’d left.
“Good. Now say it one more time while my cum is still dripping out of you.
Chapter 18
Malachai
Her spine was pressed to my chest, my arm draped over her waist, holding her exactly where she belonged. Even in the warm water, I could feel her thinking again—the slight hitch in her breathing, the way her body tensed against mine.
I waited.
“Would you have let me go?” she asked quietly. “If I never came back… if I stayed gone forever… would you have eventually let me go?”
The question was pointless. She already knew the answer.
This was the part of Indigo I could live without—she needed feelings. She needed soft words and long explanations. She needed me to be human and say something gentle like, “No, I love you enough to let you go.”
I didn’t have that in me.
I tried for a second to understand the logic other people lived by. Why did they think releasing something proved love? If you truly valued something—a weapon, a car, a woman—you kept it close. You protected it. You made sure no one else could ever touch it. Letting go wasn’t love. It was weakness.
“No.”
I dragged my thumb slowly across her bottom lip.
“No. I would’ve kept looking for you,” I said, voice even. “I would’ve dragged you back by your throat if I had to. And I would’ve killed anyone who helped you disappear.”
My hand slid to the back of her neck, holding her there—not tight, just enough to remind her I could.
“You don’t get to leave me again, Indigo. Not permanently. Not temporarily.”
The water shifted as she tried to pull away. I tightened my grip.
“You can run. You can fight. You can hate me,” I continued. “But you will always be mine. Even if I have to keep you locked away to make sure of it. I know you have your issues with me, but I love you the only way I know how—completely. Violently. Without exit.”
She swallowed against my palm.
“When I woke up in that hospital, I didn’t feel the hole in my chest where you’d buried that knife. I felt the void where you were supposed to be. I was so goddamn angry that the world kept turning while you were gone.”
“Malachai, let me go.”
