Grasping her nape, I reared up and rutted into her.
The tension in my balls, the bruises she’d caused, and the wounds she’d imprinted all surged with speed and recklessness.
I wanted to come.
As fast as possible.
I needed out of this woman, away from this lust. I needed to remember how to breathe.
“I truly hate you,” she groaned as she matched my manic pace.
“I feel”—thrust, thrust, fucking thrust—“the same way.”
“Liar!” she hissed, rocking her hips into the coarse vehicle carpet, her moans tattered as I drove harder into her.
Liar?
Who was the liar?
Life itself?
Fate?
Hope?
Definitely hope.
I curled my fingers around the back of her neck and fucked with single-mindedness. I didn’t think about her well-being—no one had ever thought of mine. I wrung out my pleasure from her body, not caring if she came with me or not.
Anger born from all the shit in my past washed over me.
It was hot and black and toxic.
I lost sight of the girl I was with. The girl called Gemma who had strength and safety in her veins, and instead saw every badness, sadness, and pain I’d endured.
Every woman and man who’d thought they’d owned me.
No.
Not anymore.
My anger switched to violence.
My pace switched from manic to murderous.
“God. Oh, God. Oh my...shiiiitt.” The girl beneath me detonated.
Her pussy fisted me, milked me, rippled and stroked.
She shoved me out of the darkness and into the splintering light.
“Oh, fuuuuck—” My stomach tightened, my balls pulled up, and an orgasm gathered, full of reminders that every release since I was twelve had been blank and infertile. Courtesy of the Storymaker. My master. My hell.
On the cusp of bliss, memories tried to steal me.
My mind flickered with Fables, with my family, with the blood-soaked end that I’d reaped.
I was falling, losing, tumbling back into the past.
But then...just before I turned rogue and killed everything breathing around me, the girl who forgave me for things that should never be forgiven, moved.
Her head twisted to the side. Her lips kissed my fist that was planted on the floor by her cheek.
I had no idea why she’d kissed me. Why she’d dropped her guard. Why she’d done something so...nice when I was being so cruel.
Her gentleness, her sweetness, her wonderful, courageous forgiveness.
It broke me.
It shoved me over the edge into a splintering, shattering release.
I punched into her, over and over, jerking and grunting as pulses of heat shot up my cock and into her.
Again and again.
Eradicating some of the filth from me to her.
Christening her into my twisted world.
Ensuring what I said was true.
She was mine.
Not just for tonight.
Not just for tomorrow.
But for every single day of my sorry existence.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
I HAD A DREAM.
A dream where soft fingers trailed through my hair, gentle kisses pressed on my temples, and a warm blanket cocooned my naked body.
I dreamed those soft fingers and gentle kisses gathered me close and held me tight, all while I slipped from aware to unaware.
Whispers invaded the night. Whispers that weren’t just whispers. Whispers that had the power to conjure images in my head, paint a story I never wanted to see, and force me to endure a different kind of life to my blessed one.
There was a boy. Lots of boys. There was a girl. Lots of girls. They all lived in a gilded prison and were only allowed out to play when monsters paid for their company.
They slept with joined hands. They ate with bare fingers. Their tears and blood had blended so often, they were no longer just one but all.
Family.
Married by circumstance, adopted by survival, and forged with unbreakable bonds.
My dream swirled with blacks and grays, revealing a circle of children, waxy skinned and haunted eyed, clinging to each other as the door opened to select another for playtime.
No.
I didn’t want to see.
I didn’t want to know.
This wasn’t a dream but a nightmare.
“I’ll go in your place,” a boy murmured. A boy with long dark hair and darker eyes. “I’ll protect you.”
I thrashed. I tried to scream. Didn’t the boy know not to offer? Not to sacrifice himself to the monster?
Don’t!
The boy squeezed the other boy’s hand, looking once at his family of broken members.
And then, he walked out the door.
Blood cascaded from the ceiling.
No, stop!
Children’s screams filled my ears.
Stop!
I couldn’t take the agony.
I threw myself against the wall of sleep.
“No!” I woke up gasping.
For a moment, I was lost.
My bearings were wrong; my location made no sense.
Then I recognized the ceiling of my trusty Jeep, the stain from an old owner on the door panel, the comforting scent of adventure and pine air freshener.
Shoving myself upright, a blanket tumbled from my shoulders as I switched from lying to sitting. Snatching the vibrant orange fleece that I packed for emergencies—that’d somehow ended up draped over my nakedness—I sucked in another breath.
My captor sat on the other side of the Jeep, his feet planted, knees up, elbows dangling with hands linked in the air. His position was exposing. I saw right between his legs. I studied his scarred cock, the soft sack of his useless testicles, the hair of a man who hadn’t shaved in years.