I didn’t move. I didn’t breathe.
The monstrosity. The horror.
Roman stared at his hands, his face twisted with emotion three decades old.
“He brought me back to that cabin the next year. We did the same sort of training, but his heart wasn’t in it anymore. When spring came, he walked me out on the ice, and when he told me to jump, I jumped. The water was so cold and all my breath rushed out of me. I thought about slipping under to be with Ant, just to spite my father. He could lose both of his boys. He’d deserve it. But I knew Ant wouldn’t want that for me, so I did what my father wanted, and I survived.” He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and let it out again.
“I’m so sorry.” I touched his leg, leaned my lips against his shoulder. Words weren’t enough.
“I hate my father. I’ve always hated my father. But I was supposed to be the one to kill him, and Oisin took that from me. Now I’m going to kill Oisin for his crime, and everyone in this world will know that I’m made of.” He looked at me, cold and hot all at once. “Ice and death.”
I kissed his lips. He kissed me back with a shocking passion, his fingers tugging at my hair. His forehead leaned against mine and he held me there, his hand curled against the nape of my neck.
“You never should’ve gone through that. I can’t imagine what kind of father could watch his son drown.”
“Now you know why I am the way I am.”
“I’m so sorry. God, Roman, I’m so sorry. You were just little boys.”
“He wanted us to be strong. The life of an Oligarch isn’t easy. In some ways, he was right to prepare us the way he did—but he was wrong to let Anthony die. I think he knew it too. He was never the same after that. I think it gnawed at him, ate at him, and he wasted away to a ghost of himself in his later years. And still, I hate him so much, and I wish my brother was alive.”
I didn’t know what to say, so I hugged him tight, kissed his lips, his chin, his hands, his neck. He held me back and breathed in my hair, not crying, not losing himself, but sitting with a deep, black, dark melancholy that I didn’t think I’d ever quite understand.
He tilted my chin back and looked into my eyes.
“Talking about it helps,” he said softly. “I didn’t expect it would. I haven’t told that story in a very long time. But it does help.”
“I’m glad. I want to be here for you.”
“And you already are, my pretty little wife.” He bit my lower lip.
I trembled for him.
His hands ran over my body. He kissed me deeper, my mouth opening, his tongue rolling against mine. His arms were hot, the passion and heat radiating off him in waves as he pinned me against his brother’s bed. His lips traveled to my neck as he held my wrists up above my head. “Roman,” I whispered, and he groaned in response, hurried unbuttoning my jeans, tugging them off. “Please, Roman.”
He bit my lip hard. I bit him back, groaning, as his fingers slid down beneath my panties.
I wiggled my hips. I was wet, and it was wrong. I shouldn’t be wet right now, not after he told me a story like that, not after he relived the worst trauma of his life. I should’ve screamed or cried or did anything else, but after he was finished and he touched me and looked at me like he needed me so badly, I couldn’t help myself, and now—
God, now, he unbuttoned his own jeans and wriggled out of them. He was hard, massive and thick and made from granite. He pressed himself against me and I opened my legs, only his briefs and my panties separating our sensitive flesh as I ground my hips against him.
His touches were furtive, needy, intense. His lips were steaming and delicious. When he pulled my panties off, ripping them away like paper, I threw back my head in bliss. He took off his boxer briefs and pressed the tip of his throbbing, perfect cock against my dripping entrance—
And slid so deep I felt him press against my cervix.
Again, and again, he thrust hard, killing me to the literal brim, and my back arched, and I screamed his name.
“You’ll be my perfect little wife,” he said, fucking me faster, eyes lost in the moment, in pure passion and bliss. Pleasure rolled around me like a hurricane, and I was lost, so lost, as he filled me again and again, my cunt dripping and spread wide. “You’ll do as I say. You’ll be all mine, for as long as I want to keep you. Say you want to be my wife.”
“I want to be your wife.”
“Say it again.”
“I want to be yours, Roman. I want to be all yours.”
“Your cunt, lips, breasts. Even your scar. I want it all, Cassie.” He fucked me faster, pumping roughly, merciless, the twin bed shaking, creaking. I writhed my hips against him, my swollen clit rubbing against his muscular belly. “I’ve given you everything and now I want to claim what’s mine from you. I want you to come for me Cassie, and I want to fill you up. My wife, my little fucking wife, god I need this.”
He moved faster, faster, and I gasped, finger digging into the headboard, and he looked handsome and perfected as I spread my legs wide and took him as deep as he would go, one intense and gorgeous thrust after the other, making me shake, making me moan, until I felt it peak, and peak, and peak, and I came in a cascade of incredible muscle-spasms and screams, and he kept going, fucking me through my orgasm, the haze leaving me nearly blinded, nearly passed out, and I felt him fill me moments later, his orgasm mingling with mine, bliss and bliss and bliss, and he collapsed to the side and wrapped his massive arms around my body and pulled me tight against him.
We stayed like that for a while, breathing deep.
“I didn’t expect that,” he said after what might’ve been a lifetime.
“Yeah? You don’t sleep with girls in your dead brother’s bed very often?” As soon as the words were out, I wished I hadn’t said them.
But he laughed. “No, not often. You’re the first.”
I rolled over to face him. I touched his cheek, kissed his lips. “Thank you for showing this to me and for telling me about your brother.” I leaned forward, bit his ear. “Will you tell me happy memories about him one day?”
“I would love that.”
I nodded and curled up against his chest, and let him hold me for as long as he wanted.
