With my romance book in one hand and a cup of steaming hot cocoa in the other, I sit on a bench outside the Tartarus House and enjoy the evening. It’s far too noisy inside right now, and sometimes I just want a little me-time away from their crazy shit.
Besides, these novels don’t read themselves.
I flip the page and lick my lips as the guy is about to kiss the girl for the first time, only she doesn’t know it yet. I always get giddy when I get to this part. It’s one of my favorite books, and I can just read it over and over without ever getting bored.
With a stupid grin, I take a sip of my hot cocoa when I spot a blond-haired girl in a little blue dress stomping toward the cars parked out front beyond the gate with a knife in her hand.
“Oh dear …” I mutter as I place the cocoa back on the little table beside me.
She walks past each one with the knife held out in front of her until she finds the car she’s looking for. An Aston Martin. And I know just who it belongs to.
She scratches along the paint without a single care whose car she’s damaging. Or maybe that’s exactly the point. She slices through the metal and punctures the tires, then looks up at me with disdain.
I just keep drinking my cocoa, shrugging as I lift my book to hide my face behind it, even though she’s already seen me.
When she’s finally gone, I breathe a sigh of relief.
I’m so glad she didn’t come up to the gates looking to fight me. I don’t want to hurt her.
At least not in a break-your-fingers kind of way.
I shut my book and place it on the bench beside me, then pull my phone from my pocket and start the convo.
“Caleb?”
“What do you want?” he barks.
“Well, I thought you’d like to know a certain girl just slashed your tires.”
“WHAT?”
“Yeah, you might want to come downstairs,” I reply.
“Is she still there?” he growls.
“Nope. Sauntered away with that little knife of hers like it was no biggie.” I gaze at my nails, wondering if I should do a different color because black might not suit me after all. “She also kind of ruined your paint job.”
He hangs up without saying another word.
I scoff at the phone. “Rude.”
I place it on the bench beside me and pick up my book again to finish.
The door slams open. “Why the fuck didn’t you stop her?” he yells.
“I don’t know. It’s not my problem.” I shrug.
He grabs my open shirt and knocks the book out of my hand. “You let her do that to my car?”
“Get your hands off me,” I growl back. Only when I narrow my eyes does he finally do what I say. “This Gucci is far too priceless for you to tear holes into it.”
“I’ll tear holes into your body if you don’t fucking tell me where she went right now,” he barks back.
“Oh, don’t threaten me with a good time, please,” I muse, chuckling.
He attempts to slap me, but I grasp his wrist and twist it until he’s locked in a place where he can’t move.
“How many times must I tell you? You can’t win this, Caleb,” I say.
“All right, all right, I’m sorry,” he splutters.
I slap him on the ass and release him. “Good boy.”
He gets all flushed as he pats himself down and pretends I didn’t just easily subdue him.
Sometimes he forgets I’m a black belt in both ju-jitsu and Kendo.
Hell, I even forget it myself sometimes.
“She walked back down the street she came out of,” I say, pointing him in the right direction. “Looks like it’s on the way back to her dorm.”
He walks toward the gate and throws it open, then runs to his car, the panic settling in his eyes when he sees how badly damaged it is. “My fucking baby.” He caresses the car. “She ruined you.”
“It’s just a car,” I yell across the lawn.
“It is not just a car, asshole!” he yells back. “She just got a fucking paint job!”
“Well, maybe you shouldn’t have pissed that girl off as much as you did?” I shrug.
Now he’s really fuming.
Oops. My bad.
He slaps his own car a little too harshly. “She’s gonna fucking pay for this.”
“Do you really think that’s the smart thing to do?” I ask him, casually sipping on my hot cocoa. “You know, seeing how she pretty much knows something no one can find out?”
“I don’t fucking care. She ruined my car.”
“And what did you do to deserve it?” I muse, taking another sip while he’s almost exploding like a hot air balloon being fed too much fire.
He slowly marches back into the property. “She followed me. So I gave her a piece of my mind.”
My eyes narrow. “You mean an inch of your dick.”
The smirk says it all.
He leans in to whisper into my ear, “Every fucking inch. And if you want to know … She also tasted divine.”
Now why did that make my dick bob up and down in my pants? I’ll never know.
He turns around and saunters off, waving at me. “Don’t tell Ares.”
“You know I’m terrible at keeping secrets, darling,” I warn him. “I might let it slip.”
He sticks up his middle finger at me. “Then tell him the truth and let him know how good she felt while she came all over my fucking tongue. I’m sure he won’t mind that I played with his shiny new toy.”
Crystal
I put my bag in the corner of my room and take a deep breath.
There. Much better now.
I shrug off the leftover anger and grab my study books so I can prep for a quiz before I have to go to sleep.
However, when I turn around, the shadowy figure in front of me makes me scream.
Right into his hand that covers my mouth.
Caleb.
My eyes widen.
How did he get in?
A cold breeze follows him into the room, and my eyes immediately lock onto the open window.
Shit. I knew I should’ve closed it before I left.
“Shh … don’t want to wake your friends now, do we?” he whispers, eyes filled with rage.
I kick him in the balls, but he swiftly grabs my arms and wraps them together, body pressed against mine as one hand is still snaked tightly around my mouth to prevent any sound from coming out.
“Do you really want to do this, Crystal?” he asks. “After you’ve already been such a bad fucking girl, slashing my tires?”
I knock my head back into his so he loses some of his grip, and I tear away from him.
But he holds my arm and drags me right back to him, this time with a knife pointed right at my neck.
I stop fighting and hold my breath. “Now are you going to behave? Or should I make you feel the same pain you gave my beautiful car?”
“You ruined my face, so I thought it’d be fair game to ruin your precious car in return,” I spit. “An eye for an eye.”
His fingers dig into my skin, jaw tensing up.
Suddenly, he shoves me up against the door, one hand firmly planted on my belly.
“An eye …” he growls, holding the knife closer to my face, lifting it up high. “Is that what you want me to take?”
Panic fills my bones, but I stay put, trying to remain calm.
Don’t show them any weakness. Zero fear.
“You do that, and my mother will know exactly what kind of family she’s attached herself to,” I tell him.
His hand slowly lowers between my legs, and I struggle to stay put. “Is that before or after you tell her about how you writhed all over my tongue?”
I spit on his face.
He deserves it.
His nostrils flare, eyes looking more incensed than ever. And all it does is make me smile.
He wipes his hand along his face and gathers my spit while lowering his knife until it touches my bottom lip.
“Open your mouth,” he growls.
When I slowly part my lips, he pushes his own two fingers inside and gives me back my own spit.
“Pretty girls like you don’t need to act dirty,” he says.
He spits back.
Right into my mouth.
“I’ll be the one to make you fucking dirty,” he groans. “Now swallow.”
Oh God.
The knife tips up against my lips. “Go on.”
I do what he says despite the humiliation and swallow down both of our spit.
“Good girl.”
He lowers the knife and leans in, his lips hovering so close to mine, and I suck in a breath. Instead, he reaches for the doorknob and locks the door, stealing the key. A wicked grin spreads on his lips as he leans back and watches me for a moment.
Then he steps back, tucking the key into his pocket.
“Give me back the key,” I grit.
With a smug smile, he steps back until he reaches my bed. He sits down, palms behind his back. “Come and get it then.”
I lean against the door and look for a way out, but the only other option is through my window, the same way he came in.
“Don’t even think about it,” he says. “I will catch you before you make it halfway across the room.”
My teeth clench together.
Shit. He’s lured me into a trap in my own room.
“Now, come here, Crystal.”
“No.”
My eyes flutter to my bag.
My knife is in there. If I can grab it, I might be able to fend him off.
WHACK!
Caleb’s knife lands right beside my head into the wood.
He threw an actual fucking knife at my head.
“Grabbing your knife will do you no good, Crystal. So go ahead, grab mine. See if you can hit me.”
He’s completely insane.
Still, I grab the handle, the blade much heavier than mine as I rip it out of the cracked wood. I clutch it tightly, slowly walking toward him while keeping a careful eye so I don’t misstep.
And then I strike.
He swiftly grabs my wrist and twists my hand until it hurts, and I drop the knife. Right into his other hand.
“What did I tell you?” His voice is low, gruff, almost like he’s warning me not to overstep his boundaries. “You can’t win this game.”
He pulls me to him and lifts me from the floor, only to throw me over his lap.
“What are you doing?”
He slides his calloused hand underneath my blue dress. “Giving you the punishment you deserve.”
“Let go of m—”
THWACK!
A sharp pain hits my ass cheek, and I yelp.
I try to shove myself off him, but he holds me steady with one hand. “Stay.”
Another hit to the other ass cheek almost has me flying off the bed.
Oh my God … He’s actually spanking me.
