Total pages in book: 155
Estimated words: 146417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 732(@200wpm)___ 586(@250wpm)___ 488(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 146417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 732(@200wpm)___ 586(@250wpm)___ 488(@300wpm)
“Yeah, I’d intended for this to end that way, but if you need to rage a little more, go on. I assure you I can take it.”
He’d already taken so much. She wanted to have it out with him, to let him know the truth about all things, but she couldn’t. So instead she gave him some truth of her own. He wanted honesty? She could give it to him. She moved in, needing him to understand that he couldn’t intimidate her. “You know what I thought when Levi told me he had the drug?”
“No. What did you think?”
He was infuriatingly calm now. It bothered her because she felt white hot. Like a live wire that was twitching and jumping, looking for something to send all that energy through.
“When he told me he had that drug and that he planned to use it on me, I was afraid at first. Then he pointed out that all my pain would go away because I wouldn’t remember who you were. I wouldn’t remember how easy it was to break me because I wouldn’t remember meeting the man who’d done it.”
His eyes flared, the first sign of his emotion. “You think you can forget me? You think some drug can make either of us forget?”
“I think I might like to try.” She didn’t mean it. She would never give up her memories of him. For a brief time he’d been everything to her. He’d been her future, and while they’d been together the world had been a better place. She would cling to that memory until the day she died.
His hand came up, gripping her hair and forcing her head back. “Then maybe I should remind you.”
His mouth came down on hers and all thoughts of leaving fled.
She knew she should be fighting him, but how long had she wanted this? How long had she waited for those gorgeous lips of his to be on hers again? All these years and she’d had a few encounters, one she didn’t remember at all, the one that cost her any hope of a reconciliation—but no one ever moved her the way Beckett Kent did.
She brought her arms up to circle his shoulder and bumped against the bandage on his arm. He hissed. She tried to pull away, but he tugged hard enough on her hair to make her gasp.
“No. Don’t stop me.”
She shook her head. “You’re hurt.”
“I’m always hurt around you. Make me feel better. You’re the only fucking person in the world who can make me feel better.”
She couldn’t resist him, couldn’t say no, though she worried there was a stark undertone to his words. All that mattered was taking this moment. She might never see him again. This might finally be the end, and she wanted something sweet, something to hold on to, something that she would fight to remember even if Levi caught her again.
She wanted one more moment with Beck.
He devoured her mouth, kissing her with a hunger she matched with her own.
“This is what you need, what we both need,” he whispered against her mouth. “Take off those pants and those fucking panties and let me touch you. Let me help clear some of this poison. Let’s get it all out of our systems, and then I’ll beg you to not make me sleep on the couch tonight.”
This was such a dangerous place to be. “You can’t make me forget. You’ve been an asshole to me for years.”
“I can. Give me a chance. You don’t have to love me again. You only have to want me. You have to trust me to get you through this. Let me start by getting you through the night. Tell me you don’t want this. Tell me you don’t want to know what I can do to you now and I’ll walk away. I’ll sleep on that couch and we can go right back to being polite in the morning.”
“You are never polite.”
“Because you don’t need polite. That’s not what you want in bed. You want me to take charge. You want to be able to close your eyes and focus on the pleasure. You want to shut your brain off and know that you can relax. I promise you won’t be thinking about anything but the way I can make you feel. Let me show you what I’ve learned over the years we’ve spent apart. Let me show you how much better I can take care of you now. Give me the power.”
She wanted to, but there needed to be boundaries. “I can’t make love to you.”
His hands tightened in her hair, lighting up her scalp and making her skin tingle. “Who said anything about making love? I want to fuck you. I want to spank you and make you cry for me. I want to hurt you but in the best way, in the way that unleashes your pain and makes me feel like I can do something good with all the bad inside me.”