Total pages in book: 105
Estimated words: 98892 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 494(@200wpm)___ 396(@250wpm)___ 330(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 98892 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 494(@200wpm)___ 396(@250wpm)___ 330(@300wpm)
“I don’t know, Nik!” she yells, looking up at me without an inch of fear. The way she throws her weight around makes Mal uncomfortable to an extent, but that’s only because people have been killed for less. I wouldn’t kill Meraki, though. At least not yet, or unless I’m fucking her while doing it.
She stands so fast the chair crashes to the floor behind her. It’s cute when she’s angry because she’s so small. I’ve always let her be whoever the fuck she wanted to be around me, but I’m curious to know if that will work now that we’re adults.
“Do you have a boss?”
I think over her question, but I find myself faltering, because all of that anger is pulsating into me. I shake my head slowly, running the tip of my index finger across her collarbone. It’s sexy and sharp. I could remove it with my teeth and sharpen it enough to hang on the wall with the rest of my weapons.
She slaps my finger away as if I’m not who the fuck I am.
Her face lights up as if she had the answer that people have been searching for, for an eternity. “You’re in the Mafia.”
My eyes roll. “So cliché. No, baby girl, I’m not.” I grab her by the throat and force her lips onto mine. Warm, soft, kind of like how they always felt wrapped around my cock. “You get one last guess.”
She stares up at me, her eyes crossing because the proximity of us is too close. “Or what?”
I chuckle, sinking my teeth into her bottom lip until the toxic wave of metallic teases my throat. I kiss the swell of the wound gently. “Or I’m going to lay your ass out.” I lean into the side of her head until my lip grazes the curve of her ear. “And just a heads-up, I don’t fuck like I used to. I like pain now, and a lot of it.” When I push her back so I can see her reaction, I release her throat just enough for her to not pass out from lack of oxygen. “Final guess.”
Her eyes close and then open as if she’s trying to remember what it was like to be held by me. Not like this, that’s for sure. “I don’t know.”
I force her face down onto my desk, gripping the back of her neck while kicking her ankles to widen her legs. With my other hand, I squeeze her upper thigh and slowly run my palm over the skull tattoo on her thigh, up until it touches the hem of the oversized shirt she’s wearing. When I grind my cock against the crack of her ass, I feel a slight push back from her.
I snicker, reaching into my pocket and pulling out my switchblade. “Still my toxic little slut.”
Flicking it open, I bring the tip to the base of her neck and her body twitches beneath my grip. Smirking, I slowly glide the sharp tip down the collar until the fabric splits open and her naked back is on display.
“Nik,” she warns. “Please.”
“Please what? Please stop? Or please keep going?”
She turns limp, her face lying flat on the desk.
“You know what I want,” she whispers, and she’s right. I do. I’m always going to be that man who knows exactly who she is.
“Yeah, I do.” I keep dragging the knife down in a perfect line. “You forget I know all of your dark, dirty little secrets, Mer.”
When the blade reaches the end, I study my impressively straight cut mark before my finger dips beneath and I flick the shirt off in one simple movement. She’s bare and curvaceous, and all for my taking. Before I can second-guess myself, I’m bringing the blade back to her spine. When the cool metal touches her skin, goose bumps spread over her tanned flesh and all of my blood rushes to my balls.
“I know all of what you keep hidden from the world. I know all of your demons, you wanna know how?”
She doesn’t move. Bent over my desk and painfully perfect. The tip of the blade sinks into her skin and it splits open, blood filling the fresh wound. I don’t blink as I watch the crimson liquid trickle over the curve of her waist.
“I know all of your demons because if I didn’t create them, I fucked them.”
She whimpers so quietly I almost miss it. Sliding my finger over the cut, I dip my finger into her blood and start tracing across her back. “Spell the letters out for me, baby.” I push my finger into her back and trace the first letter.
She shudders. “G…”
“Good girl.” With my other hand, I run the palm of it over her swollen ass as I continue with my art with the other. “Continue.”