Page 8 of Hate Me

I watched her for a few moments, the sexy way she walked with a swing of her hips, one that wasn’t even intentional, just all her. Then there was the confidence she exuded too. And the whole fearless thing she had going on. She was a real warrior in so many ways.

Fucking Sky.

That party invite had really gotten under my skin.

I’d done so well not thinking about her for months on end and now with one reference, all this other shit was bubbling up and coming to the surface.

Fuck, maybe going out with Ashley was just what I needed to finally put that traitorous bitch behind me.

Maybe being with somebody else was the final step on that long, painful journey she’d set me on two years ago.

Maybe.

So, yeah, instead of heading home, which was now King Manor once again, I’d ended up here.

At The Ruins. The former Bennett mansion.

Well, what was left of it, which wasn’t a whole lot.

The structural integrity had been severely compromised by that fire and the fact that with what had happened that night delaying the arrival of the firefighters.

The place was ash and debris now. The foundations were still intact, but whole walls were blown out, you could see into the interior of the house from the outside. It was a fucking cinder box. Talk about a metaphor slapping me in the face.

Maria Bennett had died in that brutal fire.

At first, we’d thought it had been a shitload of smoke inhalation from being trapped in her bedroom for so long before Frank Bennett had arrived and pulled her out. She’d also suffered severe and disfiguring third degree burns over more than fifty-percent of her body. But the actual cause of death had been a heart attack brought on by the shock and panic of it all.

She’d been buried at the edge of the estate.

None of her family had come to her funeral.

Sky and her father hadn’t even returned to the city for it.

It had just been me and Cas there out of respect.

Well, and my mom, shockingly.

That was the only time I’d actually seen her in the last two years.

I was done with her for her penchant for always taking Damien’s side.

And she was done with me for me falling off the wagon again, the humiliation upon the family of that sex tape getting out, and from blaming me for Cas pushing Damien out of the city.

My gaze darted to where the trellis had been leading up to Sky’s bedroom and the memory of that night I’d snuck in there and ravished her played on my mind.

The night she’d surrendered to me, to what had been between us.

The night she’d finally admitted that she’d wanted me as much as I’d wanted her.

The night my confession had affected her so deeply.

“I fucking want you too. More than I should. More than should be possible. You’re crawling under my skin, Skylar. Deep in my bones. I can’t cast you out. And worse than that, I don’t fucking want to.”

I’d thought I’d found somebody who I could go the distance with, somebody who understood me, who accepted the light and the very dark and disturbed.

Somebody to love.

I’d brought her into my world, she’d become beloved by Cas and Caleb too.

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