Page 51 of Unholy Bonds

“He…he forced her to take her own life. He killed her.” Her lips trembled. “And then he carried on like she never existed. His life went on, and there were no repercussions. Money makes everything alright. In the end, everything fell into place for him, and my mother was just a forgotten, crazy, mentally ill woman who committed suicide.”

Fuck. I wanted to pull her into my skin and steal her pain away, protect her from the viciousness in the world, but who would protect her from me?

“I don’t want to say sorry, but… I want to… kill the man who did that to you.” It came out before I could stop. “I want to hurt him in every way possible.”

She smiled at me, and my breath faltered.

“He isn’t alive anymore,” she said.

I wished she hadn’t so readily given me a look into her secrets, her scars. Her trust in me was staggering, just as staggering as her confession about how much she wanted me.

“You must miss her,” I said, and she shook her head, a soft smile slipping past her brokenness, quickly filling the cracks in her mask and the Yara West I knew was back. “My mother died, and I still miss her.”

“Yes, I miss her so much, but I’m grateful that she decided to end her life sooner rather than later. I wouldn’t wish that pain on anyone. The worst thing about all of this was that she loved my father until the day she died.”

“Some are so conditioned by the society around them to accept whatever was given to them. They’re manipulated to take the scraps of love thrown their way, coated with abuse. And these women forget they deserve nothing less than the very best. It’s depressing, but I’ve seen it happen so many times.”

The stories I chased took me into places I had never wanted to visit again, to men who didn’t deserve to live.

“You must have seen a lot of it,” she said as she took a deep breath. “This isn’t where I wanted this night to go, Ryden,” she finally said with a shake of her head. “Not really.” She looked confused as if she wasn’t sure what the fuck was going on.

I chuckled. “You have a one-track mind, Doctor West.”

“That’s what made me become a Chief Medical Examiner at this age, Mr. Sinclair. I know you’re the same. You wouldn’t have been here if you weren’t focused.”

“I am.”

“Tell me about the woman,” she said after another long pause.

“I said I don’t have a girlfriend. I wasn’t lying, but I do have someone. It’s purely physical between us, and we both know it’s temporary,” I said. She looked up at me, her fingers tugging at the silky strands of red.

The image of her on her knees in front of me, her mad eyes bright, her red lips wide and ready to take all of me in… it was so fucking vivid it made my breath snag.

“But?” she asked, leaning her head back on the couch. “Go on.”

“There’s no but,” I said, a bite in my voice. It came out harsher than I intended. My jaw clenched, my eyes fell to her lips, and I felt hunger rushing along my skin. Wild and unconstrained. I wanted to break myself out of the cage and hunt—hunt her to the edge of the night, chase her into oblivion until we were tangled together, our naked bodies bruised from pleasure and pain.

“There is definitely a but,” she said with a soft smile that made my cock harder.

“Fuck, Yara.” Her name was a curse, a prayer. My fingers itched to feel her, just one more time. Maybe then this ravaging need inside me would simply shut the fuck up.

I came here to talk about Victor, but now I wanted to know more about this maddeningly sexy woman in front of me, looking at me like she had been thirsty for a long time, lost in a desert, and I was that one drop of water.

Why can’t you give in? It can be a one-time thing. A small, hungry voice prodded inside my mind. I shook my head and took another step back from her, saving myself from the torture of being so close to her.

“I need to go.”

“Why, Ryden?” she said my name in a whisper… like a supplication. Like an offering to God. Fuck. She’d be my demise.

I’m scared of this raging hunger inside me, the quivers in my heart.

For the first time in my life, I was afraid. Afraid of what this woman could do to me if I gave into the need roaring inside me, if I let my guard down and made way for her inside the walls.

No. That would be stupidity.

“Because we both know that this isn’t going to end well.” I shrugged, and her lips pulled up as if she was amused to hear me say that. “Why do it when you already know the ending?”

She chuckled and licked her lips. “Because we both know that the sex would be unbelievable. It’s stupid to resist something that could bring us both a world of pleasure. It’s not like I’m asking for a ring. I’m just ordering you to fuck me. One night. Just one night.” She licked her lips, and her eyes went to the half-opened book on her table. It was something obscenely sexy. She followed my eyes and smirked. “You can borrow it if you want. He does things to her… dirty things. He ties her to her bed and fucks her hard; cuts his name on her skin… he chases her into the woods and uses her like the whore she is before he fucks her with his tail… oh, and he’s a dragon.”

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