Page 100 of The Secrets of a Sin

“If you think I’m ever going back to St. Catherine’s again, you’re crazy.” I add as he reaches for the bottom of my chin and turns my face towards him.

“Bout time you caught on.” He leans in, rubbing the tops of our noses softly together.

I chuckle lightly but am suddenly hit with reality and frown. “What happens now, Arsen?” I ask.

I surely wasn’t going to subject myself with going back to St. Catherine’s, so where was I going to go? Back home? Stay here with Arsen? As questions wafted inside my head, Arsen squeezes my chin and forces my attention on him.

“Stop overthinking, angel.” He coaxes across my chapped lips, and my eyes instantly flutter. “What’s happening is you’re leaving that school and coming to live with me. We’ll find you online courses and get you graduated, then whatever you want to do comes next.” He orders like I don’t have a say in the matter. “When I said you owned me, I meant it. Death was never going to keep me away from you, and now that we’ve avoided that, I plan to do everything right with you.”

My heart won’t stop pounding. It bashes against my breastbone as I’m shoved closer into his chest and his warmth.

“Let me be the man who worships you forever.” He kisses along my bottom lip.

“Yes.” I sigh, knowing that I’d follow him anywhere.

“Then let’s take you home, angel.” He places one short peck on my lips before pulling away.

Home.

Arsen was my home, my sanctuary, my everything.

With him, I didn’t need therapy, confessions, or counselors because he was my addiction. I didn’t need a school to try and fix me or the belief that with God’s help, he would heal me too.

God wasn’t who I needed. God didn’t make my blood heat or cause my heart to batter as he did. Arsen was the cause, the cure, the enabler, fucking everything that sparked my compulsion into what it is now. And it is more than I could have ever imagined.

It was two tarnished souls who found each other to create chaos. His broken past, my troubled one, we were perfectly imperfect. Both flawed. Even more, damaged, but we were a match made in hell.

And together, we’d thrive.

Together, we’d conquer.

But, most importantly, we’d leave behind the school that had destroyed us both and never fucking look back.

EPILOGUE

Charlotte

Six months later

“Harder.” I moan as my back is pressed further into the tiles of our shower as Arsen continues to drive forward inside of me. In the beginning, he always wanted to savor me with gentle thrusts and kisses that made me physically melt into his mouth. As much as I adored the Arsen’s sweet side, I needed more. I needed his ferocity like I needed air. I was drawn to the gruff side of him, his crude words, and the way my body ignited from his savagery.

He was my monster, whom I craved in the dark and the prince that I ultimately needed to save me.

And he did.

“Any harder, and I might split you open.” He teases as he powers forward with a brutality that has my head spinning and smacking back against the wall. I was close to orgasm, and I knew that Arsen was too. His grip on me tightened, and his movements became sloppy and uncoordinated as we both cried out in ecstasy.

There wasn’t a day where we weren’t fucking, where we weren’t devouring each other into oblivion, and everything else was completely forgotten about. When I first moved in, all we did was have sex. Every minute of every day. We were addicted to the idea that we’d be around each other all the time. We were so accustomed to our new daily routine that I almost forgot that I needed to find a different school to go to. After hours and hours of searching and arguing, I reluctantly found an online school that I enrolled in, and last month, I officially graduated. Now with a diploma and no clue of what I wanted to do, I found myself writing about myself and what happened to me. It seemed to help me cope with what I had gone through, and the nightmares I was having began to slowly fade away. As much as I wanted to forget and ignore the lives of Annalise, Priscilla, Verity, and Sister Mary, I couldn’t. As twisted as it was, their insanity made me feel sane.

Like my flaws were nothing compared to what they suffered from.

Arsen kisses my forehead before exiting the shower, leaving me there to finish washing my hair. I lather my head in soap and rinse it all out using my fingers as a comb. Then once I finish, I hop out and reach for a towel to dry off. I wait and wait for Arsen to exit the bathroom, and once he does, I slowly tiptoe to the door and turn the lock. Walking over to my makeup drawer, I leisurely pull it open until the pink box of a pregnancy test comes into view.

God, why was I so anxious?

With palms already sweating and a pounding heart, I take it out and rip open the package. Once I have the stick out, I saunter over to the toilet and sit with spread legs. I find it hard to pee, but when I do, I place the stick under me. Once I finish, I place it on the sink counter beside me. My eyes are eager to look, but I can’t bring myself to watch the lines appear.

Was Arsen ready for a child?