Page 92 of Brutal Game

Raising a hand, she gently brushed a hand through my short hair. “You don’t trust anyone, do you?”

“How could I? Everyone leaves.”

Except for Coach.

And maybe her.

“You don’t trust anyone either,” I pointed out.

“Except for Asher,” she said.

“Right.” Her fucking brother.

What would it be like, to have the same loyalty from her she had for him? I wanted it, badly. And I promised myself in that moment: I’d get it. Break my own rules to make sure it happened. Lie, cheat, or steal. Aviva would be loyal tome,and me alone.

She cupped my face. “I’d kill your father for you, you know.”

Her words were a sweet stab, a knife dripping in honey.

“I will kill Tom, and those men who shot your parents. And you. Did you ever find them?”

She sighed. “No. It’s more important to Asher than it is to me. It was a random robbery gone wrong—even though we had nothing to steal. I’ve got vengeance in my bones, but now it’s for the living.”

The look in her eyes.

You, it said.You, despite every terrible thing you’ve done to me.

“My little fury,” I said, kissing her again, and she kissed me back, claiming me as much as I’d claimed her. There was no sweetness, no gentleness this time. We were both angry at each other’s pasts, each determined to erase it. She scratched her nails down my back, I grabbed her arms and held her down. I shoved inside her, she bucked, still wet with her release and my come. I pounded into her and she fought me, but this time it was because she enjoyed it. Atsome point, I needed her, so I flipped her over onto her stomach and layered my chest over her back, entwining my fingers with hers. Daylight turned her brown hair almost copper. My cock hurt, almost raw from the number of times I’d fucked her, but I was too hungry for her to stop.

My world could’ve burned to the ground, and I wouldn’t have cared.

As long as I was inside her wet heat, listening to her as she screamed from the combination of pleasure and pain, my name a litany on her lips, nothing mattered but her.

My little fury.

If Aviva wanted to burn the world down, I’d help her. If she wanted to burnmyworld down, I’d hand her the match.

Because from now on, she was my world.

29

Aviva

Things seemed to change after Jack’s and my venture into somnophilia. That morning, he’d held me, made me burnt eggs in our little kitchenette, his eyes earnest as I’d forced myself to eat them.

I kept rubbing my left shoulder. It was bothering me.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, an unreadable expression on his face.

“My shoulder itches, and part of the skin feels raised,” I said. “It’s kind of weird.”

He walked behind me, lifting my hair to look at my shoulder, stroking his thumb over the bump and sending shivers down my spine.

“Looks like a bug bite,” he said, before bending to drop a kiss over the irritated spot. “There we go, all better.”

Straightening, he came around to stand in front of me, the kitchen bar in between us.

“How doyoulike your orange juice?” he asked, changing the subject.

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