Page 72 of Thorns of Malice

"I mean it, Ivy. You don't understand how much I've missed you."

She maintains her silence. Several moments pass, and I hold her tight.

She moves her head off my chest and pushes against me.

I release my grip on her and palm her ass, asking, "What's wrong, baby girl?"

Her expression sends a chill down my spine. She announces, "I'm going back downstairs now."

Panic hits me. I question, "For what?"

"I told you, Dax. I'm not the same woman you knew. I'm no longer naive and gullible. Everything I am is because of you. And I need more. I'll never stop needing more."

My insides quiver. "You don't need them. You needme."

She blinks hard. "Is that what you think?"

"It's what I know," I insist.

She laughs, then a tear falls, and she swipes at it. She turns toward the wall.

I turn her chin back so she can't avoid me. "Ivy, we're going to get through this. I'm going to right my wrongs against you."

She tosses her head back and sarcastically laughs. Then she sniffles and narrows her eyes, pinning them on me, asking, "Do you think a couple of orgasms from you will erase all you did to me? Or that one person to fuck will ever be enough for me?"

My chest tightens, and the air in my lungs turns stale. Bile rises in my throat.

She gives me a look that reminds me of Avery, stating, "I can assure you that anything you're romanticizing in your head right now is a fantasy."

"Ivy—"

"You disappoint me, Dax. You're the one who made me into a filthy whore. Yet, you seem to have forgotten what your role is, as well as the others'."

"Ivy—"

"It's time you remember what dirty sluts are for, Dax Carrington."

13

Ivy

Everything I felt years ago with Dax comes flooding back, and the high I've been unable to attain since the last time we were together has finally returned.

I can't stay here. It's too intense. The feeling I sought for over a decade is all I yearned for, urging me to do things that don't make me proud.

Yet here I finally am, getting exactly what I wanted.

But I no longer want it.

It's too much.

He'stoo much.

The rug's been pulled out from under me, and I'm falling back under Dax's control. The more he gives me—the more we sync like we used to—the more I want from him.

It's way too dangerous of a position.

"You're not a filthy whore," he claims.

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