Page 233 of Pretty Little Lies

“When did your dad die?”

My whole body coils into this uncomfortable knot of the reality I’m sitting in, and I’m starting to run out of words to describe how I’m feeling.

I’m all over the place.

This house brings back every memory. It’s the home he raised me in.

And I want nothing to do with it one moment and everything in me wants me to keep fighting for it somehow.

“I don’t want to talk to you about that,” I mutter.

“Why, because I’mnothingto you anymore?” he sneers out. “I know I’m not Judah, but—” I immediately begin thrashing around to throw him off me, but to no avail.

I’m trapped under another Wildes man for the second time, and I’m in love with this one. It doesn’t matter how much Torin did and what he conjured up in his head, I know the feeling of grief, and we’re both doing it at the same damn time.

“Go ahead,” I taunt, still yanking on my arms. “Doexactlywhat your brother did.”

“I’m nothing like my brother, Wildfire. I’m worse.” His hand glides and descends my ribs in a gentle brush. “You’re addictive and beautiful. You’re so fucking raw and sinful that I’d go through hell just to know what it feels like to be inside you. You’re an addiction…a hard one to kick. I don’t know if I want to kill you or fuck you into next week.”

“I want to kill you,” I whisper with zero steel in my town because my vital organ that still beats for him clinches onto what we had. It was starting to fall for the person my brain told it repeatedly to stay away from. “You took Ellie and Mae from me.”

“You took Judah.”

“I told you?—”

“You wanna kill me, Astor?” His fingers dip underneath the waistband of my cotton shorts. “I want to hear you say it.”

“Fix it,” I reply instead through the tingles that begin to form all over my body. “Fix your fuck-ups.”

“Can you fix mine?”

He knows I can’t, but I wish I could.

It was never supposed to go down that way; however, his brother had other plans. I don’t know if he was so high that his decision-making was non-existent or if he truly wanted to take me out, except I wasn’t going to hang around for the so-called rational part of him to show up.

“Did Judah ever fuck you?”

My nostrils flare at the completely inappropriate and unhelpful question, though I answer it anyway. “No.”

Torin pulls his hand free from my shorts. With his palm still keeping my hands secured together, he tears them down my legs.

He has an easy night, because I’m not wearing panties and the appreciative growl that rumbles from his chest shows how grateful he is for that fact.

“Don’t you fuckin’dare, Pretty Boy,” I leer though my body burns at the thought of him fucking me and conjuring all the negative thoughts to flee my head. Even if just for a moment. “You think I’m going to fuck you after everything you did?”

“I don’t need you to fuck me, Wildfire,” he emits low. “I can fuck you all by myself, baby. Ineedthis.”

My empathy latches onto him too easily, but my brain still won’t allow me to forget.

He’s taken everything.

“Yeah?” I snarl back. “And what do I get to give you?”

“What do you want?” His question licks up my body and causes my nipples to pebble. Torinownsme and I need the title back to my heart. Even after being thrown and ejected into the unknown of what’s going to happen, I’m still riding the road with Torin driving the damn car to my heart.

“Let me go and find out,” I press, testing to see how much he gives a shit about how I feel with him touching me.

For a split second, I’m surprised as hell when both of his hands show up at his sides, but the warmth of his fingers still splay around my wrist as a reminder of what he just did.