Page 91 of House of Lilith

It renders me speechless, the absurdity of everything he just said. “How,” I start, struggling not to lose my cool, “buthowdid you manage to makethisabout yourself?”

He just blinks at me, all confused all of a sudden. “Because, you know, we had our little spat yesterday,” he starts to explain, earnestly, and it makes my blood begin to boil, but I let him keep going. “And you weren’t pleased when we parted and neither was I, so I just thought it would be good to tell you, you know, that I support you in this. We’re powerful as is, we don’t need Max, right?”

It takes me a second to calm down enough to be able to form coherent sentences. Once I do, I take a step closer to my brother and I say, “First of all, it wasn’t a fucking spat, it was an insulting, incredibly selfish request from you and that’s not the way to treat me.”

I pause to take a breath, watching my brother’s eyebrows pulling down. “Second, I didn’t just break up withMax. I think I need a little time away fromyouas well.”

Now, that leaves him speechless. But I don’t wait for the effect to wear off. I’m so sick and tired of all this bullshit and I finally feel like I could put an end to it.

So I turn on my heel and I walk away, heading straight back to my room to pack, take a bath and get out of this stupid lacy underwear. Today at five PM, if he doesn’t like how I look in my regular bra, he can just go fuck himself. He won’t be getting any assistance fromme.

*

I’m worried that we’ll be seen and I don’t want to be right on time, the very thought making me feel pathetic, so it’s at five o’clock that I finally leave my bedroom dressed in the plainest clothes I own. On legs that at least feel shaky, I start making my way to the top of the Tower, wondering what I’ve gotten myself into.

I’ve just broken up an engagement, I haven’t had sex with anyone other than Max in three long years, and, well, I couldn’t exactly be called a pin-up girl. And I won’t even get into my little problem with finishing.

So, in a minute or so, when I find myself alone with him, the guy everyone’s drooling over, the guy who’s a real-life player, how am I supposed to think I won’t be making a fool out of myself?

I’m so out of my depth here.

I keep climbing, but all of a sudden, my mind is flooding with images of him in some imaginary locker room with the boys, laughing at my expense.

The anxiety threatens to make me stop midstep, turn on my heel and leave.

It’s fine, I tell myself, he probably won’t even be there.

But as soon as I enter the rookery, I smell him and I stop midstep.

It’s dark and I can’t see him yet, but I can definitely smell him.

Throwing one last glance at the empty staircase behind me, I gently close the door. And I take a few steps inside, my eyes darting left right, when I sense a presence behind my back and all my muscles tense up.

For a second, I just keep standing there.

Then I roll my eyes, letting out a soft scoff. “You know I can smell you?”

But when I turn around to face him, there’s no one there.

I frown, wondering what the fuck he’s doing.

Then I sense him behind me again and I freeze, my heart starting to pound with a strange thrill.

I hear two soft footsteps. Still, I don’t move, my mind running around in circles.

Until it stops, abruptly.

First I feel the breath on my neck, then the light brush of fingers against my waist, then the heat radiating off him. My spine arches and my body tingles in anticipation, the weight of it growing with every passing second.

Then there are fingertips tucking a lock of hair behind my ear, but they only add to the torture, turning my breathing ragged as they brush down my neck before returning to my waist.

I swallow roughly and I move to turn around, needing more, but that only makes the arms wrap around my waist, keeping me fixed in place. Then they pull me closer, pressing my back against a rock-hard chest and my ass against an equally rock-hard dick. It makes me bite my lip, my heart skipping a beat and my neck arching, offering itself up, shamelessly and eagerly. And the next thing I know, there’s a mouth abusing the sweet spot on it, my breath hitching and my eyes closing as pleasure ripples through my body.

To turn around, I have to break myself free of the arms holding me around the waist. But when I do, I find him standing so close, looking down at me with intense, hooded eyes, one corner of his mouth curled into a smile.

I just stare at him, anything I could say sounding so stupid in my head.

“Well hello,” he whispers, simply, in that hot,hotfucking voice of his, and he moves to pull me closer to him.

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