Page 26 of The Devil's Secret

I shake my head. “No.” I lean over and kiss his knuckles. “I was just thinking stupid stuff.” A bitter laugh escapes me. “Could we sit? The hour will be up soon, and I want to spend a little time with you before you go.”

“Yeah.” He attempts a smile, but it never quite reaches his eyes. Grabbing my hand, he gently squeezes as he leads us to the couch. When I take a seat beside him, his arm rolls under my ass and brings me over his body, my thighs straddling his. His fingertips cruise up and down my hips as he looks deep into my eyes, and my heart—it shatters.

I want you so badly. Every bit of me aches.

“When we’re together,” he says. “My lap is your permanent seat.”

I force a grin. The way he stares at me, it’s like his entire face brightens. It’s like I’m the only woman on earth who could ever steal his heart away. That I’m his already. That nothing matters. But it does. It all matters. And I hate it.

Why do I have to meet him when my world is in ruins? Why is the universe trying to punish me more? Haven’t I been through enough? Why dangle him right in front of me, only to take him away?

“Well, I much prefer to sit elsewhere.” I tease away the pain boring a hole in my chest.

He pops a brow as I stare down at him—all man, the masculinity and power dripping from every pore. His hand reaches for my neck, his fingers crawling up until he cradles my jaw with a commanding grip.

“Try it, Joelle.” The darkness from his tone oozes with an erotic undercurrent.

“I don’t want to,” I whisper, my heart skittering with quickened beats.

“That’s my girl.”

His girl.I almost burst into tears. It means so much to me and he doesn’t even know it.

He glides his knuckles softly down my cheek. “You’re so beautiful.”

My heart squeezes, an ache forming behind my eyes. How I wish we were normal. Two people falling for each other. But that is not our fate, and it may never be.

I palm the side of his face, wanting my hands everywhere, to discover all his hidden secrets. The ones I know he has.

We all have them.

But for some of us, they’re filled with too much obscurity, seething into the wounds we carry in silence.

CHAPTEREIGHT

JOELLE

“Wake the fuck up,”someone yells, the male voice distant, cutting through the fog of sleep draping over me.

I groan, my face still planted on the pillow, burrowing further.This is a stupid dream. I want to go back to bed.

“I said wake up, you lazy bitch!” a man roars, his hand on my arm, fingers roughing into my skin, my heart beating so fast, it climbs up my throat.

As the stranger yanks at my hair, dragging me out of bed, I realize this isn’t a dream at all, but a very real nightmare.

I let out a scream into the shadows, the walls caging my cries, my hands fighting as I fall to the ground, knees slamming into the tiles with scorching pain.

“Be careful,” someone else says from behind us, turning on my bedside lamp. “If she breaks a bone, Faro is gonna kill you.”

“Yeah, yeah.” He hauls me up to my feet by my arm, and I discover a brown-haired man, around my age, his eyes small and round, his height towering over me. “See, she’s in one piece. Isn’t that right?” he asks with a sinister chuckle.

“What is this?” I muster out the question, my legs and scalp aching.

“The boss wants to see you. You have two seconds to put on your shoes.”

“I need to get dressed first.” I run my hands up my bare thighs, my pajama shorts riding up my behind. “Could I get some pants at least? I’m only in a tank top.”

He snickers. “Yeah, and no bra.” His eyes zero in on my nipples.

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