Page 1 of Claiming Pretty

THE WARDEN

Ifollowed Ava into my father’s secret Blackthorn laboratory, my nerves stretched taut, every instinct on edge as I braced for whatever secrets this place held.

The sconces flickered to life, their faint yellow glow barely cutting through the heavy shadows that clung to the room. The air was dense, choking, thick with the sharp tang of chemicals mingled with a sickly-sweet musk I knew too well.

Ava was ahead of me, but she was just out of reach, her shoulders tense as she moved silently between the workbenches.

Her silence was heavier than the room itself.

But I could tell she could feel my presence behind her, just like Ifelther all around me—on my lips, in my arms, around my cock, the memory of her all-consuming heat lingering like an ache.

Ava’s guilt radiated so strongly from her it felt like itseeped into my bones. She was already pulling away, turning into a ghost before my eyes.

A kiss had turned into sex. No therapy to mask it, no punishment to justify it. Just raw, unfiltered need.

She’d kissed me.

She’dbeggedme to fuck her.

No matter how much guilt clouded her eyes now, no matter how much she tried to pretend it didn’t happen, I knew it meant something.

Avafeltsomething for me.

Maybe it wasn’t the same as what she felt for Ciaran. Her heart still ached for my brother.

And she still hated me. How could she not?

After everything I’d put her through, everything I’d done in the name of saving her.

But something had shifted. There was a crack in the wall she kept between us, and I could feel it.

There wassomethingthere between us now, buried beneath her anger and the hatred. A thread, fragile but real, connecting us.

Something that wasours.

And that was a start.

A spark was all it took to envelop a forest with wildfire. There was a spark between Ava and me. All I had to do was fan it.

I wouldn’t give up now. I couldn’t.

I’d sacrificed too much, risked too much, to lose her now. Even if it meant I had to break my own brother’s heart.

I tried to steel myself against the flood of guilt that threatened to drag me under every time I thought abouthurting Ciaran—and how I’d have to destroy him to have her.

My own flesh and blood. My brother. My twin. My mirror. The other half of me.

But she was more important thananything.

No matter how far I had to go, no matter what lines I had to cross, I’d make her see that she was mine.

I clenched my fists, forcing the guilt down, burying it deep where it couldn’t reach me. This wasn’t a battle I’d lose. Not to Ciaran. He’d crossed that line first.

He’d sworn to protect her, to keep her safe—but never to touch her.

She was mine. She’d always been mine.

But he’d stolen her anyway, justifying it because he thought I was dead.

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