Page 35 of Tempted By Poison

My chest tingles from it because it didn’t feel like just a fuck—no, this was something different, something more magnetic than my body can explain. It was...

It was the most pleasant, most deranged thing I have ever felt.

Being inside of her was like standing in the freezing cold for years, only to finally find a hut with a warm fire, safety, and comfort.

I have never cuddled with a woman before. I didn’t see the point, and I never understood the gist of it—laying with someone else and purposely allowing yourself to become heated like a furnace. But as I laid with her, I realized it’s more than that. My throat tightens as I shift in the lounge chair.

Iunderstandwhat they mean and what theyfeel. To have her next to me so closely in that way...it’s dangerous, and I'll accept it. I'm not holding back.

Last night was such a pile of emotions. The shit with Victor had my mind so fucked and discombobulated that I felt...like a failure—again. Then I opened up to her more than once. I’ve never done that, only when my mother was alive, and she was that safety net I had. And I haven’t experienced that since.

Until last night. Anita allowed me to feel safe and to be...open without judgment. She saw my scars and wasn’t recoiling in detest; she cried for me, and for some reason, it turned me on so goddamn much. For someone likeher, a woman who hated me, a woman with the hardest shell to cry and acknowledge my pain.

She kissed my marks and made me see I don’t have to hate myself. I only need to accept myself. I close my eyes slowly, dwelling on the gentle kiss she applied to my marred skin while I was waking up, kissing the wounds, and the last part of me that makes me who I am.

Maybe it’s why I came so hard that my soul split from my vessel.

I hope Carter doesn’t hate me.

I now sit in the corner of the room, hands clasped up to my chin, only a few feet from the bed where she sleeps soundly. Watching her. Her light breathing with the glow of the waning moon bursting over her gorgeous skin from the overhead window. The cover fits under her arm, revealing a perfectly curved collarbone with bruising from my teeth marks on her and the dent lining down to her breast. My eyes sketch out her body, perfect in every way, even through all the fucked up shit and hard exterior. Underneath lies a different kind of interior.

I want it all, her good, bad, ugly, the rawness of her, the skeletons she chose to lock in the closet. The demons she forces to keep at bay, but I'll be the one to stoke the fire, set the circle, and summon the bastards. We’ll burn them down together, wreak havoc like a chaotic duo ready to blaze to glory. I’ll bust through that shit and kick out all the brittle bones. Consuming them with my own body and darkness. Becoming one.

I need to know more about her. How did she get into this world? What happened to her father? I already knew he had a military background, but did he do this to her? Did he make her this beautiful, dangerous person?

I let out a silent breath before flipping open the laptop sitting on the coffee table. The reason I got up in the first place is to ensure Bedford sent me exactly what I asked for. I adjust the laptop to get a clear view on the glowing screen. A soft moan skirts from in front of me, and I freeze mid-finger. Anita stirs under the plush covers, bringing them over her shoulder, tugging them lightly to her neck. She doesn’t wake, but I listen to her slow breathing, like a soothing melody. Her wild, curly hair mushed around her slender face, her golden-brown skin resembling cream that you’ll beg to smear all over your body until the entire container is empty.

She’s so fucking beautiful.

A thickening lifts between my thighs.Not now.So, I grit my teeth and focus back on the screen, patting my hardening cock down like a tempered dog.

In the midst of the gun fire Bedford scanned a facial recognition on everyone who was in that office, leading me to the man of the hour.

Jax.

I tap my finger into the key and up pops his picture. A picture from when he served in the military. They recruited him, and then he served as a secret agent. From there it’s blank. Only an honorable discharge. Nothing aboutwhatexactly caused his discharge.

What the fuck? My face dulls. If I had the moral capacity, I would give a shit about his life path, but I don’t.

“Here we go,” I mutter, clicking on the data, my eyes gliding up at the beauty before me, making sure that my quiet words alone didn’t wake her.

Nothing.

I skate my eyes back down to the digits and map, zooming into a location. A home address. I’ll be seeing you tomorrow, right when you least expect it. If he cares about his life the least bit, then he’ll come through with the location of the kids. I do have the GPS tracking Victor’s every single move. I can blast a hole into his entire corrupt corporation and blow the entire thing into smithereens—along with parts of his body. But he’s a nuisance to me at this point. Irrelevant. Like I wasn’t even seeking blood from his death to begin with.

The kids are more important.Muchmore relevant.

I press the key, revealing what I need. Bedford always comes through. In the back of my mind, I make note to add those two bonuses in his Christmas payout.

Oh, shit.

Christmas. School. Another week. I grit my teeth even harder as I remember the kids petitioning for a Winter Christmas dance. Something that I relentlessly promised to them to make them feel what’s the word? ‘Normal.’

Fuck that winter wonderland dance. There are bigger things at hand. I don’t have the time to maneuver around rescuing kids, getting to Victor before he tries another sick stunt, while also preparing an entire school and chaperoning a dance.

You’ll disappoint them.

They’ll be fine; we don’t get through life expecting everything to go the way it was supposed to.

---