Page 4 of The Last Time You Break Me

“Keep telling yourself that, because one of these days, Ramero... I’m going to be long gone. I know what I feel. I know how I feel when I’m around you. But it’s you who continues to lie. And here I was thinking real men do no such thing.” He flew across the room, and a hand fisted in my long locks as he backed me into a wall. My head arched, meeting his defiant eyes with my own, and dared him to counter that. “This is the last time you break me,” I declared. My voice filled with venom. My only tool of defense.

“Break you? Little girl, I haven’t even begun to play with you.” He chuckled darkly. Gray eyes ablaze in something malevolent. You think you want this? Want me?” he breathed. Harsh and warm breath drifted down onto me like a warm breeze. It sent tendrils of my dirty blonde hair over my shoulder, to fall down my back. He leaned in with thick lips that whispered against mine as he smeared the dead man’s blood along the seam of them. “I’d destroy this pretty heart of yours. This world would swallow you whole and spit you out in pieces. You don’t even know what it is to be a woman, so why, do you think I’d ever want to become your man?” The question struck me. But I remained unmoving. Unblinking as I shut down myemotions and deadpanned his dead man walking’s ass right back.

He wouldn’t break me.

I wouldn’t allow it.

I may not have had the proper training to join the ranks with the Wyelli’s, but something broke inside me the day I was born. It opened a portal for a depraved kind of darkness to consume me. To filter through me.

They were too caught up in their own shit to even notice just how wrong I was.

Just how heartless when that darkness took hold. They didn’t even see it when it crept in and took over. They never saw it at all. So it often left me wondering… Do they even see me?

They overlooked how smart and cunning I was.

How wicked and violent.

How great I would be used as a weapon and not as a delicate wallflower.

Yeah, those around me had no idea just who I was or what I could do.

“You’re right, Ramero. I was playing silly games. It will never happen again.” I gave him what I thought he wanted but instead, something dark and frenzied skated through his gaze. They darkened like burning gold as he shook his head and barked out a laugh filled with disbelief. “I mean want you? Want what? To kiss cold lips that make me feel nothing?” he roared as he closed the small distance between us and my back hit the wall with a thud.

My scalp burned as he pulled even harder, brutal lips crashed down on mine as he kissed me.

Punished me.

Tormented me.

Set my lips aflame within a wildfire that left its mark.

He made me pay for my sinful cravings with that kiss.

I moaned, purring and panting under his control and I hated myself for being so weak. His thick thigh pressed between mine, his knee firm against my aching core as I rode him without shame. My clit was seeking the attention it had burned for all these years.

The second I touched him and pulled at the strands of his black and curled hair, clawed my nails across his shoulders, and ripped my way through his shirt, he dropped me like a dead weight and pulled away.

He left me weak and I almost fell to the ground but caught myself on the wall as my body churned with need. He looked back at me—disheveled, frantic, and untamed. A rough hand wiped across his stubbled jaw and he turned his back on me, stomping toward the door before he turned around once again and uttered, “Absolutely nothing.” He stalled, his stare intense as he added, “Don’t be so quick to join the life that will destroy you, princess. You have the chance to fight to be freed from the weight of the crown.” Then he almost took my door off its hinges as he slammed it and walked away from me.

It cemented our fates.

It hardened my resolve.

I blinked unfeeling eyes as wasteful tears fell. Tears I no longer felt.

Because I no longer felt anything. Darkness, my old friend, had once again come to say hello.

The only thing I felt right now was absolute clarity.

It was time to join the family.

Because it was the crown I wanted most.

Chapter One

Lara

Wicked Way - Halestorm

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