Page 35 of Hostile King

And that’s what I do.

I clamp her wrists and pin her reluctant body against mine. Her flushed cheeks wear patches of smeared blood, so pretty and chaotic.

“Enough,” I snarl, the primal urge to fully claim her taking over.

“Get off me…” She shoves her body weight into me. “Let me go!”

“It’s too late for that, Carina. You came back into my life for a third and final time.” A wildfire of power charges through me when she licks her lips.

With as much force as she can muster, she yanks her hands hard and breaks away, simultaneously wobbling on pencil thin heels. “I had no choice!” Our hungry gazes never waver. “Your brother took me to Mag Mell, because your mother thought I deserved her time. I’ve been in some mystical Irish paradise for days.

“And you know what, I don’t feel guilty for what I did to that bastard, even if your bullet killed him, mine was meant to do the same. I was always the misfit until I found you. I pickedyou.” Her voice trembles. “But…this is the end of it. I’ll never be anyone's second best,” she pants. “Let me go, Tomás.”

Carina sways, her palms skimming the fractured mirror in a bid to steady herself. “Shit!” she curses.

I stagger a few steps, my eyes drinking in the fresh gash lining the heel of her hand. Her lacey cleavage rises as blood drips to the debris scattered underfoot, then she swallows and looks up at me with an uncertain crease in her forehead.

Prowling into her space so we suck in the same hot air, I snare her delicate wrist and inspect the crimson cut to check for lodged particles.

“You’re not afraid of me.” I point out. “You never have been.”

She tugs her hand away and holds it close to her chest. “For some reason, I trusted you, like no one else. I stupidly believed your dark veneer the world sees was translucent to me. But now I don't trust you anymore, Tomás.”

Corruption inches over me, a weighty curtain to suffocate what decency I have left, and to tip the scales of my integrity. I do my best to trap the violence hissing through my veins. She bites her lower lip as if she's said too much, then runs her gaze over my bare chest. I can't deny how the red tracks trickling down her arm doesn’t make me tingle all over.

It’s not the usual feathered hostility that consumes me. It’s blinding lust. A palpable hunger that her trembling body reciprocates with every quick sip of oxygen she takes.

I want this woman more than I’ve wanted anything in my life. Carina’s throat works as we stand in silence, waiting for the fallout of her blood meeting my skin. So, I give in to my urges and listen to the fine-tuned instincts that have served me well so far.

It’s a calculated risk. A heart-stopping act to prove she’s my personal anchor.

I slap her bloodied palm to my bare chest, clench my jaw tight, and press my hands over top so she can feel the erratic rhythm of my thumping heart. Runny blood sticks to my prickled flesh, glossy and warm. My lungs stutter at the exact moment her pupils flare.

Our furious gazes clash like lethal blades, mine slicing through her shocked expression. The twitch in my jaw warns her of the untamed beast within me grappling to break out of the underworld.

“You…are…mine,” I manage to spit out with burning lungs. “My hell is better with you in it. Those people out there…” The mist descends. “…can go to fucking Hell.”

10

CARINA

He pierces me with an unraveling stare. The undeniable glare of a man transforming into darkness.

His head cocks and his muscles visibly vibrate. I suck in a tattered breath, conceding to his unyielding posture.

Chills scurry from the roots in my scalp to my painted toenails. I’m on fire. An absurd reaction to a gruesome declaration of ownership and frozen under an avalanche of apprehension.

He could fuck me or kill me.

Or both.

Syrupy blood sticks to his smooth chest beneath my trapped hand he refuses to let go of—or can’t.

The psychological battle to retain control of his mind is evident from pitch black pupils engulfing moonless irises. They widen like mesmerizing holes of perpetual wickedness. I wince when he snarls, grappling with the stinging sensation of a raw wound clutched tight to his feverish flesh.

An unbreakable chain lassos his volatile mood to keep him in check, even though he’s taken the stance of a ruling predator ready to destroy. Sweat glistens on his temples, his lungs expand with a ragged motion, and his jaw works as his teeth clench the declaration to dust.

We gaze at each other for the longest, most painful moment. It gives us a transient truce wherein I cherish the man I’ve fallen for and resent the egotistical beast who threw my devotion away.

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