Page 11 of Promise of Hellfire

Millions of questions ran through my mind, completely unrestrained. I paced back and forth in front of the couch, unable to sit still. The reality of everything was finally sinking in. Until now, everything had been happening too quickly. Yesterday I ran around putting out fires, but today I had time to think about it.

How could I watch Trace burn alive and Libby be shot in the head with zero emotion, but the idea of these women being kept against their will made me feel physically ill?

“When are we going?” I asked.

Dominic leveled a somber look in my direction. “Tomorrow night. With New Year’s Eve, we should be able to blend into the crowd and find some of the answers we’re looking for.”

Chapter six

Hunter

Latethatnight,Ilay in bed by myself, drowning in my emotions. Getting completely drunk seemed like the natural thing to do yesterday after I received the news that Ayers was my father, but it was foolish. I was disgusted with myself for my actions. Between Lexi being missing and Ethan disappearing, I should have been ready for anything to happen.

At least the pounding headache from this morning was gone.

Rayne tiptoed quietly into the room, blending into the shadows. She probably thought I was asleep by now. I’d given everyone an excuse hours ago that I was still tired from the night before and wanted to go to sleep early. Something about being ready for our trip to the Rose the next day. The excuse sounded thin even as it slipped past my lips.

I watched as she shrugged off her clothes and picked up a t-shirt from a pile on top of my dresser. She pulled the shirt over her head before sliding beneath the covers and scooted close to me. The moonlight illuminated her face, hair cascading across her shoulders and down her back. She was tense, and a divot formed between her eyebrows. I rolled onto my side and ran my fingers through her hair, trying to calm whatever thoughts she was having.

Both Ethan and I were broken, and neither of us knew how to put the pieces back together again on our own. There was something about Rayne that seemed to ease the sharpness of those broken parts.

She shifted towards me and stared for several moments, darkness shrouding us. “I’m sorry,” I said, my voice thick with emotion. The shame crashed down on me as I lay beside her. “I shouldn’t have–”

She pressed her lips against mine firmly, but with a gentleness I wasn’t used to. “Shut up,” she whispered. “You don’t get to apologize. I just want you to tell me what’s going through your head right now. What were you thinking yesterday to set this off?”

Her fingers traced my lips as I let her words sink in, and I sighed before closing my eyes.

“I’m thinking about everything I’m doing now, and everything I’ve done to get here. My mother would hate it if she knew the truth. She sacrificed everything to keep me safe and away from this life, and I somehow still ended up here.” I placed my hand over hers, stilling her motions. “She told me she loved Ayers at one time. She pushed him away because of his business associates. More specifically Aldo. Do you know what the fucked up thing is?”

Rayne shook her head at me and I cleared my throat, trying to will away the emotions coursing through me. “She’s still friends with Aldo.” I turned my face from her before I spoke again and my voice came out barely above a whisper. “She could have had everything, and instead, she chose nothing to keep me safe.”

I felt her shift in the bed beside me. “Don’t do this to yourself. You can’t change the past and it wasn’t your decision to make.”

Turning my face back to her, I gave her a sad smile. “I can’t change the past, but I can change the future. I want to be the type of man you deserve. You deserve more than this. More than any of us. All of us are monsters, and I’m sure you want more than this in your life.”

“I’m pretty sure your mother would hate the fact that you’re so caught up in all of this because it’s a fucking mess and the body count keeps rising. I understand if you want to take a step back or maybe your conscience has gotten to you, but you don’t get to tell me what kind of man I want.” She clenched her jaw at me and pushed against my chest. “You don’t get to tell me what I do or don’t deserve, Hunter Nicholson. Especially not after your drunken confession,” she hissed, sitting up straight. “You don’t get to take back what you said. Do you even remember what you told Phillip?”

Shame and sorrow morphed into fury as she spoke and I narrowed my eyes at her. Did I remember what I said? Of fucking course I did. It was the thing I’d been thinking about for weeks. I shifted and pushed her onto her back, trapping her beneath me. “Of course, I remember and I meant every word.” I grabbed her jaw, forcing her to look at my face. “I’m not taking anything back, even if I wanted to. God knows I tried staying away from you, Rayne, maybe even more than Dominic. In the beginning, Ethan followed you around like a lost puppy while Dominic froze you out.”

I lowered my face close to her ear. “The whole time I knew if I spent any more time around you, I would lose myself to you completely. I also knew that once you were safe, you would disappear from our lives forever.” I nipped at her earlobe, rolling my hips against her. “Tell me I’m wrong.”

Despite knowing that she would leave and crush my heart into pieces, I couldn’t stop myself from feeling the way I did. Everything about her was perfect. Her stubbornness. Her pride. Every scar and stretch mark. How she challenged me at every turn.

She dug her nails into my arms and glared at me as emotions washed across her features. She couldn’t deny what I was saying to her, because it was the truth.

How did I know she would leave? Because we were the same. She wouldn’t want to owe anyone anything and didn’t want to feel like a burden. She worked too hard and had too many goals to allow something to stand in her way. Her tone was that of a woman tightly controlling a temper she desperately wanted to release when she spoke. “That might have been true at one point, but you’re wrong about one thing. I’m not leaving. I wouldn’t be able to.” She turned her head away from me and burrowed against my shoulder trying to hide after her heated words.

My breath caught for a moment and my heart stopped. What was she saying? That she would stay here with us even after she was safe? Did she feel the same way about me that I felt about her? I trailed my lips along her shoulder. “What does that mean? I wouldn’t be able to?”

I pulled back from her and searched for any clue as to what she was thinking. She looked at me with wide eyes and bit her lip, lost in thought. I pressed my fingers against the pulse in her neck where it beat furiously.

And just like that, I knew. She was scared to admit how she felt. I wanted to reassure her and force her to say the words to me out loud. I brushed my lips against hers slowly, savoring the moment, licking at the seam and beckoning her to let me inside. She parted her lips, and I took my time exploring with my tongue, slowly delving inside.

This wasn’t like the other times we had been together alone. I wanted to show her everything inside me. All the tenderness and affection. All the shame and sorrow. My struggles. That she was the one for me.

She brushed her hands against my shoulders and wrapped her legs around me, removing any space between our skin. As she rocked her hips against me, her fingers raked along my shoulders and back, scratching across the surface of my skin.

I could feel the control on my desire slipping and I rocked back against her, my cock strained against the lace covering her. “I need you to say it to me,” I murmured against her lips. “Tell me what it means.”

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