Page 45 of Ambition

I jerk her hips closer to mine, blood rushing to my groin as her breasts skim my core. It hurts, but I don’t fucking care. My pulse is pounding fast, my eyes are wide, I’m so fucking alive with anger, it doesn’t matter. I tilt my head and dip my face, my lips brushing hers.

“For you,Isadora.” I bite her bottom lip, unable to hold back as I pull it between us and her fingers curl in my hair, apparently finding that an acceptable spot to grip me as she rolls her hips over me, like she can’t help it, and right now, I don’t want her to. “Everything is always for you.” I kiss her again, savoring the way she tastes, fresh and clean andangry,too, with how her teeth clash with mine.

She twists and yanks my hair between her fingers, her breasts pressing to my chest, my body lighting like a glow map of pain, but I don’t care.

“But I didn’t want you to,” she hisses between kisses, her forehead pressed to mine as we breathe each other’s air. “I didn’t want you to do this for me.”

“I don’t care what you want, if it means I protect you,” I say coldly, my eyes on hers as our chests heave and I try not to black out again. I slide my hands more fully over her ass, squeezing so tightly she bites her bottom lip. “So get mad. Hate me if you have to, but I will do it again, and again. I will sabotage every assignment of yours if it means you’re fucking someone who could hurt you.”

She rolls her hips again, dry fucking me right here on the mats, a groan caught up in my throat as she does. She wraps her arms around the back of my neck, her nose grazing mine. “You are so fucking dumb,” she hisses.“Youdon’t even want to fuck me.”

“Yeah?” My eyes feel heavy as I stare down at her. “But you’re still going to try, aren’t you? Are you that desperate? You want to ride me while Cain watches because you think that will make you some kind of fucking professional? Is that what you were doing letting me touch you yesterday? Getting used to your newcareer?”

She licks her tongue over my mouth, following through by lifting her chin and glaring down at me. But instead of biting back, instead of cutting me down like I expect, she asks, “Why don’t you want me, anymore than to fuck with me, like yesterday? You don’t want anyone else to have me, you will fight for me, kill for me, get yourself busted up for me, and pity fuck me, but you don’t want me either.Why?”

I don’t answer for a moment as my pulse ricochets through my body, both of us still chasing our breath; anger and lust and confusion warring between us.

Then I tug her hips closer, shifting her over my cock, forcing her to ride me as I stare at her. A breathy moan leaves her lips and her eyes flash, but she doesn’t resist my guidance.

“I can’t stand when you walk away,” I tell her, and I mean it. The words hurt more, in some ways, than the contusions. It’s hard, being so fucking vulnerable with her and I don’t even know why. “I can’t have you one night and let you go the next morning.I want to fucking own you like you have always owned me.”

“Show her.” It’s Cain’s voice, not Isa’s.

I don’t stop guiding her hips over me, my cock growing impossibly harder as I watch Isa’s pupils widen, edging out the darkness of her irises. It’s hard to breathe, my body a roadmap of pain, but I want to claim her more than I want rest or relief. Despite what I said, the cold words I spoke to her moments ago about not wanting her, I want to fuck her in front of Cain so he can let everyone know that Isadora Croft belongs tome.I hope Cosmo told everyone the same thing.

“Show her what that means,” Cain reiterates.

“He can’t, becauseno oneowns me,” she says, refusing to let two men speak for her. Something I fucking love about her, but it drives me crazy too.

I release her hips and dart one hand to wrap around her throat, covering the hickeys Theo left behind. I dive my other hand down the front of her sweats, into her underwear, my middle finger brushing over her clit.

“Yeah?” I taunt her as a shallow gasp leaves her lips. But she doesn’t stop me because she is such a perfect girl. Her eyes glaze over as I slide my fingers lower, slipping them beneath her, searching for her tight hole. I feel how wet she is, and it doesn’t take much to curl my index finger inside her as I tighten my hold softly on her throat. I lift my chin and gaze down at her as her eyes close for one second before she’s looking at me again. “No one, huh?”

Her nostrils flare, her arms tightening around my neck. We are both so close to each other but still not close enough for me. I want to climb inside her, invade every inch of her, claw through each cell and leave my name on them. Ever since I was old enough to know desire, I have felt a pull toward her. She was my first everything and none of the rest matters to me. And when I saw that guard on Halloween night, dead at her hands, I only wanted her more. The rest of Writhe wanted to shield her, thought maybe she was fucked up because of it, but that shit turned me on. And learning two nights ago it was forme?

Yeah. There’s no way I’m fucking letting her go.

She cradles my heart in her hands and I would do anything for her to close her fist around it and keep me.

She rides my finger and I push another one in, groaning at how tight she squeezes me. “Von,” she says, her voice breathy, her eyes closed once more. “I am not…” She drops her forehead to mine, so her next words dance over my parted lips. “I am not yours.”

I push the heel of my hand against her clit, grinding my palm on her as I finger fuck her just like I did on the couch. She fucking lives for this shit. It’s physically hard to do, considering the confinement of her sweats and her underwear. My wrist isaching,bones crunching, the back of my hand and my knuckles inflamed, but I want her to stop saying stupid shit like that. I want her to…give in.

I lick at her bottom lip, savoring the taste of her. “You are,” I whisper against her mouth. “You have always been.”

I know she is strong, and fierce, and smart, and collected. She watches me with greedy eyes when I leave for a job, examines me even more when I return and methodically cook for us, because it calms my nerves and I like to take care of her. I’ve seen her notepads, journal entries, the tin under her bed with my stupid refrigerator notes. I know she hates doingresearch,as Writhe calls it, but she does it all the same. She mapped out the hierarchy of over one hundred syndicates and societies on the East Coast, and it was so detailed, full of accuracy, that Writhe’s president had it printed into a disguised pamphlet that he distributed to every member of Writhe. She does not half-ass any task, but she always wantsso much more.

Ambition.

She isn’t lacking it. But maybe she doesn’t understand I have the same quality, for a different aim.

Her.

“No,” she says, moaning the word like she hates fighting me but she cannot give in. “You do…you do stupid things for me. Let me be… my own person, Von.”

With effort, I push another finger into her, stretching her around me as I grind my palm against her clit in circles and she rotates her hips, lowering down so her entrance hits against my first knuckles. I am so fucking deep inside of her, but it’s not enough. I would crawl out of my skin to live in hers.

I kiss her then, running my bottom lip over her top one. But she pulls away slightly, only to quickly lean forward again and press her forehead to mine. She forces her gaze open, staring at me with sleepy eyes, her breaths little pants as she letsmedo all of the work now, her arms still wrapped around my neck.

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