Total pages in book: 195
Estimated words: 185573 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 928(@200wpm)___ 742(@250wpm)___ 619(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 185573 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 928(@200wpm)___ 742(@250wpm)___ 619(@300wpm)
My heart aches that I ever could have forgotten. He’s the other half of my soul. And somehow, even when I didn’t know who I was, I found him. I came here, to this place that called me, and I found him.
“Is he okay?” I give voice to my thoughts as I sit up straighter and wipe my tears.
“Who?” Birdie blinks.
“Madden.”
Chapter 82
Madden
—PAST—
“Madden?” Bianca comes to a stop in front of my truck like she can’t believe I’m really here.
My eyes move over her, and regret weighs heavy on my shoulders. She looks like she’s been crying, and I wonder how she got away tonight. What she had to tell Adam to sneak out and meet me like this, and if they fought because of it.
I swallow those notions and stuff them down as I open the door for her. She pauses to look at me as I help her into the truck, and it feels like every memory we’ve ever made lingers between us. I’m the first to break eye contact because I know if I don’t, I’m going to unleash everything I’ve ever wanted to say to her.
I return to the driver’s side, and we sit together in silence for a while before she glances over at me.
“Are you going to talk to me?” she asks.
My stomach sinks at the hopeful note in her voice. I don’t know how the fuck to do this. I don’t know how to tell her that I love her, but I have to let her go.
“Madden, look at me.” Bianca scoots over and pulls my face toward hers, so I have no choice.
It feels like I’m choking on an entire lifetime of pain when I look into her eyes. Those are the eyes I’ve dreamed of since the first time I saw them. The eyes that got me through my bleakest moments and somehow made everything bearable whenever she was near.
“I didn’t mean what I said to you in the hospital,” I tell her.
“I know.” She bobs her head like it was never even a question. Like it’s just so goddamn normal for us to hurt each other this way, she expects nothing else.
“Lilith isn’t my girlfriend either,” I confess. “I’ve never touched her. I never wanted to.”
“Then tell me you’re mine,” Bianca whispers.
“I’ve always been yours,” I admit. “You know that.”
Tears streak down her face as she crawls onto my lap and crushes her mouth against mine.
“Bianca,” I murmur a halfhearted protest against her lips.
“No,” she says under her breath. “Please, Madden. I have to have you now. It’s been so long since I’ve felt you.”
I don’t stop her because I’m an asshole. I’ve always been an asshole when it comes to her, and she will forever be the drug I don’t want to quit, even when I know it’s the best thing for her. So I let her take out my cock, and I groan as she lifts her skirt and sinks over me, taking me straight to my own personal hell.
It’s hell because I don’t know if this is the last time I’ll ever feel her. The last time I’ll ever taste her. If I’ll ever be able to come back to her sober, and even then, if she’ll be ready to light a match and say fuck it all.
“I love you.” She peppers my face with kisses and drags her fingers over my scalp as she tips my head back. “God, I fucking love you so much.”
It’s right there on my lips. The words I’ve never spoken. The ones she deserves, but not from me. I’m not the man she needs as much as she wants to believe it. I can’t be anything to her right now. And yet it doesn’t stop me from indulging in these stolen moments. Taking what isn’t mine to take. It doesn’t stop me from fucking her until I’m ready to black out and then coming inside her like the heathen I am.
She shudders in my arms as she rides out the last waves of her orgasm, soaking up every second of pleasure that she can.
The usual cocktail of self-hatred and regret stirs in my gut, but I can’t bring myself to pull away. Not until she looks into my eyes and hits me with our ice-cold reality.
“Run away with me,” she blurts. “Please, Madden. Take me away. Let’s go right now.”
“Bianca—” I tear my gaze from hers. “You can’t mean that.”
“I do.” Her voice fractures.
When I look at her again, there’s nothing but sincerity in the depths of her eyes. But it doesn’t change anything. If I took her away tonight, she’d resent me by morning for letting her blow up her life. She’d see the worst of me and come to understand that as long as my addiction lives and breathes, this would be a relationship of three—me, her, and the demon on my back.