Total pages in book: 141
Estimated words: 134531 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 673(@200wpm)___ 538(@250wpm)___ 448(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 134531 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 673(@200wpm)___ 538(@250wpm)___ 448(@300wpm)
In the house that my friends had given me.
Given me.
I was alive, breathing. I was divorced.
Yeah, things were not bad. Objectively, things were wonderful.
Still I needed to pick at things, it seemed. I needed to open the wound.
“I’m fucked-up, babe,” Swiss dragged a hand down his face. “That’s not gonna change. Even someone like you cannot change that. So I imagine I’ll still need a fair bit of kink when I fuck you… Though if what we just did was vanilla, I’m content with that.” He continued stroking my arm.
“That was certainly not vanilla,” I replied.
He chuckled. It was low and throaty and warm.
“I know that seeing me like… that did something to you,” I whispered. “Changed something. But I also need you to know that even after that, especially after that, I want you to mark me. I don’t want you to be afraid of hurting me.” I bit my lip, moving to position myself so my elbow was on his chest, propping me up to look him in the eye. “I need you to hurt me,” I confessed. “Your marks on my body are ones I’ll wear with pride. Because if you haven’t noticed, I’m a little fucked-up too.” I smiled softly.
Swiss did not smile back.
“I’m sure I’ll get to the point where I enjoy that again,” he reached up to brush the hair from my face. “Where seein’ you writhe in pain and pleasure makes my cock explode.”
I shivered in expectation and excitement. I was hungry for that, for a different kind of pain. But maybe I was being a little hasty, wanting that from him when I was barely healed.
“Besides that, it’s my job, the one I take really fuckin’ seriously, to give you what you need.” He rubbed his thumb along my bottom lip.
His hand ghosted downward, to my neck, which had returned to its regular coloring.
“But I will never put my hands around here again,” he vowed, eyes displaying the conviction in his words. “I’ve needed to taste death when I come. A woman’s death. ’Cause of my past. ’Cause I like to torture myself.” His eyes shimmered. “But, Kate, I didn’t just taste your death. I had to swallow it whole. Now it’s inside of me. And the only thing I need when I’m fuckin’ you is to know you’re alive.” He laid his palm on my chest. “To feel the life inside of you.”
My heart thundered underneath his hand. I swallowed roughly. “Did you mean it?” I asked in a meek voice.
“Everything I say I mean to you, Kate,” Swiss replied soberly. “But what in particular are you talkin’ about?”
I drew circles on his chest, tracing over the raised skin of my mark.
“About marriage,” I said. “Ours.”
Swiss stilled. I glanced back up at him.
“Fuck yes, I meant it,” he murmured, taking my hand to lift it to his lips.
“I understand if you need some time,” he hedged. “Considerin’ you’ve been someone else’s wife since you were a teenager.”
His voice changed at the brief mention of Preston. Preston, who had seemingly been released from wherever they had been keeping him. Preston, who I hadn’t seen hide nor hair of since he was strangling me to death.
I assumed he’d made it back to our former home, and I wondered idly how he’d explained the injuries he no doubt left with. How he’d explained my absence.
But I didn’t wonder about that for long. He wasn’t my problem anymore.
I did have a pang in my heart thinking about his parents, who were the closest thing I had to a mother and father. Who I likely would never see again. Who very likely hated me because of whatever lies Preston no doubt spun about me in order to come out the hero in the story.
But I didn’t want a hero.
I certainly didn’t want to learn what my life would be without the villain who saved me from the man everyone thought was a hero.
“I don’t need time,” I declared suddenly. “I want to be your wife.”
He jerked. Literally jerked with emotion. Emotion so visceral it hit his body. Made impact.
“Thank fuck,” he murmured. “I’ve been waitin’ all my life for you, and although I would’ve survived waitin’ a little longer to marry you, I would’ve been an ornery bastard to everyone else. Someone would’ve definitely gotten stabbed.”
“Well, we can’t have that,” I grinned.
We were silent for a while, bathing in the happiness that was infusing the air.
“What do you want for a wedding?” Swiss asked eventually. “I imagine no one asked you that the first time around.”
I let out a chuckle. “No, they did not.”
I didn’t choose the location. The date. The guest list. Or even my dress. Everything was planned around the child growing inside me and the image that Preston’s parents wanted to portray.
It hadn’t bothered me much, people making decisions for me about the ‘most important day in my life’.