Page 92 of Blackwood

Monroe leans back. “Then stop spiraling. Let them try. Let yourself try.”

I glance toward the window where the skyline’s half-blurred in summer haze. “Maybe I will.”

“And Bella?”

“Yeah?”

“If you get shot because you were distracted by anyone’s mouth again, I’m calling your whole team in for a group session.”

I groan. “You’re the worst.”

“You say that,” Monroe says, already reaching for his next form, “and yet you’ll be back next week.”

Chapter 31

BELLA

Rosethorne Mansion - Wexley University

576 Days Since Zeke’s Death

Cade’s mouth is on me like he’s ravenous, but not reckless. No, this is slow, focused, delicious torture. The kind that says he’s waited for this. His hands grip my thighs like they’re his, like he’s staking a claim he’s been dying to make since our first coffee-non-date, or maybe even Nashville.

My back arches off the bed, a strangled gasp slipping out, “Cade…”

He groans against me, sending a tremor through my core that feels like a breaking point.

We’ve been testing the edges of this thing, testing us, before he brings Lex into the picture. And I still can’t believe I’m even saying that. I’m dating a guy with the hope of eventually adding another one.

At first, the whole throuple situation scared the shit out of me. But I’d be lying if I said I’m not excited about the possibility of it now.

But when it’s Cade, when it’s this? God, it almost feels inevitable.

So many nights tangled in rooftop conversations and late-night texts. So many coffees and dinners and inside jokes that go back years.

He knows my sarcasm. My coffee order. The way I hum when I’m thinking too hard and chew pens when I’m anxious. He knows the version of me that fit neatly into their family orbit, but not the parts that shattered and rebuilt themselves after.

He doesn’t know about Dylan. Or the Black Books. Or Zeke, fully. Or what I really do after dance practice. To him, I’m just the girl from a bad foster situation with a dead brother and a past I don’t talk about. A girl who loves to dance. A girl he wants to spoil. Protect. Worship.

Cade is the sweetest. He carries the conversation like a pro. Opens doors. Sends playlists. Shows up with daisies and asks how practice went like it’s the most important question in the world.

He remembers things, like how I used to steal his hoodies and fall asleep on the Whitmore’s couch after too much sugar and too little sleep. How I always hated mornings but somehow never missed a single dance class. How I once made Ellie a glitter bomb that exploded in his car and he didn’t speak to us for a week.

He remembersme,even the messy, chaotic, glitter-coated parts.

And right now, he’s driving me insane in the best way possible.

I cry out as the pressure inside me fractures, sharp, aching, and unbearable. My fingers claw through his chestnut brown hair, anchoring me to something real, something solid, while the rest of me unravels beneath his mouth.

He doesn’t let up. His tongue strokes slow, then fast—circling, teasing, plunging—until I’m trembling, legs shaking, breath stuttering in broken gasps.

The smell of cedar and ink wraps around me, thick and addictive. It fills my lungs, clings to my skin, and marks me as his. I breathe him in and fall apart for him, again and again, until I’m not even sure where I end and he begins.

He groans against me like the taste of me is his only religion and this is the altar where he worships. Cade’s hands grip my thighs like he needs to keep me there, needs to own every inch of my surrender. And he does. God, he does.

He wraps his lips around my clit and sucks hard before thrusting two fingers deep inside me, curling them upward.

“Fuck! Cade, oh!” I cry out, falling apart, my body shuddering as my orgasm rips through me. My thighs clamp around his head and he holds me there, mouth still moving—like he lives for the way I break apart just for him.