Page 32 of Cruel When He Smiles (Sinners of Blackthorne U #3)

Liam’s breath shudders out of him like I just gave him permission to destroy. His hands slide up my stomach again, then across my chest, fingers grazing the lines of muscle until I’m shaking for a different reason.

He bites my shoulder hard, and I gasp, hips jerking back into his, my eyes fluttering half-closed before I catch myself. “No. Keep them open,” he says and tugs my shorts down, lips brushing down my spine with obscene control. “I want you to remember exactly who fucked the pain out of you.”

And when his hand wraps around my throat again, when he lifts my face to the mirror, I believe him.

I believe I’ll forget every goddamn thing except this. I see it all in the mirror. His reflection behind mine. His eyes dark, mouth parted as if he’s restraining something with teeth. The way he holds me looks like ownership, and I’m letting him own me.

“Say it again,” he breathes against my ear. “What do you want, Nathaniel?”

My knuckles whiten against the mirror at his use of my full name. “To forget.”

He hums. “And what are you willing to give me for that?”

“Everything,” I whisper. And I mean it. Fuck, I mean it. I’d let him hollow me out if it meant scraping this feeling from my ribs. “I’ll give you everything.”

“There’s a good boy. Let me make you forget your best friend betrayed you.”

I bite down on a sob, but he feels it. I know he does. He grabs my hair, yanks my head back again, and forces my eyes to the glass. “Eyes on me,” he snarls. “You wanted to be hollow? I’ll empty you out.”

His words hit deeper than his cock ever could, and the fucked-up thing is, they work. Liam knows how to use pain like a balm—to make filth feel holy.

I bite down on a groan and brace myself harder, palms flat, muscles locking. I can’t stop staring. Can’t stop watching myself in the mirror—watching him, standing behind me like a sin in a T-shirt, untouched and composed while I’m being taken apart in slow, brutal pieces.

“Do it,” I whisper, my voice barely holding shape. “Fuck—I can’t… just—do it, please.”

He makes a quiet sound, a pleased hum deep in his chest. “I’m not prepping you soft,” he says. “This isn’t about romance. You don’t want sweet.”

I shake my head, throat tight. “No. I want it to hurt.”

He grips my hips and pulls, bending me forward so my chest brushes the cooling glass.

My pulse is still thundering, my body still trying to process what just happened, when he spits in his hand and presses his slick fingers against me, sliding one in without fanfare, slow and deep, watching my reaction in the mirror with quiet focus.

I bite down on my lip hard enough to sting, arching into it before I can stop myself.

“You want more?”

I nod.

“Words, Pup.”

“Yes,” I breathe. “More, please.”

He hums and bites my neck. “Reach around into my pocket and grab the packet of lube. As much as I want to do this rough, I’m not letting you get hurt and bleed all over my cock.”

So, that’s what he grabbed in that room.

I’m half bent over the mirror, skin tacky with sweat, when I fumble behind me with a shaking hand.

Liam doesn’t help and doesn’t guide me. He just watches with his fingers still buried inside me.

The moment I find it—that familiar crinkle of foil between my fingers—he curls his finger just right, and my whole body jolts.

I gasp, almost drop it, glaring at him in the mirror before I hand it back to him, my breathing still uneven, my body already wrung out but begging for more. He takes it from me with a soft, approving noise.

“Good boy,” he murmurs again, too close to my ear, too fucking satisfied with how easily those words ruin me.

I hear the packet tear and feel the slick, cool press of lube against my already-sensitive skin.

His fingers return with purpose now—two this time, scissoring me open with practiced pressure. I suck in a breath, shaky and broken, the stretch hitting too fast, too much, but exactly what I asked for. What I begged for.

“You take me so well when you’re in pain,” Liam says, not even trying to hide the dark affection curling around the edges of his voice. “Bet you’d have been even better if I’d fucked you the night you begged me in the parking lot.”

I groan, forehead pressing harder to the mirror.

“I remember how you looked at me. Drunk off defiance, mouth red and eyes sharp. You said you hated me with your lips, but your body said something else entirely.”

His fingers crook deep inside me, and I cry out.

“God, you make the prettiest fucking noises,” he says, dragging his hand away to undo his own pants. I hear the sound, and I go still, too aware of what comes next.

He presses the head of his cock against me, just enough for me to feel the weight of it, the heat, the unspoken promise that everything will hurt exactly how I want it to.

“I’m going to fuck you now,” he says against the shell of my ear.

“But you’re going to keep your eyes on the mirror.

You’re going to watch what I make of you. Can you do that? Use your words.”

“Yes.”

He closes his eyes and moans, tilting his head back. My body jerks instinctively, and his hands grab my hips again, pulling me back toward him until I feel the press of him, hot and thick against the curve of my ass.

“You sure?” he asks. “I don’t have protection, Pup.”

I nod, but he doesn’t move.

“Nate.”

I swallow hard. “Yes, I’m sure. Just fuck me, you goddamn stalker. You already know my results, anyway.”

I catch his grin and know that’s all he needs.

He pushes in with a groan that vibrates in his chest, the first genuine sound he’s made that isn’t a command. I gasp as he stretches me, my body adjusting around him. His hands grip my hips even tighter, and when he’s halfway in, we both go still.

I groan—half pain, half more.

“Shit—fuck, Liam—”

“Breathe,” he says, soothing and dark, like it’s nothing to him. Like this isn’t wrecking me from the inside out. “You can take it. You want to take it. Be a good boy and open up.”

I relax just enough to let him bottom out, my knees shaking, and thighs trembling from the force of keeping myself upright. I feel full—too full. Every nerve ending burns, and when his hips finally meet my ass, I choke on a sound I barely recognize.

Liam exhales hard behind me. “You feel that?” he whispers against my ear. “That stretch? That ache? I want you sore, baby. Every time you sit in class, every time you try to focus, I want you to remember how I made you forget him.”

“Please,” I whisper.

I don’t even know what I’m asking for, but he gives it to me.

His hips snap forward without warning, just once, hard and deep, and I cry out, forehead thunking against the mirror. He does it again. Then again. Building a rhythm designed to wreck, slamming into me with punishing control, no hesitation, no faltering.

And the mirror—

God.

I can see it all: my open mouth, my glazed eyes, my body jolting with every thrust like I’m nothing more than a hole to be used. Liam behind me, sharp-jawed and focused, hair messy now, his face a portrait of calculated destruction.

Every thrust is measured and cruel in its softness. My hands scrabble at the mirror again, trying to find purchase. Trying to stay grounded while he fucks me full of everything I wanted to forget.

And when his eyes meet mine, I see something new in them.

Not gentleness or even cruelty.

Reverence.

He watches me as if I’m the ruin he prayed for.

“Fuck,” he groans as his fingers slip under my tank, dig into the softness of my waist as he pistons his hips forward, relentless now, brutal in pace but never messy. I’m gasping, choking, my knees knocking, my body clenching around him like it’s trying to keep him there.

Through it all, Liam doesn’t sweet-talk or say anything romantic. He just uses me the way I begged for.

He wraps a hand around my throat again, tighter this time, dragging me upright against him as he fucks up into me from behind. I’m gasping his name, lips parted, head tossed back, and he catches my jaw with the hand that was at my throat.

“No hiding,” he warns. “Eyes on us. I want you to remember this the next time you think about crying over a boy who never deserved you.”

I sob. My vision blurs, heat pooling again low in my stomach, traitorous, alive, and clawing its way out.

“Please, please—”

He fucks me harder, hips slapping against me with obscene sounds, every thrust pushing the air from my lungs in ragged gasps. I feel like I’m coming undone at the seams. Each stroke hits somewhere deep that has me moaning without shame, without fear, only need.

His rhythm quickens, and I’m incoherent now, noises pouring out of me in gasps and broken syllables. His hand returns to my throat, then he slams into me harder. Faster.

“Say it,” Liam growls. “Say you belong to me now.”

I shake my head, but it’s weak, and he slams into me harder. “Say it, Nathaniel.”

“I—” My voice catches on a groan. “I belong— fuck —I belong to you.”

His grip tightens and he groans, hips stuttering. “God, you’re perfect when you break.”

I feel the build, the unbearable pressure curling at the base of my spine and the way he’s pounding into me, the filthy way he’s using my body. “I hate you,” I rasp, even though my cock is leaking, even though my body’s already tipping forward, right over the edge.

“Good. Hate me harder while you coat the fucking mirror.”

I don’t even get to answer before it rips out of me.

I come, cock untouched, and my release streaks across the glass as I shake through it, knees giving out under me. Liam holds me up and keeps thrusting. Chasing his own high with brutal, deep strokes until he groans and pulls out at the last second, his cum spilling over my ass, my back, my thighs.

Liam leans in, his lips brushing the shell of my ear, voice breathless but cruel as ever. “Next time, Pup… you’ll beg me to do worse.”

And I already know he’s right. I finally understand he’s not trying to help me forget. He’s rewriting me, piece by fucking piece.