Page 56 of Haunted (Blackwood Brothers #1)

MIRA

I press my back against the bathroom door after locking it behind me, finally able to breathe without Xavier's overwhelming presence suffocating every thought. Seven days. Seven days of him refusing to give me the space I desperately need to process what he told me.

After visiting Cora last week, I'd spoken with Monica, the woman Xavier claimed he helped escape an abusive hunter. His story checked out. She described how Xavier had provided her with a new identity, money, even a job in another state when her hunter refused to let her go after their year was up.

"He saved my life," she'd told me, her voice still shaking at the memory. "I'd probably be dead without him."

One good deed. One act of decency amid a sea of blood and violence.

Can a single act of kindness redeem a lifetime of destruction?

My father, with his unwavering moral compass, would say no.

My mother, the prosecutor who built her career putting away men like Xavier, would laugh at the very suggestion.

And yet...

I splash cold water on my face, meeting my reflection’s accusing stare in the bathroom mirror.

The woman looking back at me has swollen lips from Xavier’s relentless kisses and marks on her throat from where he can’t seem to stop claiming her skin.

She looks thoroughly debauched and completely confused.

But beneath that confusion lies darkness—something I've spent my entire life trying to deny. A shadow that always lurked beneath my skin. The Sullivan family legacy: upholding the law, protecting the innocent, and always taking the moral high ground.

What would they think if they could see me now? If they knew how desperate I am for a criminal’s touch? If they discovered the shameful thrill I feel when he makes me his in ways that would horrify my proper, law-abiding parents?

Xavier didn't create this darkness in me. He merely recognized it, dragged it into the light, and showed me it was always there—waiting.

I've spent my entire life pretending to be someone I'm not. The perfect daughter. The crusading journalist. The moral compass in a world gone mad. But Xavier saw through it all with those steel-gray eyes, identifying the hunger I've desperately tried to hide.

The contract binds me to him for a year. That's non- negotiable. But loving him? That's my choice. The only real choice I have left.

And I'm terrified because, despite everything—despite the blood on his hands, despite the lives he's destroyed, despite everything I was raised to stand against—I'm falling for him. Falling for a monster who sees the monster in me.

Every time I try to think—really think—about what it means that Xavier kills people, he's there.

His hands are on my waist as I make coffee.

His lips against my neck while I try to read.

His body pressed against mine in bed, whispering promises that scramble my brain until I can't remember why I needed distance in the first place.

Which is exactly his plan.

Xavier Blackwood doesn't lose, and he sure as hell doesn't wait patiently for verdicts that might not go his way.

Instead, he wages war on my senses, making it impossible to maintain any emotional distance.

Every touch is calculated to remind me how perfectly we fit together.

Every kiss is designed to prove that, whatever I think about his actions.

And it’s working.

I can feel my resolve cracking under the constant assault of his attention.

How am I supposed to reconcile my feelings about him being a killer when he won’t stop touching me long enough for rational thought to surface?

How can I examine my conscience when his mouth is always on mine, drowning out the voice in my head that screams this is wrong?

The voice that sounds suspiciously like my father .

A soft knock on the door makes me jump.

“Mira.” His voice is intoxicating, resonating through the thin wood. “Come back to bed.”

Four simple words make heat bloom in my chest, pulling me toward the door like a flower seeking sunlight.

“I’m taking a shower,” I call back, proud that my voice sounds steady.

“I’ll wash your back.”

The doorknob turns despite the lock—of course, he has keys to every room in his own penthouse. I watch in the mirror as he steps inside, already shirtless, his gray eyes dark with familiar hunger.

“Xavier, please.” The words come out breathier than I intended. “I asked for time to think.”

He moves behind me, his chest pressing against my back as his hands settle on my hips. In the mirror, his reflection meets my gaze with an intensity that makes my knees weak.

“You’ve been thinking for a week,” he murmurs against my ear. “What conclusion have you reached?”

“That’s just it—I can’t reach any conclusions when you don’t leave me alone long enough to?—”

His mouth cuts off my protest, covering mine in a kiss that steals every coherent thought from my head.

Xavier’s hands slide under my thighs, lifting me effortlessly as my legs instinctively wrap around his waist. He carries me toward the shower, his mouth never leaving mine, turning on the water with one hand while pinning me against the cool tile wall .

Steam begins to fill the space around us as hot water cascades down, but all I can focus on is the desperate hunger in his eyes as he looks at me.

“I can’t leave you alone,” he growls against my lips. “You’re mine, Mira. Every breath, every heartbeat, every thought in that brilliant mind—it all belongs to me.”

The water soaks through what little clothing we’re wearing, making the fabric cling to our skin. Xavier’s hands are everywhere, stripping away every barrier between us.

“I’m addicted to having you,” he continues, his confession making my heart race even faster. “The way you say my name when you surrender to me.”

Before I can process his words, he slams inside me without warning, stealing my breath and making me cry out. The force of it drives me back against the tile, and I have no choice but to hold on as he fucks me with an urgency that borders on desperation.

Each thrust is punishing, possessive, designed to remind me exactly who I belong to. The hot water streams around us as he takes what he wants, his grip on my hips bruising in its intensity.

“Xavier,” I gasp, my nails digging into his shoulders as pleasure and pain blur together.

“That’s right,” he rasps against my ear. “Say my name. Let me hear you surrender.”

His pace is relentless, driving me higher with each powerful thrust until I’m sobbing his name. The bathroom fills with steam, and the sounds of our joining echo off the tile walls.

“Tonight,” he pants between thrusts, his voice rough with exertion and desire, “we’re going to Purgatory. Like I promised.”

My pussy clenches around him, remembering his earlier promise about displaying me.

“We’re going to fuck on display for everyone to see,” he continues, his rhythm never faltering. “And then we’re going to watch others while I make you come again and again.”

The realization hits me painfully, cutting through the haze of pleasure and steam surrounding us. If Xavier takes me to Purgatory tonight—if he proves again that I crave being watched, being displayed, being used for others’ entertainment—there will be no pretending anymore.

If I let him parade me through that club tonight, if I respond the way we both know I will, then I’ll have to face the truth about what I’ve become. What he’s made me.

An exhibitionist. A voyeur. A woman who gets wet at the thought of strangers watching her surrender. An object to entertain him, others.

“I can see you thinking,” Xavier growls against my neck, his thrusts slowing to a torturous pace that makes me whimper. “Stop.”

But I can’t stop. Because I know—with terrifying clarity—that if he does this to me again, if he proves that my need to be watched extends beyond that maze, beyond that contract, then I’ll never find my way back to who I was before.

The woman who would have been horrified by the thought of public sex and called Purgatory depraved.

That woman is already dying. I’ve been dying since the moment I signed that NDA and let Xavier take me in front of fifteen hunters, telling him I belonged to him.

But tonight will be her funeral if he makes me do this.

“Xavier,” I whisper, my voice breaking around his name.

He stills inside me, his grip on my hips tighten possessively.“What is it?” His gray eyes search my face.

The words stick in my throat because saying them out loud makes them real. Makes this choice real.

“If we go tonight...” I swallow hard. “If I let you do what you want to do to me there...”

His jaw clenches. “There’s no going back,” he finishes for me.

I nod, unable to speak past the lump in my throat.

“You’ll be mine completely,” he continues, his voice dropping to that hypnotic rumble that always makes my knees weak. “No more fighting it. No more worrying about the morality of what I do.”

I no longer have the energy to continue fighting this. Fighting him. Fighting myself. Fighting the hunger that grows stronger every time he touches me.

I’m so fucking tired of the war raging inside my head.

I crash my mouth against his, pouring all my surrender into the kiss. My teeth catch his bottom lip, biting down until he growls against my mouth .

“Fuck me,” I breathe against his lips, my voice raw with desperation. “Stop holding back and fuck me like you mean it.”

A wildness flickers in his gray eyes—recognition that I’m done fighting, done pretending I don’t want this with every fiber of my being.

“You want me to claim you?” His voice is deep and gravelly. “Right here, right now?”

“Yes.” The word is torn from my throat. “Make me yours, Xavier. Completely.”

He pulls out of me only to spin me around, pressing my palms flat against the steamy glass wall. The position leaves me completely exposed and vulnerable, and I arch my back instinctively.

“Spread your legs wider,” he commands, his hands rough on my hips.

I comply immediately, trembling with anticipation. The hot water streams down my back as he positions himself behind me, one hand tangling in my wet hair to pull my head back.

“Look at yourself,” he growls, forcing me to meet my reflection in the fogged mirror across from us. “Look at how desperate you are for me.”

The woman staring back is flushed and panting, water streaming down her skin; her eyes are dark with hunger.

“Tell me what you want,” he demands, pressing the tip of his cock against my entrance.

“I want you to fuck me until I can’t remember my own name,” I gasp. “I want you to brand every inch of me.”

He slams into me with a force that steals my breath, pinning me against the wall as he sets a brutal pace. Each thrust is deeper than the last, hitting spots inside me that make stars explode behind my eyelids.

“Mine,” he snarls against my ear, his grip on my hair tightening. “Every fucking part of you belongs to me.”

“Yes,” I sob, pushing back against him desperately. “Yours. All yours.”

The steam swirls around us as he takes me with animalistic intensity, his free hand sliding around to grip my throat possessively. The pressure makes me lightheaded, amplifying every sensation until I’m drowning in pleasure.

“Come for me,” he commands, his thumb finding my clit. “Let me feel you shatter.”

His relentless thrusts send me spiraling over the edge, my scream echoing as pleasure tears through me. All I feel is the terrifying hunger for more.

And I know, with bone-deep certainty—I have been well and truly claimed by this man. Not because of a contract that binds me to him for a year. Not because of the Hunt that brought us together.

But because the darkness in me recognizes the darkness in him. Because beneath all my pretense of morality and righteousness, this is who I've always been.

Xavier Blackwood didn't corrupt me. He simply showed me the truth I've been running from my entire life.