Page 52 of Hunt Me

My face burns. I can’t look at her. Can’t admit that when Alexi pinned me against that mirror, when he told me he wanted to watch my stomach swell with his child, when he fucked me raw and came inside me like he owned me?—

I loved it.

Every. Fucking. Second.

The shame tastes like acid. What kind of woman gets off on being dominated by a criminal? By a man who’s probably responsible for her parents’ deaths? Who talks about trapping her with a pregnancy like it’s foreplay?

“Iris.” Maya moves closer. “Talk to me.”

But how do I explain that Alexi touched something in me I didn’t know existed? That for those hours in that abandonedbuilding, I wasn’t thinking about my parents or my mission or my careful plans for revenge.

I was justfeeling.

“I liked it.” The words spill out before I can stop them. “I likehim.”

My face burns with mortification, but if I can’t tell Maya—my best friend in the entire world—who the hell can I tell?

Maya’s eyes widen. Then she whistles, long and low. “Okay. So, you’ve officially lost your mind.”

“Maybe.” I press my palms against my eyes, willing the humiliation to stop. “Probably.”

“Iris.” She sits on the edge of my desk, forcing me to look at her. “His brothers had some kind of hand in your parents’ death. You told me that. You’ve been investigating them formonths.”

The guilt hits like a physical blow.

My chest tightens. I can see them—Mom and Dad—in that mangled wreckage the police showed me. The “accident” was anything but. The investigation went nowhere because someone with power made it disappear.

The Ivanov family.

Alexi’s family.

“I know.” My voice cracks. “Iknow, Maya.”

“Then what are you doing?” No judgment in her tone, just genuine confusion. “You’re supposed to be taking them down. Getting justice. Not...”

“Fucking the youngest brother?” I finish bitterly.

She doesn’t flinch. “Yeah. That.”

I rake my hands through my hair, tugging hard enough to hurt. The pain grounds me, keeps me from spiraling completely.

WhatamI doing?

Last night, I was supposed to be gathering intel. Using Alexi’s obsession with me to get closer to the family’s secrets. Finding proof of what they did.

Instead, I let him fuck me raw in an abandoned building. Let him whisper filthy things about breeding me, owning me, keeping me. And I came apart in his hands like I’d been waiting my whole life for it.

“They killed them,” I whisper. The words taste like ash. “His family killed my parents, and I just... I let him...”

Nausea churns in my gut. Different from before. Worse.

Because this isn’t fear of pregnancy or morning-after pill side effects.

This is guilt.

Pure, unadulterated shame that cuts deeper than anything Alexi did to my body last night.

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