Page 38 of Hunted Temptation (Alpha Nights: Unlikely Heroes #4)

MARLOWE

“Hale,” I call out.

He buries his fingers in the nape of my hair, gently tugging my head back slightly so my eyes are forced to find his. He looks down at me, my heart racing with each moment. This is a problem because I want him again.

It’s only been moments, and yet, I want him.

“I’m going to ask you something, but not because it has to do with any male sense of anything misogynistic. It’s purely because I want to make sure that I’m taking care of you the way you need to be taken care of.”

His words cause me to pause. In fact, I’m not quite sure what he’s about to ask me. My heart starts beating against my chest in a hard and fast rhythm. Then he shifts his face closer to mine, his lips touching my own in just a simple brush.

“How many men have you been with, Marlowe?”

I’m not sure how his words are supposed to make me feel. I think I’m supposed to be offended. Maybe he shouldn’t be asking me these things, but we’re going to be married. He’s also been inside me completely bare, so he should probably have already known something like that, and I should have, too.

“Two,” I whisper.

“And the second was when you were violated?”

The way he says it is such a nicer way than the actual act.

Violated . I mean, I was, but it was much uglier than that word.

There are a million different ways I could downplay what happened to me.

Like pretending it was because we were drunk.

That it was just a party and things happened.

They got out of control. But that simply wasn’t the case.

Dorian hurt me. He threatened me. He did things to me without my consent, and now he thinks he can take my baby. And Stellan is mine. All mine. Nobody can have him, especially not that drug-dealing monster.

“Yes,” I exhale, answering Hale’s question.

I will answer all of Hale’s questions anytime. This is a man who has earned that answer. He’s put in work that I don’t think a saint could actually have put in. He’s cared for me when I didn’t even care for myself.

And he’s loved Stellan when he didn’t have to, which is the main reason why I said yes to his proposal.

“Anytime at all I make you uncomfortable, from here on out, you tell me.”

“You didn’t,” I say. “I swear you didn’t. That was amazing. I’ve never…” My words trail off because I don’t know how to admit that I’ve never come before… That a man has never put his mouth between my legs before.

How can one be twenty-five years old and never have that done to them before? I’ve read about it in books, so I knew what to expect, but that is nothing like actually experiencing it live and in person.

He releases my hair, his hand shifting around as he cups my cheek. “How about this?” he asks. “You like something, you tell me. You don’t, you tell me. You want to try something, you tell me.”

I can’t hide my smile. It takes over my face. “Okay,” I breathe.

“Yeah,” he murmurs. “Okay.”

Hale’s mouth touches mine just as I hear Stellan’s cry. I start to pull away, albeit reluctantly, when Hale’s hand touches my shoulder as he breaks the kiss. “I got him, sweetheart. Get some rest.”

Slipping down into the sheets, I tug the covers over my body, rolling onto my side as Hale tugs up a pair of athletic shorts over his gorgeous bare ass and then walks out of the room.

I watch him move down the hallway, wondering again how and why in the hell this man wants me.

He slips into Stellan’s room, and I hear his sexy timbre. Almost instantly, Stellan stops crying.

Then, about five minutes later, both man and baby are beside me in bed, and it’s in this moment that I realize what all those commercials on television with the family in the bed are about…

because this is bliss. Pure unadulterated bliss.

Nothing, not a million tax-free dollars in the bank, could top this right here.

HALE

Dorian is going to die. There is no way around it. He simply cannot live. As I leave the office, Stellan and Marlowe are under the umbrella of safety that I can offer them. But they will never be completely safe if Dorian is alive.

Sure, killing him just makes the roaches spread. However, I don’t think anyone gives a fuck about Marlowe or Stellan the way he does. And he only gives a fuck because Stellan is his child. He violated her, and for that, he simply cannot breathe another day on this earth.

“You sure you want to do this?” Boden asks.

Typically, on something that involves death, Vaughn would be the first one called, but he’s busy today, and I want this done before I claim them as mine. Even though they already are.

“I am.”

I’m one-hundred-percent certain that I want this piece of shit gone, but before I kill him, I need to speak with Myla. Another reason why Boden is hesitant to join me. He knows a little bit about Myla’s history, about Marlowe’s history.

I didn’t tell him everything, but what he does know, he doesn’t like. He is also a man who, like the rest of us, doesn’t want to hurt the innocent, especially women. So the fact that Myla is probably going to be a major problem in this situation doesn’t sit well with him.

I walk into the trap house and look around in disgust. Clearly, Marlowe was the reason this house wasn’t completely disgusting when she lived here. I doubt anyone has picked up a broom since I took her away.

Myla isn’t hard to find. She’s sitting on the couch, staring straight ahead at an empty wall. There was a television there once. You can see the outline on the wall. She’s in a drug-induced zombie state, absolutely useless.

A noise in the hallway catches my attention, and I watch as her boyfriend moves toward me. If he is surprised to find two men standing in his living room, he doesn’t act like it. Instead, he jerks his chin toward me.

“What do you want?” he demands.

I’m not sure if he knows who I am. I also don’t care. He is nothing. He is nobody. He is also a complete pile of dog shit. He’s just like all those men who prey on the weak, who abuse their power over someone else.

He is probably the reason Myla is in the state she is. He likely put her there in an effort to control her, so she will always bend to his will. She’s not only addicted to drugs, she’s addicted to him, and he likely brags about that.

“Marlowe doesn’t exist any longer,” I announce.

He smirks, but mentioning her sister’s name wakes something up inside Myla, and she turns her head, focusing her dazed attention on me.

“Marlowe,” she whispers.

“You think I give a fuck about Marlowe?” He ignores the way Myla spoke.

Clearing my throat, I dip my chin in a single nod. “I think your boss does, and you’re one of his minions,” I state.

He shakes his head a couple of times. He’s so inconsequential that I didn’t even bother finding out his name. He doesn’t matter. If he lives or dies, I wouldn’t lose even an ounce of sleep over him.

“My boss has some sense of ownership over that thing that came out of her cunt. I don’t give a shit about that.”

“Myla,” I grind out.

She blinks but doesn’t say anything, so I ignore her and shift my attention to the man. “Myla doesn’t contact her,” I state.

His lips twitch into a smirk. “How much is that peace of mind worth?”

I already knew this asshole was going to want to be bought. I came prepared. Taking a bundle of ten grand out of my pocket, I toss it toward him. It’s more than he would ever think to ask for, but I don’t want there to be any mistake in what I want to accomplish here.

“Marlowe who?” he asks, his focus now on the money.

I turn around and walk out of the house, and Boden follows behind me. Climbing into the driver’s seat, I touch the button to start the engine, but I don’t pull away from the curb immediately. Turning my head, I look over at the house again.

Myla is standing in the doorway, her vacant gaze focused on me. I can’t believe this is the woman I fucked over a year ago. She’s on a rapid decline, and it’s sad to watch, but at the same time, she has to want to save herself, and she doesn’t.

Which, unfortunately, is the case for many addicts. I know it hurts Marlowe. She wants her sister, but she also knows that right now, she’s not healthy.

Leaving the trap house, I drive toward the edge of town where I know this fucker Dorian lives.

It wasn’t hard to find him. He’s a complete fucking piece of shit, but he is not discreet.

In fact, I’m pretty sure he is putting himself out there because he’s just that cocky.

I’m not stupid enough to kill him in his own home, though.

Mainly because I don’t want to put in the work it would take to clear out his cameras and get rid of evidence.

So, Boden and I lie in wait. It doesn’t take long.

He has a standing appointment with his masseuse every week at this time.

Driving past his house, I make my way to the massage parlor.

I know he enters through the back of the building, which is in an alleyway and not under any type of surveillance, city or otherwise.

I park a couple of blocks away, and Boden and I make our way to that alleyway, though we don’t just walk down said alley from the sidewalk. We go through the building that shares the alley and slip out the back of that business.

As we wait for Dorian, I lean against the side of the building, watching for his arrival until he appears, like clockwork.

This is why routines can be a son of a bitch.

I want to shoot this fuck in the head, but I don’t because I’m not lifting a finger to clean up this mess.

Instead, I call out his name when he’s within arm’s reach.

“The fuck?” he asks the moment his gaze finds mine.

And that’s when I lift my hand, the knife firmly in place, and bury it into his neck. Then quickly slide it across his throat from behind so I don’t get any blood on me. It’s a bit of an aggressive move, but I don’t want him to live. Boden chuckles, but as my lookout, he doesn’t say anything.

When Dorian is on the ground, blood pooling around him, and his body twitches.

We watch until he’s completely still, and only then do we walk away.

But we don’t go through the building we came from.

Instead, we walk a bit down the alley and slip into another shop then walk out on the other side of the street, using a different path to get back to the car.

“So, now that’s done,” Boden murmurs once we climb into the SUV again. Turning my head, I look at him.

“Thanks,” I say. “Now it’s time to marry Marlowe and add my name to Stellan’s birth certificate.”

“You sure you want to do this?” he asks.

“Two hundred percent.”

Boden’s lips twitch up into a smile. “Then let’s go get your girl.”

“Let’s fucking go.”