Page 222 of Ominous: Part 1

I grab her hard, hoping my fingerprints will bloom into bruises on her skin, and it makes me fuck her harder, wanting to possess her, to own her, to cross over every line she’s ever fucking had until they’re nothing but faraway memories and she can’t believe she ever put any kind of boundary between us.

She moans again as I shift up the flesh of her ass, hitting her deeper, and I’m so fucking close, and I want her to be there, too, but she gave it up.

She fucking gave it up.

Anger courses through me, that she didn’t trust me, and something on its heels, like longing.I want you to, I want you to, I want you to.

In my head, I can hear her mind screaming for mine.I want to, I want to, I want to.

I haul her up by her throat, her arms extended, fingers still gripping the tub.

I press my chest to her back, reluctantly letting go of her ass as I wrap an arm around her waist, my thrusts shorter, but with her pussy even tighter at this angle, it’s not going to take much.

“Are you mine?” I whisper against her ear, my hand still fixed around her neck. I want to hear it again. I kiss her cheek, my mouth running up the side of her face as I fuck her. “Tell me you are. Tell me you love—… Tell me you’re mine.” I almost said something else, because she makes me stupid, but we can’t go there. Not yet.

She’s still holding onto the ledge, her slippery body so warm in my arms. “Yours, I’m yours,” she breathes, her belly rising, falling as she tries to keep breathing. “I’myours,Eli.”

I’m so close. I just… I just want to do something bad. I want to do something terrible to her to drive me over the edge. The misinformed think sociopaths can’t be sadists because we can’tfeelthings. They have no fucking idea. “Can I hurt you?” It’s a gasp, the question, and I don’t think I can wait long for an answer.

She doesn’t make me.“Always.”

I shove her down, releasing her so she collapses, her fingers slipping from the edge of the tub to the base of it, and I push her head against the porcelain, her face twisting to the side as she lies there, her ass still in the air.

I see her eyes close, her lips parted as she whimpers.

I want her beneath me,always.I feel good like this. She feels good like this. But I know too, as my own release seems to catch fire beneath my skin, and I collapse over her, holding her to me as my elbows crunch against the hard bottom of the tub and I come inside of her, moaning her name in her ear, I’d gladly bow to her too. I’d lie down at her feet, I’d do anything she asked me to, I’d let her hurt me and punish me if she wanted, and just because she’s beneath me, just because I obliterate all of her boundaries, it doesn’t mean that, eventually, I won’t let her do the same to mine.

36

Eli

I feelsomething warm beneath my hip. At first, even with the fan spinning overhead, the A/C on high in this house, I think it’s my sweat. Coming awake happens slowly, and I know I only slept because Eden insistedItry her pills. It was a suggestion I could have easily forgone, but truth be told, after fucking her in the bathtub, bruises over both of us, I could use the rest.

It was probably the best sleep I’d had in years.

Now, my mouth is dry, I feelheavy,and I wonder if this is how people usually feel when they have a full night’s rest. It isn’t a great feeling, like chunks of uncontrolled time have passed without me.

I roll onto my hip, sliding my hands from under the cool side of my pillow. The first thing I see through bleary eyes is Eden’s braids, still coiled on top of her head, a few strands of dark hair at the nape of her neck, my shirt on her body, an old Trafalgar wrestling one with the dragonfly on the back.

My sheets are pulled only to her hips, covering her ass, and I want to run my fingers over her bruises, I want tosee them.

But instead, I look for the damp spot that is very clearly not sweat, because I’m actually cold.

Dropping my gaze a little reluctantly from Eden, the faintest tendrils of morning light filtering in through my curtains pulled closed from the patio, I see the spot of crimson.

I swipe my hand under the white sheets, lifting them marginally, not enough to disturb my girl.

The stain is right by her round ass, her black shorts hiked up enough to expose one fingerprint of mine, blooming purple and red. A smile curves my lips at the quarter-sized spot of blood beside her. I drop my hand and cover it. It’s still warm, and when I lift up my palm to examine it, the ridges of my hand are coated with red.

I shift over closer to Eden, picking my head up just to see the time on my alarm clock. Ten minutes after nine in the morning. I hear nothing in the house and assume Dominic is still sleeping. But right as I reach for Eden, wanting to pull her to me, uncaring about the blood that soaked through her shorts, I hear my phone buzz on the nightstand beside me.

Rolling my eyes, not wanting the vibration to wake Eden, I slowly turn over and snatch the phone, yanking it off the charger. Propping myself up on one elbow, I see the text from Dad.

Him: Dinner tonight instead, I’m coming home early. I’m having it delivered, my flight is delayed.

I don’t respond, and instead drop my phone on the nightstand, turning it to silent before I do. Then I flip over, pull a still-sleeping, warm Eden into my arms and hold her close, my chin resting on her head.

I think about last night. The bathtub. Her willingness to indulge me.