Page 69 of Promise of Destruction (Destruction & Vengeance Duet #1)

sixty-four

Soren

“Eyes on me,” Declan commands, giving my thighs a squeeze that chases fire to my womb again.

I blink away the tears and bite down on my bottom lip in an attempt to keep any sound from slipping past my lips.

He’s fucking devastating.

His beauty, his ruthlessness, the way he makes me feel precious and then worthless in rapid succession. Declan isn’t a creature who was created by the gods. He may be one himself, though— a ruthless god bent on the suffering of humanity, using us as his playthings.

All gods are bastards.

“Why are you crying?”

He seems genuinely concerned with his head tilted an infinitesimal amount to the side so that his dark hair falls in his emerald eyes.

That makes me laugh, and I choke on a sob that tried to change its mind halfway out of my throat. He’s quiet, allowing me a moment to compose myself.

“Seriously?” I sigh, pulling on my hands by way of illustration. When he only blinks, my frustration overflows. “I’m naked and tied up on a stranger’s bed and you’re really going to ask why I’m crying?”

“Don’t pretend you’re crying over me, Ren.” His voice is barely more than a whisper as he crawls up my body, his eyes locked on mine in a predatory gaze.

He covers my body with his, his mouth inches from mine as he hovers over me, resting his arms on the back of the headboard.

“I…”

“Shh.” He shakes his head slowly, his lips brushing ever so slightly against mine with the movement. “You may be mad at me, but you’re not crying because I just made you kiss the fucking moon.”

His fingers, so brutal and magical, are soft as he brushes them over my cheekbone, swiping away stray tears. It’s an oddly intimate gesture that somehow makes me feel more exposed than I was when he was between my legs.

“So, tell me, kitten. What’s with the tears?”

His eyes on me are too intense, the heat between his body and mine even more so.

He’s still fully clothed, but my blood is warm as it rushes through me.

I want to close my eyes and escape the weight of his expectations for a response.

I don’t, though, because some stupid, na?ve, little part of my brain thinks it will feel better to get the words out into the air.

Of course, I’m not going to tell him I’m crying because that was the most powerful thing I’ve ever fucking felt and that terrifies me more than anything I’ve ever known.

So, I settle for the lesser of my two evils.

“Vince.” I manage to whisper his name without bile creeping up my throat, but it’s a small victory and I regret it as soon as I say it.

Declan’s eyes harden again, his lip curling upward. “I just made you come so hard you looked like you were on the verge of a seizure, and you’re thinking about him ?”

The way he says ‘him’ is like Vince is just an old flame, someone I hooked up with a time or two and then promptly forgot about.

He wasn’t that; he was my husband, and apparently a vile fucking piece of shit.

I don’t know how to reconcile the man I thought I knew with the man I saw through Declan’s eyes.

I haven’t cried since I came out of the psych hold and found out the funeral had passed and the man I loved had been cremated to ash and stuck on my mantle.

There wasn’t enough of the baby to do the same, so where I had a whole family weeks before, it was suddenly just me and a shiny little urn on my shelf filled with all that’s left of my husband.

But now I’m grieving the man I thought I knew while also looking into the eyes of a beautiful monster who’s already managed to make me feel things I’ve never even imagined were possible.

My chest aches, a sensation that only grows when Declan rubs his thumb over my lips, parting them enough for a gasp to escape as the surprising tenderness floods me with confused arousal.

“It’s okay,” he whispers, and I’m not sure whether it’s an attempt to stem my waterworks or if he’s excusing me for daring to speak my husband’s name in his presence. “I guess I’ll just have to try harder this time.”

My mouth falls open. Words fail me at the implication, but I don’t even get a chance to contemplate any of them, because he unfastens his pants and then lets them drop to the floor along with his boxers.

My stomach twists at the sight of him, awe and fear twining together in an intoxicating elixir.

One thing about being with one man for my entire life—I have no concept of size. I have no scale to measure the quality of a kiss, the ingenuity of their movements, the size of an erection.

All I know is that Declan is huge, he sets me on fire with a need that I don’t understand, and if he kisses anything like he works me for an orgasm, I can never again let his lips touch mine.