Page 44

The photos slip from my trembling fingers like accusations made flesh, their glossy surfaces catching the dim light as they scatter across the leather interior. Each one lands with a whisper that sounds like Jack’s name, like a death rattle, like the truth finally clawing its way to the surface.

My breath fogs the passenger window as I stare at Thatcher—really see him for the first time.

Not the hockey star or the silver-spoon rich boy or even the predator who’s been stalking me.

This is something else entirely. Something that watches me with those calculating eyes like I’m prey he’s been circling for months, finally ready to strike.

He killed Jack.

Something dark and twisted in my chest unfurls like a flower blooming in poisoned soil. He killed for me. Because Jack hurt me. Because Jack touched me. It doesn’t make him a better monster, does it? Maybe, but I see now that he’s my monster.

“What are you going to do about it now?” His voice is silk sliding over razors, deceptively soft for someone who just confessed to murder.

The question hangs in the air between us, but my body has already decided. Fight or flight, and every cell in me is screaming to run. My hand finds the door handle, fingers fumbling with the lock mechanism until I hear the decisive click of freedom.

I don’t look back. Don’t pause to consider the wisdom of bolting into the middle of nowhere with a killer behind me. I just move, yanking the door open and launching myself out of the Tesla like I’m escaping a burning building.

The asphalt is harsh beneath my feet as I sprint past the abandoned gas station, its broken windows like dead eyes watching my flight.

Behind me, I hear the slam of his door, the measured crunch of his footsteps on gravel.

No urgency. No panic. Just the steady, deliberate pace of a predator who knows his prey can’t escape.

The tree line rushes toward me, offering shadows and concealment. Branches are catching at my hair and clothes like grasping fingers. The forest floor is uneven with roots and fallen logs that threaten to send me face-planting.

I can hear him behind me—closer now, his breathing steady and controlled while mine comes in ragged gasps. He’s not even winded. Not even trying that hard. Just... following. Hunting.

The realization sends heat spiraling through me even as terror claws at my throat. This is what he is—a hunter. A killer. And I’m the prize he’s been stalking since that first night.

My foot catches on something—a root, a rock—and I stumble forward, arms windmilling as I fight for balance. The stumble costs me precious seconds, precious distance.

And then he’s on me.

The impact drives all the air from my lungs as we go down together, his body crushing mine into the carpet of dead leaves. The earthy smell of decomposition fills my nostrils, rich and loamy and somehow appropriate for this moment—this death of who I used to be.

“Let me go!” The words tear from my throat, but even as I say them, my body is responding to his weight, to the solid heat of him pressed against me from shoulder to hip.

His hands find my wrists, pinning them above my head with an ease that should humiliate me. Instead, it sends liquid fire straight to my core. The helplessness, the complete surrender of control—it’s exactly what some sick part of me has been craving.

“Tell me, Dove…” His voice is rough, breathless, but there’s steel beneath the velvet. “Tell me that you’re mine.”

“Fuck you.” But the words come out breathless, lacking conviction. Because we both know the truth—I am his. I’ve been his since the moment he decided I was worth killing for.

His body shifts against mine, and I can feel him hard and wanting and dangerous pressed against my hip. The knowledge that chasing me through the woods, tackling me like prey, has aroused him should disgust me. It doesn’t.

“Say it from that pretty fucking mouth, Rhea.” His breath is hot against my ear, sending shivers down my spine that have nothing to do with the cool night air. “No matter what I’ve done, no matter what you know—say you’re mine.”

I try to twist away from him, but his grip is iron. And worse—I don’t really want to escape. “You’re insane.”

“Maybe.” His lips brush the shell of my ear, so soft it’s almost tender. “But I’m yours.”

There’s something desperate in his voice now, a crack in the controlled facade that reveals the man beneath the monster. When he kisses me, it’s not gentle or coaxing. It’s claiming, branding, marking me as his in the most primitive way possible.

I can taste him—mint and danger and something indefinably male that makes my head spin. And I can feel how much this affects him, the rigid length of his arousal pressing insistently against me despite—or because of—the violence of our chase.

My body responds like it’s been waiting for this moment, this claiming. Heat blooms between my thighs, my nipples hardening against the thin fabric of my bra. I hate that I want this. Hate that being hunted and caught and pinned like prey makes wetness gather at my core.

But I can’t deny it. Can’t pretend anymore.

“Rhea–”

“I’m yours,” I whisper against his mouth, the admission torn from somewhere deep and dark inside me.

His eyes flash with triumph, but it’s not enough. “Again.” His hands move to my shirt, fingers rough and impatient as he rips the seams. “Say it again.”

“I’m yours, Thatcher.” The words come easier now, like a confession that’s been building for months. “Even though you’re a fucking liar. Even though you manipulated everything.”

My shirt rips open for him, and the open air hits my exposed skin like a baptism. A rebirth into this darkness is between us.

“You killed him because he hurt me,” I continue, my voice growing stronger with each admission. “And I will always be yours.”

Something shifts in his expression at my words—a darkness that should terrify me but instead sends heat spiraling through my veins like liquid sin. His pupils dilate until his eyes are almost black, reflecting the shadows of the forest around us.

“You killed for me,” I breathe, the realization hitting me like a physical blow. The thought should horrify me. Should send me running into the woods, screaming for help.

Instead, it makes me arch beneath him, seeking more contact, more pressure, more of whatever this is between us.

“I’d kill anyone who touches you.” His voice is low, guttural, more growl than human speech. The promise in those words—the absolute certainty—makes something clench deep inside me.

“That should terrify me.” My own voice sounds foreign, thick with want and need and things I don’t want to examine too closely.

“But it doesn’t.” His lips find the pulse point at my neck, tongue flicking out to taste the salt on my skin. “It turns you on.”

He’s right, and we both know it. The knowledge that he’s capable of violence, that he’s killed for me, that he would do it again without hesitation—it ignites something primal and desperate inside me. Something that recognizes him as exactly what I need.

A protector. A predator. Mine.

His hands are rough and demanding as he strips away my clothes, his own following until there’s nothing between us but want and the whisper of air against heated skin.

He turns me over with hands that shake slightly despite their firmness, pulling me up onto my knees on the carpet of fallen leaves. The position leaves me exposed, vulnerable, completely at his mercy.

When his palm connects with my ass, the sharp crack echoes through the woods followed by my gasp of surprise and arousal. The sting blooms across my skin, a perfect counterpoint to the wetness gathering between my thighs.

“If you ever run from me again—” he starts, his voice rough with desire and possession.

“Please,” I gasp, cutting him off as I push back against him, seeking more contact, more pressure, more everything. “Please, Thatcher.”

The desperation in my voice seems to snap whatever restraint he had left. His hands grip my hips, fingers digging into flesh hard enough to bruise, hard enough to mark. And then he’s pressing against my pussy, the thick head of his cock sliding through my wetness.

“You’re mine,” he growls against my neck, and then he’s pushing inside, stretching me, filling me completely.

There’s no gentleness in what follows. Just pure need and claiming and being claimed in the most primal way possible. He moves inside me with a rhythm that’s violent, each thrust punctuated by the slap of skin against skin and the breathless sounds torn from my throat.

My fingers claw at the earth beneath me, seeking something to anchor me as he takes me apart piece by piece. Leaves and dirt stick to my palms, grit working under my fingernails, but I don’t care. Can’t care about anything except the feeling of him moving inside me, owning me, marking me as his.

“Mine,” he pants against my ear, his rhythm becoming more erratic, more desperate. “Say it. Tell me you’re mine.”

“I’m yours,” I gasp out, the words torn from me with each powerful thrust. “I’m yours, Thatcher. Always.”

The admission seems to drive him wild. His pace increases, becoming almost punishing in its intensity, and I can feel myself building toward something that feels less like orgasm and more like obliteration.

When it hits, it’s with the force of a tsunami, washing over me in waves that leave me gasping and shaking and completely undone. My inner walls clench around him, milking him, and he follows moments later with a roar that echoes through the darkness.

His name rips from my throat as the pleasure crests, a cry that might be prayer or curse or both. He buries himself deep inside me as he comes, his body shuddering with the force of his release.

He pulls me up to him, pressing his dick to my ass. He grabs my throat and kisses me. The forest is quiet except for the sound of our ragged breathing and the distant call of birds.

For a long moment, he keeps his dick buried in the crack of my ass and his lips on the back of my neck. Neither of us speaks or moves. We just lie kneel here in the aftermath, processing what just happened, what it means.

Finally, Thatcher shifts, his hands gentle now as they frame my face. His thumbs brush away tears I didn’t realize had fallen, the gesture almost tender after the savagery of what we just shared.

“What’s mine doesn’t get touched by anyone else,” he says, his voice soft but implacable. “And you’re mine.”

The possessiveness in his words should anger me, should make me fight against the chains he’s wrapping around me. Instead, it settles something restless inside my chest, fills a void I didn’t know existed.

“I need your shirt,” I say simply, suddenly aware of the cool air against my exposed skin, the way the night seems to be seeping into my bones.

Without hesitation, he strips off his shirt and helps me into it, the fabric still warm from his body heat. It hangs loose on my frame, the sleeves far too long, but it smells like him. I pull it close, letting his scent envelop me like armor.

We gather our scattered clothes in silence, both of us understanding that something fundamental has shifted between us. The lies are out in the open now, the truth laid bare and bloody, but somehow that makes this more honest than anything that came before.

The walk back to the car is quiet, neither of us needing words to fill the space between revelation and acceptance. My legs are unsteady, my body still humming with aftershocks, but I don’t stumble. Don’t fall.

Because I understand now, with a clarity that cuts through all the confusion and fear and anger… this was always inevitable. From the moment he first saw me, first decided I was his, this was always where we were heading.

I just didn’t know the cost would be so high.

Or that I’d be so eager to pay it.