by KV Rose
“You’re jealous.” I can’t believe it. “You’re fucking jealous that I…that I had a girl locked in my basement? You’re jealous?”
She lets go of me, hops off and I scramble to sit up. “I can’t believe you—”
I grab her arm and pull her back down on top of me, pick her up by her thighs so they’re wrapped around my waist as I sit on the edge of the coffee table, hoping to God it doesn’t break underneath me. “You’re jealous.”
She doesn’t answer me.
I pin her wrists down by her sides. “Say it, Ella. You’re fucking jealous because you’re fucking insane.”
Her lip curls up in a snarl. “Fuck you.”
“You crazy fucking bitch.”
“Fuck. You.”
“Where did she go, Ella?” I push her down on the carpet, flip her over so my chest is against her back as I pin her to floor. “Where did she fucking go?”
She doesn’t answer, just tries to press herself up to all fours, but there’s no way she can do that with me on top of her.
I wrap her hair around my fist, pull her head up. “We can deal with your insecure bullshit later, Ella. But I need to know, where did the girl go?”
She smirks at me, twisting her head to face me. I let her, hoping she’ll speak. Hoping she’ll say something. I need to find Ria.
I need to find Ria.
But my dick is swelling against Ella’s back and with her pinned underneath me like this, all I want to do is fuck away all of that jealousy, shut her up with my dick in her mouth.
“She’s gone,” she finally says, staring at me. “She’s gone, Mavy, and now all you’ve got is me.”
“You’re insane.” I push her head into the carpet, pull her panties to the side and shove down my shorts. “You have no respect for me, do you?”
I’ve got my hand on her head so she can’t answer me except with her words, but of course she doesn’t.
I spread her thighs, stroke my cock once, and then I push it inside of her as she gasps, trying to lift her head, but I keep her held down, feel her becoming wet around me as I slam all the way into her.
It burns me because she’s not ready, and I know it burns her, too, the way she hisses between her teeth, but I don’t care.
She’s fucked this all up. She’s made me just like Lucifer, chasing after a girl to keep her fucking alive.
Fuck her.
I thrust into her tight pussy, feel her walls expand around me, loosening as she gets wetter. I’ve got one hand on her hip, the other still pushing her face into the floor.
“You’ve fucked this all up, baby.” I fuck her harder, loving the way she whimpers and cries out my name, her nails digging into the carpet. “You thought you deserved to know my secrets, Ella?”
She clenches around me and she tries to round her back, to push further against me, but I hold her down, flat against the floor.
“You’re nothing but my little slut. You didn’t deserve more than what I gave you.”
She moans my name and I close my eyes, loving how it sounds from her lips.
“Tell me,” I whisper, my voice hoarse. “Tell me what you are, Ella.”
“Y-yours,” she gasps, her words vibrating against my palm as I keep her head down.
I laugh. “My what, Ella?”
“Your little slut.” The words come out in a whisper.
“Say it again. I can’t fucking hear you.” I thrust into her harder, most of my weight against the side of her face. Feeling her struggling beneath me—struggle to breathe, to think, to speak—it’s what gets me off. It’s what gets rid of all this fucking rage.
She doesn’t say anything.
I don’t think she can.
I pull out of her and flip her over, crawl over her body and wrap my hand around the base of my cock.
She opens her mouth, her eyes wide, both sides of her face red—from the carpet, and my hand.
I pin her wrists over her head as she takes my dick in her mouth. With my other hand, I thread my fingers through her hair and help her suck me off.
Her eyes lock on mine as she gags against me, my cock hitting the back of her throat. God, she feels so fucking good, drool spilling down the corners of her red lips.
“Fuck, you’re a beautiful little whore.”
Her eyes widen, but I keep thrusting her head into me, and then I feel my body tense, feel that momentary reprieve I get from all this fucking anger. All this hate. All this…emotion that I feel like I’m drowning in.
I finish in her mouth and when I open my eyes, I watch as she swallows all of it down, my dick still in her mouth.
I pull out of her, see the strands of saliva and my cum that connect her lips to me. Then I crawl back down her body and pull down her panties, spread her thighs, my hands gripping each of her legs.
I breathe against her, warming her up, and she moans in anticipation. I lick her clit, swollen and pulsing on my tongue.
God, she’s ready now.
My little whore.
I run my tongue down her slit, teasing her little hole, licking all the way back up to where she wants me. She runs her fingers through my hair, and I slide two fingers into her, loving the way she gasps as I’m inside of her.
But then I remember how we got here.
Then I remember what she did.
I fingerfuck her harder, like I did the first night we met. I suck on her clit, relish in the way her fingers dig into my scalp, like she wants to hurt me.
The feeling is definitely mutual.
I pull my head up and slap her pussy, feeling the slick wetness of her cunt, hearing her cry out my name.
I do it again, and then I meet her gaze as I let spit drip from my mouth down her slit.
Her lips are parted as she watches me treat her like shit, like she’s fucking nothing.
She’s not nothing.
She’s not nothing.
Let it go.
But she loves it.
And so do I.
I spit on her again, and dive back down as she spreads her legs wider, bucking her hips, wanting me back inside of her. I push three fingers into her this time as I swirl my tongue around her.
She tastes so fucking good.
Even better knowing I was just in her, and I’m the only one that’s been inside of her since I met her.
I feel her tightening around my fingers, feel the heat of her as she pulls my hair, her back arching off the floor.
“Maverick,” she gasps, and I don’t stop as she says it over and over again.
Not until she lies back down, until her juices flood my mouth. I lick her all the way down one last time, loving the way her thighs tremble and then I pick my head up, my eyes on her dark green ones.
“Maverick,” she sighs again, spent.
“Ella.”
“Maverick… I think…”
My chest tightens. I don’t know if I want her to say what she’s going to say next, but I don’t look away from her, even with her thighs spread beneath me, my hand on her knee as I watch her struggle for the right words.
“Maverick I…” She bites her lip. “I think I love you.”
I close my eyes, lay my head against her stomach. I don’t want to see her. I don’t want to hear that. This isn’t that. This is not love. This is…wrong. This is toxic. Fun for now, but in the long run, it’ll be fucking terrible for the both of us.
No.
I keep my eyes closed, listening to her breathing. Waiting for my response.
“You don’t, baby. You don’t love me.”
Chapter Eighteen
I take her home.
There’s nothing else to be done, and she won’t talk to me. Besides that, I need to find Ria. So I take Ella home, and even when I see that her fucking mother is there, I don’t go inside.
She gets out without a word, slams the door of the Audi shut.
I still wait for her to get inside, but she doesn’t look back. Just slams her front door, too, leaving the screen do
or a little more crooked than it already was.
I call Ria, but then remember I took her fucking phone.
I go to her apartment. No one is there, and I would know because I broke in.
Nothing.
I don’t go to her family, because I’m not that desperate or that stupid. Not yet. I think about driving to Sanctum. I even think about going to my parents’ house, but I don’t.
And I don’t tell anyone.
I sit inside my house, curtains drawn closed, and wonder what the fuck I’m doing with my miserable goddamn life.
And I keep sitting there as day fades to night. As my stomach growls, and my head hurts and my stomach is twisted up in knots.
I think about all the things I don’t let myself think about until I’m ready to get fucked in the head all over again.
I think about Malachi.
About the nanny.
About the blood.
Her head.
I think about all of it.
I think about my brother.
I think about his sandy blonde hair, the dimples that flashed in his face when he grinned up at me or Brooklin.
I think about Brooklin, too. About Jeremiah Rain and his hands all over Ella. Mine.
But she’s not mine. She’ll never be mine.
Amor fati. A favorite of the 6; love of fate. Another way to say that no matter how bad life fucks you, it’s all for the greater good.
My father took that one to the extreme after we buried Malachi. He never spoke of him again. Neither did my mother, even though I know it tore her up. I know, because for years, she spent nearly every waking moment locked away in her study, doing God knows what. If I tried to talk about Malachi, or what happened after I pushed him, or the nanny, my father would fly into a rage.
Malachi doesn’t exist, he’d say. Malachi is gone.
Factum fieri infectum non potest. It is impossible for a deed to be undone.
And I’d made it that way. I’d killed him.
Fuck that. Fuck them. Fuck all of this shit.
The doorbell rings, startling me.
I rub my eyes, glance at the clock on the microwave in the kitchen. It’s nine at night, and I don’t want to move. I’m still wearing the t-shirt and shorts I was when I came downstairs to find Ella had fucked up my whole life.
Who am I kidding? My life has been fucked since the moment I was a born an Astor.
I force myself up as the doorbell rings again, and I hope it isn’t someone I want to kill: Lucifer, Jeremiah, maybe even Ella herself.
Please don’t be them.
But it isn’t. I see a slight figure through the etched glass as I flick on the light and I know who it is, and my stomach coils tighter.
What does she fucking want?
I open the door before I can think too much about it. Maybe she brought dinner because she remembered she has two sons and one is still alive.
But she’s got nothing in her hands as she forces a smile, then holds out her arms for a hug as she steps inside.
I let her hold me, smelling her overly sweet perfume, her hairspray.
“Hello, Mavy,” Elizabeth Astor says softly against my shoulder. “I’ve missed you.”
I offer her wine from the wine rack in the hall, and we split a bottle at the dining room table, sitting across from one another like we’re at a formal dinner even though I don’t have anything made. There’re sugar cookies Ella made for me last night, before everything went to hell, but I feel strangely protective over those fucking cookies and I don’t offer my mother one.
“Why are you really here?” I ask her as I tip back my wine glass, swallowing it all, her hazel eyes watching me carefully.
She plays with the stem of her own half-full glass, her red, manicured nails clicking against the side of the glass. She has on red lipstick, her shoulder-length blonde hair swept away from her face.
My mom has always been thin, but her face reminds me of Sid’s in the way that it’s so gaunt. She’s still dressed like a senator’s wife, with a red sweater that has gold buttons. A thin gold necklace with a rose on it. Her skin is bright, face unwrinkled, as is tradition with the 6: Botox, filler and implants should really be part of the 6’s virtues.
“Things haven’t been going well for your father, you know.”
I almost choke on my wine as I set my glass back down. “Excuse me?”
She sighs, swirls her wine around but doesn’t drink it. Her eyes linger on it before they finally meet mine. “There was a…mistake, involving a client.” She doesn’t stumble over the words, but she chooses them very, very carefully. Because I’m not supposed to know about this. She licks her lips, leans back in her chair. “People were killed that weren’t supposed to be.”
I actually laugh out loud at that, running my hand over my mouth. Of course they were. And of course the 6 would refer to wrongful murders as mistakes.
Her eyes narrow on me. “Don’t act so self-righteous, Maverick,” she snaps. “You bludgeoned Pammie Malikov to death with a hammer.”
I smile at that and she looks disgusted. “She had it coming.”
She rolls her eyes. I know she doesn’t care. She was never close to Lucifer’s stepmother. She was never close to anyone. Not even her own children. Not after Malachi.
“Go on,” I prod her, gesturing toward her with one hand. “Please do continue.”
She looks like she might get up and walk out instead which would be fine with me, but then she keeps talking. “I know that you’ve been seeing someone.”
I’ve got one arm slung around the back of the chair beside me, one on the table, and I tighten that hand into a fist. “What does that have to do with anything? Am I not allowed to have a fucking girlfriend, Mom? I’m twenty-fucking-four.”
“You know what it has to do with.” She leans forward, leveling me with her gaze. “Ria needs to be taken care of, Maverick.”
“Did Dad send you here?”
“No.” I’m surprised to find it seems like she’s telling the truth. “He didn’t. I took it upon myself to come here. To warn you, since you seem to have forgotten.”
I bite my tongue. Don’t speak. I haven’t forgotten shit, bitch.
“You seem to have forgotten that people die in your father’s organization. They die in his work. Your work. I know you’ve gotten time off, since Sacrificium went so wrong, and Noctem is coming, but if you get entangled with this girl, Maverick, she will die, too.”
“Is that what you came here for, Mom? To remind me that wherever an Astor goes, people end up buried? To remind me that my life isn’t really mine? That Dad is a piece of shit and his organization is a goddamn cult?” I stand to my feet, the chair scraping the floor behind me. I slam my fist on the table. “I already fucking know that, Mother. So if that’s all you came to say, you wasted your fucking time and you can get the fuck out of my house.”
She’s still sitting, her gaze piercing, arms folded. I’m over six feet tall, and she’s sitting in a fucking chair, but somehow, she still seems to be looking down her nose at me. “You saved Jeremiah Rain.”
My stomach burns. I know where she’s going with this. I know, and I can’t find the words to stop it. I can’t say a fucking thing.
“You saved him for a whore that you barely knew.”
My nostrils flare, and I dig my short nails into my palm, fisted on the table to keep from upturning it on top of her.
“You saved him, and now he’s coming back to interfere, once more. Lucifer made a mess with what he did in that warehouse. A mess that the 6 had to pay good money to clean up, but he did one thing right. He left Jeremiah Rain to burn. And you,” she points at me, “you screwed that up.”
She stands up, her nails tapping on the table. “You couldn’t let him die because you felt sorry for Sid fucking Rain—”
“That’s not her name,” I say through gritted teeth.
She smirks at me, shaking her head. “Oh, Mavy. That girl was born into nothing. She grew up with
nothing. She will always be nothing, and eventually, she’ll find her way back into Jeremiah’s hands so he can remind her that she’s nothing.”
I clench my jaw so hard my teeth ache.
“You saved him for nothing. You have Lucifer losing his mind. He’s going to drive that girl away, and it’s going to be your fault. And yet you couldn’t save your own brother, Mavy.” Her voice takes on a tone of false innocence as she looks at me with pitying eyes. “You couldn’t save Malachi.” His name from her lips drives a knife into my gut. “You couldn’t save him, but Jeremiah Rain? You’d walk into a burning building for him?” She scoffs, rolls her eyes. As if she isn’t affected at all by her youngest son’s death. As if he means nothing to her. As if he never meant anything at all.
She hangs her head a second, presses her palms flat to the table. And then she looks back up and glares at me. “Stay away from that girl. Deal with Ria before Noctem, Maverick, or you’re going to hate that you didn’t.”
Chapter Nineteen
The next day, it doesn’t take me long to find Ella at The Ark, and it doesn’t take me long after that to realize she’s with Connor again. They’re back in the Guinea pig shed, even as night falls at the farm, less cars in the parking lot than there was the first time I came here.
It’s quiet in the dark, and I see no one as I stand outside of the shed, listening.
“Mom is home,” Ella is saying absentmindedly as the animals squeak in there, and I hear something that sounds like a piece of celery or carrot snapping. “She’s been home the past two days.”
Connor says nothing.
I press my forehead against the peeling paint of the shed, closing my eyes in the cold night. I want to hold her. I want to pull her into my arms, shove her into my car and drive us both far, far away.
Noctem is coming.
My sins won’t be forgiven until I’ve bled them all out there. But I still can’t stay away. God, I wish I could.
“How have you been?” Ella asks, as if she expects an answer.
