by Ella Miles
It’s been two days since I saw Nina. I haven’t been avoiding her exactly. My work has taken me away for most of the time, and the rest of the time, I’ve spent recovering in my room, trying to sleep through the nightmares.
I sense her as I lie in my bed. I know she’s close. I pull out my phone and turn to the security cameras outside my quarters.
She’s found me.
She’s showered and changed into a white sundress. Her hair is clean again, long and straight. She looks like an angel. An angel who should not be knocking at my door right now.
I should just stay in bed. My body is broken. I’m exhausted. I won’t be able to think straight right now. I know why she’s here. To get her question, which is owed to her. But I don’t want her here.
I roll out of bed, my body creaking in pain while, at the same time, my cock is growing hard, just thinking about her.
I walk slowly out of my bedroom, down the long hallway, and to the front door of my quarters. I throw the door open as she knocks again.
Her jaw drops, making me smirk, as she looks over my body. I didn’t bother putting a shirt on. My gray sweatpants hang low on my hips. My cock strains against them the second I see her.
“Can I help you?” I raise an eyebrow as she continues to stand with her jaw open.
She quickly closes it.
“You’re hurt again. Why are you always hurt?” she asks as she reaches out to my chest, feeling the new wound, gingerly touching it.
“Is that your one question?” I ask.
She sighs and pulls her hand away. But she doesn’t stop looking at the wound or the dozens of others that have healed but cover my chest and arms. Her eyes grow heavy as she sees just how many there are. Until I see a tear roll down her cheek.
I narrow my eyes as I wipe away the tear. “Why are you crying?”
I don’t understand what I did to hurt her.
She grabs my wrist as I wipe the tear. She closes her eyes for a second as she holds my hand against her face.
“Because I can feel your pain, and I don’t like seeing it.”
I frown and pull my hand away. “You shouldn’t feel my pain. It’s nothing compared to what you have been through.”
She bites her lip to keep her from saying whatever is on her mind.
“Can I come in?” she finally asks.
“No,” is my automatic response.
I don’t let anyone in my personal quarters. Not my brother or sister. Not any of the women I’ve fucked. No one but me and occasionally the maids are ever allowed in. It’s my personal retreat, something that is mine and mine alone. I need the space. I need a place where I can pretend the outside world doesn’t matter. If I let her in, then the place will no longer be mine. It will be the place where Nina asked me her question. Where Nina sat, stood, breathed. It will become all about Nina, and I’m not sure I can handle that.
“You’re here to ask me the question that I owe you, right?”
She nods slowly, not sure if that is why she is here or not.
“How about I show you how to shoot properly, and you can ask the question?”
I thought she might enjoy doing something that could lead her closer to being free, but if she’s excited by the idea, she doesn’t show it.
“Give me one second, and I’ll meet you out back in the gardens.”
Her eyes narrow, but she nods as she walks away.
I hurry back inside and change into jeans, a gray shirt, and dark jacket. Then, I run outside to find her sitting on the edge of one of the retaining walls that contains bright red roses.
“You look beautiful,” I say without meaning to when I see her.
Her cheeks blush a little.
I chuckle. “So, me calling you beautiful embarrasses you, but my brother and I fucking you at the same time doesn’t?”
That earns me a grin. “Sex is meaningless; it just feels good. But calling me beautiful means something.”
“What do you think it means?”
She shrugs. “That you think I look beautiful right now. It’s not surprising since I showered for the first time since I came here and am wearing something other than a dirty wedding dress.”
I shake my head. “No, it’s not that. You’ve always been gorgeous, but today, you seem different. You carry yourself with your head held higher. You have an aura around you.”
She blushes again, and I find myself wanting to make her blush again and again.
“Come on, let me show you how to shoot a gun properly, so if you are ever given the chance to shoot me again, you won’t miss.”
She jumps off the ledge. “Hey! That’s not fair. I didn’t miss.”
I smirk. “So, you were aiming to just graze my shoulder? Because it looked like you wanted to kill me.”
“It was just a threat. I wanted to know where we stood. That’s all.”
“Uh-huh,” I say as I lead her to the outdoor shooting range down the hill.
She follows, happily skipping along. I don’t know why she is so happy. Maybe she thinks, if she gets her hand on a gun, she can kill me and finally make her escape. But, whatever it is, it’s contagious. I can’t help but smile at her and how happy she seems today.
“Why are you in such a good mood?”
“It’s a nice day outside, and I get two questions answered by my two new favorite guys.”
“Anyone, I know?”
She cocks her head to the side. “Why are you in such a good mood?”
“Because I get to spend part of it fucking you.”
She laughs. “What makes you think I’m going to let you or Matteo fuck me again? I’m going to ask such good questions that I will be out of here in no time.”
“Because you want to be fucked.”
She frowns at that and turns her attention to the gun range spread in front of us.
I walk into a small building, which is a locker for some of our guns, leaving Nina behind in the sunshine. I almost always have a gun on me, but I need one for Nina, and she doesn’t get to see how to access the guns. Not yet anyway.
I pull out a handgun for Nina along with plenty of ammo and then walk back out to where Nina is waiting for me.
I place her gun and ammo on the table and take out my gun as well.
I nod to her. “Show me what you’ve got.”
She seems a little nervous as she reaches for the gun.
“You’re just going to let me hold a gun? Easy as that?”
I laugh. “I know how well you shoot, remember? I’m not in any fear for my life.”
I grab my own gun and load it. Then, I shoot off a few rounds, hitting the bull’s-eye with ease. Out of the corner of my eye, I watch Nina grab the gun and begin loading it.
She aims it at the bull’s-eye and starts shooting. She hits the target more times than not but never the center of the bull’s-eye and never the same place more than once.
“Who taught you how to shoot?” I ask.
She shrugs. “I went to the local shooting range wherever I lived. They usually had people around who could give me a few pointers.”
I shake my head. “Well, they taught you all wrong.”
“Then, show me how to shoot right.”
I smile, loving her sass today. I put my gun down on the table and walk over so that I can stand behind her. I position her hips square and change her grip on the gun so that it fits her hand more comfortably.
“What do you look at when you aim?” I ask.
“My target,” she says confidently.
I laugh. “Yes, but what part specifically?”
“The heart.”
“You should aim just below the heart. You almost always miss high.”
She nods, adjusting her aim to the stomach of the fake target.
“Now, try.”
She does. Shooting a couple of shots that are more centered on the target.
She smiles at her improvement.
“That’s better.” I walk back over and put my hands
on her shoulders, which are still much too tense to get a good shot off. I feel her shoulders relax automatically in my grasp. “You have to stay relaxed when you shoot. If you tense up, you will miss every time. Staying relaxed ensures your aim is on target.”
She takes a deep breath, trying to stay as relaxed as she can.
“Lastly, you need to want to hit your target.”
She turns and looks at me. “What do you mean?”
“When you tried to shoot me on the plane, you weren’t committed. You didn’t really want to shoot me. The only way you actually shoot someone is with intention. You have to want to shoot them.”
She frowns. “But I did want to shoot you on the plane.”
I sigh. “Maybe a small part of you didn’t. Is that possible?”
“Maybe.”
“Then, that’s your biggest problem. You will never shoot someone you don’t want to shoot. It’s harder than you think.”
“How do I want to shoot someone?”
“Hopefully, you won’t have to. But you have to find the one thing that drives you to pull the trigger. The one thing that is worth you saving. That is worth more than that person’s life.”
She nods.
“Try again.”
She turns back to the cutout of a man across from her. I keep my hands on her shoulders until she relaxes again. And then I take a step back. She takes a few seconds to gather whatever she thinks is enough to get her to actually hit her target.
And then she fires. Over and over and over until she has used all of the bullets in the gun.
She tosses her gun down on the table and turns to me with the largest grin I’ve seen on her face. She throws her arms around my neck as she tries to kiss me. I evade her kiss and just tightly hold her in my arms, taking in the smell of her hair as I do. A smell I will never forget. I love having her in my arms, and it’s a feeling I’m not used to. I’m not used to having a woman or anyone hugging me for any reason.
She slowly pulls away with the same smile on her face. “Thank you. I think I can finally shoot someone now if I want it badly enough.”
I nod as I look at where she perfectly hit the cutout in the chest every single time she shot. “I think you could. Even me, if you wanted it badly enough.”
She shrugs. “Don’t be snarky. I just might do that.”
I smile. “If I hurt you again, you’d better shoot me.”
Her frown slowly dissolves off her face.
I lift her chin for her to look at me. “What’s wrong?”
“Why won’t you kiss me?”
I smile at how adorable she looks. “Is that your one question?”
She scrunches her face. “No…yes. I don’t know.”
I laugh. “Well, you have to decide first before I answer you.”
She sighs. “It’s really not fair, you know. I answer all of your questions.”
“Sorry, I never said that this would be fair.”
“I need a few minutes to decide what I want to ask.”
“I’ll answer whatever question you want. And then I’ll fuck you, and you can ask me another question.”
She laughs. “We will see about that.”
“No, I know that is exactly what is going to happen.”
She frowns. “No, you wish.”
“Fine, I wish. I wish every single day that you would let me fuck you.”
Nina walks over to the edge of the hill that looks down on the vast empty space sitting behind our mansion.
I try to give her space to decide what question she wants to ask, it’s not in my nature to not try to control her. She needs to ask me why I don’t kiss her. It would be a waste of a question, but then I can fuck her again. And hopefully again and again until she figures out the truth.
I put my hands in the pockets of my jeans to keep from obsessively wrapping my arms around her. But I don’t keep my distance. I stand practically on top of her as she looks out at the beautiful world below her that she is no longer a part of. I intently stare at her as she closes her eyes, just feeling the sun beaming down on her. I don’t know how she can find any pleasure in the world anymore. She has to hate it after what it’s done to her.
The wind starts blowing, and her hair gets caught in it, blowing wildly in front of her face. When it slows, I can’t help but tuck her hair behind her ear again.
She opens her eyes. Her eyes that were full of brightness a second ago have turned to a darkness of concern.
“Why haven’t you kissed me?” she says without hesitation.
I pause, waiting to make sure that is really the one question she wants to ask me. “Because kissing does nothing for me and means everything to you.”
She scrunches her nose as she stares at me.
“I don’t want you so that I can kiss you. I want you, so I can fuck you. That might seem harsh, but I don’t want you for the fairy tale. I’m not your savior. I’m not even a good guy. Good guys kiss the girls they are with. They bring them flowers, take them on dates, care for them. I do none of those things, so why would I do the first?”
She sighs. “What about the kiss means everything to me? Why wouldn’t you want to take my kisses from me if they mean so much to me and you want to own me?”
“I think you having one piece of yourself that I don’t steal means that you still have hope. And, when you have hope that you will escape, it makes the sex that much better.”
She frowns. “I think you are lying.”
“I don’t lie.”
She nods. “You don’t lie to me, only to yourself.”
“What?”
She shakes her head. “Why do you only call me Nina?”
“Because that’s your name. Why bother spending time coming up with something else?”
“Because you care about me. Your brother calls me beautiful, sweetheart, pretty. It’s not that hard to just say how you feel.”
“I do say how I feel. I just don’t feel much. And Matteo is a better man than me.”
“So, you don’t care about me?”
“Nope. Other than I want you alive to fuck, I don’t care.”
Nina faces forward again so that I can’t see her face. She’s mad; I’m sure of it.
“I told you that you would end up fucking me today. You wasted your question. You learned nothing new, even after I answered your follow up questions, they were all a waste.”
She crosses her arms as she looks at me with a grin that I wasn’t expecting. “What makes you think I learned nothing useful? I don’t think I wasted my question at all.”
I laugh. “You’re delusional if you think knowing why I won’t kiss you is helpful at all.”
She shrugs. “Maybe the game I’m playing is different than the game you are playing.”
I sigh and watch her as she starts walking back toward the house. “Where are you going?”
“To get my question answered by Matteo.”
I frown. She hasn’t asked Matteo her question yet even though it’s been two days since we fucked.
What has she been doing? Or has she fucked Matteo again since she fucked us both?
I stand frozen as I watch her skip happily back into the mansion like she doesn’t have a care in the world. I know what game she is playing. I know why she is so happy.
She has feelings for both of us. Her obsessive tendencies haven’t left even though she’s been trying to harness them for years. They are still there, bubbling under the surface.
She cares about us. Maybe even loves us. At the very least, she’s beginning to obsess about us. That much is clear. And that can’t happen. She can’t have both of us. Eventually, she will have to choose. Not just between us but a chance at life again beyond her obsession with us.
18
Matteo
Me and my stupid games within the game. I don’t like sharing Nina—not with my brother, not anyone. So, why the hell did I bring up the idea of her fucking us for questions?
Because I was thinking with m
y cock instead of my head—as usual.
The only pleasure the new rule brings me is that it must be making Arlo fucking mad to have to share her with me. He’s never admitted that he has any feelings toward her, but I know that he does. How could he not?
I have fucking feelings toward her. I want her all to myself. I want to care for her. I want to own her. I want to love her even. But I have no idea how to get out of this ridiculous mess that we are in to make any of my feelings come true. I’m afraid that, no matter how this works out, I’m going to lose her.
I’m not okay with that. I won’t let her lose her life because I care about her. I don’t have any idea how to save her, but I want to save her. Almost as much as I want to win the game that my brother and I play.
I already know that Nina left my bed hours ago, but still, I glance over to her spot in my bed, hoping that she is there.
She isn’t.
I groan. What’s the point of getting out of bed then if she isn’t going to be here?
She’s probably chasing my fucking brother. I hear a knock on the main door to my quarters. I groan again. Guess she’s not off, fucking my brother. Because I’m sure it’s my damn brother at the door, coming to complain that I didn’t do something right or that I should be practicing shooting or working out or training or preparing the team for our next meeting in case it involves the use of firearms, as they all inevitably end up.
I don’t want to deal with him today. I’m already as prepared as I’m going to be for our next fight. If we are smart, we will lay low for a while before we try to push any further. They are our biggest enemies for a reason. We need time to recover, and as much as Arlo thinks he is invincible, he’s not. He needs to heal before we try to negotiate with them again.
When the knocking gets louder, I finally roll out of bed. The man never sleeps. If I’d gotten shot in the stomach, I would be out cold, recovering, for at least a week. Not my fucking brother though. He doesn’t believe in rest.
I continue to grumble to myself until I get to the door and throw it open.
My annoyance changes to joy when I see Nina standing in the doorway instead of Arlo.
“You know you don’t need to knock before entering, right? You have practically made my quarters yours. Just come in. I was in bed. You can join me if you want?”
