“What you have to do for what, Deke?” she asked, stepping away from me and giving herself some space.
“To get you to forgive me,” I replied simply.
Delaney’s eyes widened a fraction of a second before she let out a hurtful, bitter laugh. “Are you serious?” she asked incredulously. “Do you honestly think, for one second, I would ever forgive you for what you did to me?” Her brows drew downward. “Do you truly believe I’d forgive you for humiliating me the way you did? For flaunting Melissa in my face? For not trusting me? For telling everyone I’m horrible in bed? For telling me to abort your mistake?”
I flinched at that.
Every word was like the lash of a whip. A lash I deserved for what I did to her.
But I couldn’t let guilt distract me from my goal here. I knew I didn’t deserve her forgiveness. I knew she deserved better. I knew I’d never be worthy.
But that didn’t matter.
I was struggling with living without her when I thought she had betrayed me, so knowing she hadn’t?
There was no way I was letting her go.
“Tell me what to do,” I repeated.
“Leave me alone,” she responded, certain of her answer. “Leave me alone and never bother me again, Deke.”
“I can’t do that,” I told her honestly.
“Well, then I don’t know what to tell you, because that’s all I want from you,” she said again.
“Delaney, I’m sorry. I-”
“I don’t want you to be sorry!” she yelled, dropping her cold act. “I don’t want an apology from you! I want you to leave me alone, Deke. I want you gone from my life, my memories, my everything!”
I refused to believe that. I had to. I’d lose my mind otherwise. “And if you’re pregnant?”
I watched her spine snap straight, and pure loathing crawled across her beautiful features. “Then I’ll charge it to your tab,” she said, throwing my words back in my face.
“You’d really do that?” Intellectually, I knew there was nothing I could do about what choices she made regarding her body. Emotionally, I knew I deserved her words and that threat. But I couldn’t bring myself to believe she’d really do that.
Her eyes started to shine, and I knew she hated the idea as much as I did. “Luckily, we never have to find out,” she said, gracing me with a mercy I hadn’t granted her. “I started my period yesterday.”
I stepped towards her, but she matched my step and move back from me. “Delaney, I’ll do whatever you ask of me, except leave you alone,” I told her. “I fucked up. I know that, and you’ll never know how sorry I am. But I love yo-”
“Don’t,” she spat. “Do not tell me you love me. You don’t love me, Deke. You don’t know the first thing about love and how to love someone.”
“That’s not true,” I argued.
Delaney took a deep breath and I could see my presence taking a toll on her. “I’ll never forgive you, Deke. I’ll never forgive you, and I don’t want anything to do with you. I want to forget you ever tainted my life, and I want to go on to be with someone who…well, who’s not you.”
I had my hands wrapped around her upper arms and shook her in desperation. “No one else will ever have you, Delaney,” I snarled, and it didn’t matter that I was in the wrong. “You’re mine. You’re mine, and I’m sorry I didn’t take good care of you. I’m sorry I…couldn’t see past my jealousy and insecurities to treat you the way you deserve to be treated. But I am not letting you go, Lamb. Ever.” Tears started streaming down her face and they gave me hope. She had to feel something besides hate for me if she was crying, right?
Wrong.
“I don’t love you anymore, Deke,” she said, slicing me in half. “I don’t think I ever loved you or else I don’t think I would have been able to move on from you so quickly.”
She was lying.
She had to be lying.
I fucked up, and she was just punishing me by telling me these…lies.
“You don’t love me?”
Delaney shook her head. “No, Deke, I don’t.”
Chapter 36
Delaney~
I was lying.
I was very much in love with Deke still, but it wasn’t enough.
There was no way I’d be able to forget and forgive what he did to me.
I wasn’t as strong as Emerson.
I also knew I needed to get away from him, because every second he stood there was a threat to my pride and my sanity.
Deke damaged me with what he did, and I didn’t feel as if I’d ever be able to trust him again. “Deke, I…I have to go. I need to finish packing and-”
His head reared back, shocked. “Packing?”
Shit.
I hadn’t meant to let him in on my plans, but what did it matter. Regardless of what he was professing, he couldn’t stop me from leaving, and I could always get a restraining order on him if I had to.
“It’s not your business, Deke,” I replied, needing to get away from him.
His hold on my arms tightened. “Everything about you is my business, Delaney,” he fumed. “Christ, Delaney. I’m so fucking sorry. Tell me what to do, and I will fucking do it!”
I wasn’t ready to sheath my claws yet. I cocked my head and asked, “Let me ask you something, Deke. What happens if I forgive you?”
His hands dropped from my arms and he slid them into the front pockets of his school uniform. He and Winston had obviously ditched school to harass me. “What do you mean?” he asked, slightly confused. “If you forgive me…well, we put this behind us and be together like we’re supposed to be.”
God, men really were clueless.
“So, what happens the first time you reach over to touch me, and all I see is your hand on Melissa’s thigh instead of mine?” Deke paled, but I didn’t relent. “What happens the first time you join me in bed, and I lock up because I don’t know what I’m doing? What happens when you get brave enough to finally try anal sex, and all I can think about is Winston while you’re inside me?”
“Stop it, Delaney,” he snapped.
“What happens the first time there’s a pregnancy scare, and I can’t tell you because your solution to the problem is to run down to the clinic?”
“I said, stop it,” he begged.
“Or how about the first time another guy tells me I’m beautiful, and I believe him because I will always feel inadequate around you?” The last thing in the world I’d ever want to be is a cheater, but even though the digs were designed to hurt Deke, that didn’t make them any less true. Deke’s attacked against me had been personal, and his aim had been true.
Before I knew what he was about, Deke’s hands shot out, grabbed my face and he crushed his lips to mine. He kissed me like he did that day next to his car when he gave me the safety pin. He was kissing me with so much emotion, I felt powerless to resist.
I felt powerless to resist because I was pathetic, and I wanted this kiss to undo everything. I wanted the pain to go away so badly that I opened up and let him in.
The next few minutes were nothing but crashing and burning with desperation and fear. Desperate to forget the past few days, and fear because we knew we wouldn’t be able to. It wasn’t until I heard a door shut behind me that the fog of lust lifted, and I noticed that Deke had walked us back into the house.
I broke off the kiss trying to get a grip on where this was going. “Deke-”
“No, Delaney,” he snapped. “You’re mine. You’re fucking mine and you can’t tell me to stop.”
As confused, hurt, angry, and lonely as I was, I still wasn’t without complete sense. “Deke, we can’t,” I breathed as he started sucking on my neck; marking me. “I’m on my period,” I reminded him.
His answer was to drag me to the nearest guest bathroom and plop me on the counter. Stepping in between my spread thighs, he growled, “Do you think I give a fuck if you’re bleeding or not?”
Evidently not.
But that wasn’t my
biggest issue. I’d been letting Deke do whatever he wanted to do to me since the first night I slept with him. I always knew my period wasn’t anything that was ever going to deter him. “Deke, stop it!” I said more forcefully.
I knew Deke Marlow was dark. I knew he was ruthless. I knew he was relentless. And I knew he was…evil.
I knew it.
But I never knew just how dark he was or how evil his soul was until he grabbed me by my chin and said, “I’m taking you, Delaney, whether you want me to or not.” I gasped as his hold tightened on my face. I could literally feel the darkness swimming in his veins shimmer over me. “I own you. I own you like I have receipt for you in my back pocket.”
“Deke-”
“You’re mine,” he repeated. “You’re mine and I will make this right, I swear to God. I will undo everything I did to you, but you will not tell me no. And there’s no way I’m every going to let you leave me.”
My hands pushed at his chest. “Fuck you! You can’t undo it!”
His hand wrapped around my neck and he squeezed. “Then you shouldn’t have kissed me back!” he roared in my face, right before he started tearing at my shorts.
The fight was on.
I knew I wasn’t going to win, but I had to fight. I couldn’t just give in no matter how much my heart wanted to. My heart wanted to forgive him, but my mind wanted to make him pay.
And my soul?
My soul wanted to feel the peace only being with Deke could bring me.
Deke had yanked me off the counter and, even after fighting with all my might, he had my shorts and panties down around my knees right before he swung me around, pressing me up against the countertop. He locked his right arm around my body as his left hand reached in between my legs and he pulled my tampon out.
It was the most intimately disgusting thing anyone has ever done to me.
“Deke!” I screamed, trying to make him see reason, but he was beyond reason. Not two seconds later, he drove into me, and the moisture from my blood allowed him to slip right in. “Oh, God!”
Deke slammed into me as if he hadn’t just forced himself into my body. “You’re mine, Delaney,” he grunted. “You’re mine, and I will not live without you.” I started crying the second I knew he was starting to win. “I love you, Delaney. I love you more than my own life, and I will…I will…anything, Lamb. Tell me, and I’ll do anything.”
I couldn’t tell him.
I couldn’t do anything other than ride the wave and I felt weak at how I could enjoy what he was doing to me. I hated how I knew I was going to forgive him. I hated that I was going to be that girl. I hated how he felt so good inside me, all common sense ceased to exist.
“Deke…” I cried, not bother to hide the tears.
His hand grabbed my neck, and he pulled my body up against his as he rammed his cock into me over, and over again. “I love you,” he panted. I stared at him through the mirror, and he looked as torn up as I felt. “I love you, Delaney. I’m sorry, baby. I’m so fucking sorry.”
And then I felt it.
The signs of what was to come and shame coursed through my body as my body started to respond to his thrusts. I felt the anguish down to my soul as I told him, “I’m going to cum…”
His hold on my neck tightened and his head dropped to my shoulder as his thrusts became harder, faster, and deeper. “Cum on my cock, baby,” he begged. “Cum on my cock and show me I haven’t lost you completely.”
I came and my scream could be heard all over the house. “Deke!”
A few grunts later, Deke was emptying himself inside me, until I felt the weight of his body collapse over me. Our chests heaved with exertion, and while I was absolutely wrecked, being a girl, I couldn’t ignore the fact I was bleeding.
“Deke?” He mumbled something against my back, but I couldn’t make it out. “Deke, I need to shower.”
He righted himself and looking at me in the mirror said, “I can’t let you go, Delaney.”
“Deke, I just need to show-”
“No,” he hissed. “You can’t…I can’t let you out of my sight until you say it.”
“Say what?” Deke let out a deep breath before slipping out of me and the moistness was beyond what I was comfortable with. I was going to bleed all over this floor if I didn’t do something. “Let me shower, and then we can talk, okay?”
He looked skeptical but nodded. “Okay.”
Deke redressed me, and the blood not bothering him shined a huge light on his psychopathy.
Chapter 37
Deke~
It was done, but I knew it still wouldn’t be enough to undo everything I did to Delaney Saturday night, but I knew I had to do something. I also deleted that fucking picture of Melissa and me off her phone and cloud backup.
We had showered together because we both needed to get clean, but I wouldn’t have cared either way. It wasn’t until I re-dressed, and she went in search for clothing, that I noticed the two boxes on the floor of her bedroom, and that most of her personal effects were missing.
I had felt paralyzed with the realization that Delaney had been packing to move when I showed up earlier. She was moving, and had I not shown up when I did, she would have been lost to me. There’s no way Ava would ever tell me where she lived.
After Delaney had dressed, she sat next to me on her bed to talk, but as I stroked her back, she fell asleep. Now she was laying across her bed, her head in my lap, as I had done my best not to wake her while I made the video.
I was sitting up on her bed with my back against the headboard, but I had done my best to make sure it was visible that we were in her bedroom. I had done a pan of the empty room, making sure to include Delaney’s sleeping form resting on my lap.
Her phone started ringing, but it wasn’t until the second call that she sprang up from my lap, trying to wake up. “What…”
“Your phone’s ringing,” I said helpfully.
She stretched her arm across the bed to grab it from the center of the bed, blinking, still trying to awaken. “Holy crap,” she breathed as she looked at her phone. “How long have I been asleep?”
“Not long,” I assured her.
The phone rang in her hand again and, this time, she answered it. “Ava?” Delaney sat up straighter as she said, “Whoa, wait...” Her eyes flew to mine, and she lowered her phone below her chin. Eyes narrowed, she said, “What did you do?” I shrugged a shoulder, but before she could rip me a new one, Ava called her attention back to the phone. “No…I just woke up. I…no…you’re kidding me, Ava…What!?” Delaney shot me an incredulous look before saying, “Let me call you back, okay? Yeah. No. Yeah, I’ll pull it up now. Yeah, let me call you back.”
I stayed seated watching Delaney shaking her head at me. “Tell me she’s lying, Deke,” she implored. “Please, please, please tell me Ava wasn’t…that this is a joke…”
“I can’t,” I stated simply. “Pull it up, Delaney.”
Her hands were trembling as her fingers flew across the screen until she came upon my social media real-time video. I didn’t say anything, but you could hear my voice loud and clear in the quiet stillness of the room. Because, here’s the thing…I humiliated Delaney in public, and so, she deserved an apology in public, and this was the only way I could think of to do it.
The video begins by panning Delaney’s room, showcasing the emptiness of it, and then her sleeping on my lap on her bed, and finally me. “So, by now, most everyone probably knows about the showdown at the cove Saturday night. You’ve all probably heard about how I was hanging out with my friends, while a girl I was seeing walked upon us, and I kept on with my business. You probably heard about how I ripped her to shreds by sharing her utmost secrets. You probably heard how Deke Marlow used up Delaney Martin and tossed her aside.” In the video, I’m shaking my head. “But that’s not, at all, what happened…
What happened was that I saw a picture of my girlfriend with someone else, and instead of letting her explain, I let my
insecurities get the best of me, because, trust me when I tell you this girl makes me feel insecure like a motherfucker. See, she’s better than me. She’s better than me in every way. So, when I assumed the worst, I let a girl who means nothing to me sit on my lap to make Delaney jealous. I did it to hide just how torn in half I was by her supposed betrayal. But because Delaney is stronger than I had given her credit for, she walked away with her dignity still intact. So, because I was too weak to face that she might not love me, I chased after her and spewed the most vicious things about her, all of which were untrue. Nothing I said that night was true. It was all hateful shit spewed by a guy who couldn’t handle losing the best thing that’s ever happened to him…
When I found out the truth, I chased her down, begged for forgiveness, and gave her no choice but to forgive me or suffer for it. I ignored her protests and ignored how she told me she didn’t love me anymore. More importantly, I ignored how I don’t deserve her and refused to back down…
Delaney Martin is the fucking air I breathe; I can’t afford to back down…
She hasn’t forgiven me, and she probably never will…and, well, I don’t blame her if she doesn’t, because what I did to her was not love. It was selfish insecurity, and she has every right to walk away from me. As you can see from the beginning of this video, her room is empty because she’s moving. She was secretly moving away so I couldn’t find her…
But I won’t let her…
I love Delaney, and I will spend every day of the rest of my life living on my knees for her. I will live for her, kill for her, and die for her if she asks…
Delaney, baby…I’m so fucking sorry. I’m sorrier than you will ever know, but I’ll never let you go…
Ever.”
Delaney was sobbing by the time the video cut off. Her phone in her lap, her face was in her hands, sobbing, and it was the most heartbreaking thing I have ever witnessed. She was crying as if her soul was being torn to pieces.
The Enemy Series Page 56
