Scarred (Never After #2)(84)

After we were sated, she placed her head on my chest and asked about the rebels, and I told her of my goals. We planned and plotted until the early morning hours, my heart straining against its cage with every whispered word, not realizing how much I ached to have her this way. As my equal. As my queen.

“She’s pretty when you draw her, but she’s prettier in person,” Simon notes.

“She is,” I confirm again.

He’s quiet for a few moments, and then he glances out at the gates as they open up, a set of three automobiles driving through into the front courtyard and rolling to a stop, my heart pulling tight in my chest, knowing that Sara is in one of them, most likely on the arm of my brother, so close yet so far away.

My jaw clenches at the thought of them.

“Do you think that one day, maybe I’ll be able to have a lady?” Simon asks.

I break my stare away from the cars, looking to him instead, my brows rising. “You can have anything you dare to dream of, little lion.”

He nods, before his eyes shutter. “Well… then… do you think maybe one day, I can have a dad?”

My stomach rolls and I lean my head back against the trunk of the tree, tapping my fingers on my knee as I stare at him, having no clue what to say. “Having a father is overrated. Trust me, I speak from experience.”

He chews on his lip, his enormous amber eyes wide and trusting. “Do you think maybe you could do it?”

My heart squeezes.

“No one would have to know,” he rushes out, his tone hopeful. “It’d just be pretend, anyway. And it could be fun! Like… like now, only, you tell me you love me and teach me how to be a man.”

“I don’t think your mother would approve,” I chuckle through the ache that’s digging its way through my chest as I reach out to ruffle the top of his head.

He scoffs, his eyes going to the ground, disappointment drooping his shoulders. “Mama wouldn’t even notice.”

“I tell you what,” I sigh, closing the sketchbook and placing it to my side, before turning to face him. “I can’t be your father, but I’ll always be your friend.”

“Yeah, okay,” he mumbles, his toe kicking the blades of grass.

“There’s a secret place my father used to take me at the cliff’s edge at the back of the castle. One day soon, I’ll take you there. And I’ll teach you everything I know.”

His eyes light up, that gappy-toothed grin coming back full force. “Promise?”

Laughter from across the courtyard draws my attention away before I respond, and even though I know what I’ll witness, even though I expected it, white fiery rage surges through my body, regardless.

Michael and Sara pose for a cameraman, his arm wrapped around her waist and his fingers gripping her tight to his side.

My teeth grind until they threaten to break in half, and I have to restrain myself from standing up and going over to rip his fingers off of her. But I breathe deep, reaching in my pocket and pulling out a joint instead, allowing the hash to buzz through my veins and do its best attempt at keeping the jealousy at bay. It doesn’t work, the feeling slamming into my chest and spreading like a poison until everything I see is tinged in green.

She twists her head, glancing around the courtyard as if she can sense that I’m near, and then she locks her gaze on me. I hold her stare, my dick straining and my insides seething with the need to stake my claim.

I want to grab her from his hold and bend her over the hood of my brother’s favorite automobile, flipping up her skirts and impaling her deep on my cock until she screams out my name and gives everyone else a show.

Maybe then he’d know better than to put his mangy hands on her.

I’ve come on her and in her and told her she was mine. Yet he’s the one who gets to parade her around to the world.

And when he leans in, his arm tightening around her waist and bending her backward to kiss her on the lips, I lose it, shooting to a stand so fast that Simon jolts from the movement, my vision blurring to everything except the murderous rage that’s pouring through my insides.





CHAPTER 48





Sara B.





I’ve been waiting for him. I knew it was only a matter of time after Michael bent me backward and pressed his thin lips to mine.

But what I didn’t expect was for him to not show up for hours, until the dead of the night, and then storm into my quarters without even knocking.

“Tristan.” My hand shoots to my chest, the other tightening around my water cup as he rushes across the room with fire in his eyes.

“What are you—”

He walks into me, the glass in my hand dropping to the ground and shattering as he shoves me against the wall, his lips claiming mine in a brutal kiss. I moan, my arms flying up to wrap around his shoulders as he consumes me, his body pressing against mine as he licks inside my mouth, his hands roaming over my sides like he can’t bear the thought of not touching me.

“You let him put his hands on you,” he rasps, his voice tortured and low.

“What would you have had me do?” I whisper back, as he sucks and bites down the length of my neck. I tilt my head to give him better access, my core pulsing with need, his possessiveness spreading arousal through my insides, loving the way it feels to be wanted so desperately by someone with so much power.