Destroyed

10

Roan

The day I completed the final phase of training, two things happened. They tattooed me with the mark of the highest operative, and I was informed of my inheritance. For years I’d lived in a cell inside a giant manor; I’d been told what to eat, told who to kill, and when to speak. I lived in the same black clothes all the recruits lived in. I followed the code.

Then they told me who I’d been before they stole me on my sixth birthday.

I wasn’t a pauper or a bum off the street like some of the other kids. I wasn’t middle class from a generic family.

Oh, no.

Turned out, I was twenty-fourth in line to the throne. My ancestors had been kings and queens; my family God-fearing and respected.

They told me I was to inherit a multi-million dollar fortune of property, jewellery, and cash.

My real name was Roan Averin, but none of that mattered.

It didn’t matter as I was a royal heir to a succession that no longer existed because I’d killed every last person from my bloodline. No one knew I was alive. No one knew I existed.

There was no one left.

Just me.

And I belonged to them.

“I’ll kill you.”

“Do it or I’ll kill you.”

“Obey or I’ll kill you.”

“Slaughter them or I’ll kill you.”

“Kill and sever and decapitate or I’ll kill you.”

The threat resonated in my head over and over and over.

Zel’s parting comment threaded with my past. “I’ll kill you.”

The small hold I had on my conditioning disintegrated, hurling me head first into darkness. My brain swam with memories of my faceless handlers. All I saw were waterfalls of red and slicing blades through flesh.

The urges sucked me deep and dark until I forgot I no longer lived that life. I was theirs. A nobody with no feelings or hopes or dreams. Worthless.

I’d been able to control myself while arguing with Zel thanks to the pain in my joints. The beating Poison Oaks gave me kept me sane—barely. I’d kept my distance—hating her perception, her correct guesses all the while saving her from myself.

Her passion turned my cock stiff as a fucking pole. My blood raced to take her again—to make promises—to swear I could do better. To promise the next time I took her I’d be strong enough to touch her sweetly. But the pain wasn’t enough and every lash of her voice made me tremble, fighting my past.

I screamed and cursed for her own protection. I wanted her gone forever so I never had to worry about harming her.

But then she used the one sentence guaranteed to hurl me back in time.

“I’ll kill you.”

I groaned as the room swirled like a black hurricane, propelling me from safety to horror. The aliveness in my blood switched from wanting to protect Zel to wanting to kill her, and I could no longer ignore the call. The conditioning was too strong, too ingrained, too deep to reject.

The rules I’d been made to live by compounded in my skull, pounding with an insane headache. She was a weakness. She was an enemy. She knew too much.

She has to die.

My jaw ached from clenching so hard, and I howled like the wolves who’d kept me company all those lonely nights. The last of my humanity filtered away. I was about to kill the only person who might’ve had a chance at saving me.

And I couldn’t stop it.

Icy cold obedience flowed in my veins.

I launched at the woman intent on ruining me—intent on ripping my past and secrets from my broken corpse. She had the audacity to say she could fix me. There was nothing left to fix. I was a highly trained Ghost. She had to go.

Soon, she wouldn’t be a threat. Soon, she’d be dead.

She screamed as I grabbed her from the door and shoved her face first into the carpet.

My knees slammed against the floor on either side of her body; my hands wrapped around her throat. The unprotected muscles of her neck were an aphrodisiac to my need to obey. My need to kill.

I revelled in the power of my fingertips as I dug them deeper and deeper into her flesh. The pain in my body from the fight diminished, blocked off just like I’d been trained—allowing me to focus entirely on the mission at hand.

“Fox! Stop it!” Her voice wobbled and wavered before I squeezed harder, cutting off her air supply. She made a pitiful wail in her chest, thrashing beneath me.

Her arms flew back, fingers desperately scratching at my forearms. Her nails drew blood, slipping with red, losing traction. The coppery stench of blood filled my nose.

Her hands struck my thighs, my elbows, flailing around, hitting anything in reach. Her body convulsed as the terror of dying hit her central nervous system.

Her fingers locked around mine; her touch only made it worse.

The fog returned to my vision, turning everything blizzard white. I no longer knew where I was. All I knew was I had to kill her before my handler found out. He’d punish me if he knew someone had guessed my secrets. He’d find more victims for me to maim.

She was a liability. She was detrimental to my mission.

“You always were reliable, Fox.”

My heart raced in pride. My coach, my trainer—my father for all intents and purposes—smiled, but didn’t pat my back or shake my hand. Unnecessary touching wasn’t allowed. “I think you’re ready.”

My heart thudded for a different reason. I wasn’t ready. Never ready.

Standing as tall as my fifteen-year-old frame would let me, I said, “Yes, sir. Of course, sir.”

His eyes shone, knowing what I’d finally agreed to do.

I wished I could kill myself. After this, there would be no one left.

I just agreed to kill my brother.

The final step to finishing the transformation from human to Ghost.

Zel suddenly stopped scratching my arms and twisted her body. Her left leg scissored outward, kicking as high as she could go. Her hand flew to her tangled hair.

I squeezed harder.

She grunted with the last few dregs of oxygen in her lungs; her fingers erupted from her hair, clutching something.

The thick pulse of blood in her veins chugged harder, inching closer to cardiac arrest. My eyes smarted, wishing I didn’t have to be such a coward. I just wanted to be free. I didn’t want to kill this woman. I liked her. I cared for her. I wanted to keep her.

But just like everything I wanted to keep, I wasn’t allowed. They all had to die. Every single one.

I bellowed as something sharp plunged into my calf, followed by a slick withdrawal. Another hot, burning slice joined the symphony of agony as Zel plunged the serrated weapon into my thigh.

A Ghost prided themselves on working through pain—nothing would stop our objective, but the flash of torture brought clarity.

What the fuck am I doing?

I scrambled off Zel and scuttled back. Far, far away. Away from touching distance. Away from killing distance.

The white fog from my eyes withdrew, helping me to focus on the present and not the past.

I’m out. They won’t know if I don’t kill her. I no longer belong to them.

The sudden tsunami of relief crushed my lungs. My head fell forward as I let my hands drop to my sides. I didn’t have to kill her. She was safe. The conditioning ebbed away, popping into nothingness in my blood.

I didn’t care about the crimson gushing from two gashes in my leg. I didn’t care about the red-black stain pooling quickly beneath the wounds. All I cared about was ending my miserable life.

I didn’t deserve to live. Not after the atrocities I’d committed or the lack of strength I had to ignore a lifetime of training. I was ruined, and there was no way I could change.

Zel had guessed everything right about me, but she’d also shown just what a lost cause I was. There was only one way to end my suffering, and it wasn’t through the gasping, wild-eyed woman slouched in front of me.

Zel squirmed into a lopsided upright position, one hand rubbing her tender throat. Her lips were bluish-white from lack of oxygen; she watched me with tears glassing her eyes. “Don’t touch me, you asshole!”

My eyes dropped to her bloody outstretched hand, smeared from stabbing me. She brandished her skinny blade in my direction. “That’s twice you’ve tried to kill me. I’ll murder you if you try for a third.” Her voice wasn’t soft and melodic; it rasped and croaked from strangulation.

“Do it, operative.”

“Finish it.”

My hands clenched as the commands siphoned through me. I shook my head, trying to clear the conditioning. The need to kill throbbed just out of reach, making me wish I could peel off my skin and find the switch to deactivate it.

I needed serious fucking help. She’d never forgive me. I’d never forgive me.

I deserved an eternity of purgatory.

Zel climbed onto her knees, double-fisting the knife. “Who the hell are you?”

I dropped my eyes, looking detachedly at the wounds in my legs. The red seemed to twist and helix into shapes. I became entranced watching the droplets spread into a larger stain on the carpet, turning black to deep red. Who am I? I don’t know. I’ll never know who I was before they broke me.

I deliberately poked the oozing wound in my thigh with an unforgiving finger. I winced, hissing through my teeth. The cut wasn’t big, only a centimetre in length, but it was deep.

I’d been stabbed, beaten, and tortured more times than I could remember, but Zel was the first female—the only woman—to ever inflict harm on me.

My eyes flew up at the thought. Every injury had been given by a man. Either sought out by fighters or retribution from my handlers.

My anger toward Zel changed to deep respect. Something untangled deep inside me, unlocking long forgotten needs. I wanted companionship, friendship—someone I could rely on to never let me get out of control.

It was as if the sun entered every recess of my brain, chasing away the darkness and despicable past leaving me to see clearly for the first time in my life. Hazel was strong enough, brave enough, stupid enough to put up with me. I could suddenly breathe easier, and the hatred for myself ebbed just a little—leaving me suspended, tingling with hope.

I drank her in: her fire, her temper, her amazing strength. She was fierce and quick and smart. She’d prevented a Ghost from killing her. No one had been able to stop me mid-mission.

I opened my mouth to say something, anything, but what could I say? How could I put into words the epiphany Zel gave me from stabbing me in the leg? She’d knocked more sense into me with one action than anything she’d screamed at me in passion. She may never forgive me, but I’d fallen more under her spell and had no chance in hell of letting her go.

Panic raced in my veins with a compulsion to tie her up and never let her out of my sight again.

“What’s wrong with you, Fox?” Zel snapped me out of my thoughts. She sat braver, slightly recovered. Her lips were parted, eyes wild, and the buttons in her shirt had torn open revealing lace-cupped breasts.

I couldn’t tear my eyes away. “Everything’s wrong,” I murmured. My heart thudded with lust, so different to the driving throb of taking her last night. This was different. It was laced with something deeper, more profound. I wanted to be deep inside her. I didn’t want to come fast or search for a quick release, but just feel her heat and rest a while.

Rest.

Sleep.

A chill seeped into my bones, and I dimly wondered how much blood had spewed from my body to floor.

Perhaps it was best if I just let go. Let death finally take me.

Anything would be easier than the constant fight—even if Zel had shown me hope.

A rustling caught my attention and I craned my neck to look at Zel standing above me. “You move and I’ll stab you.” Her green eyes glowed and the knife stayed pointed in my direction. “Stay there.”

The incredible urge to say ‘yes, sir’ filled me with amazement.

Oh, my fucking hell.

By earning my utmost respect, she’d somehow earned a top hierarchy in my mind.

I’d done it. I’d found what I’d been searching for and constructed a replacement for my handlers. If I could learn to obey Zel’s every command—to find that sweet surrender of never thinking, always obeying—I might find freedom.

I would belong to her body and fucking soul. She could order me to do anything and I would, regardless.

That’s not freedom.

I wanted to laugh. I wanted to curse. I hadn’t found freedom. I’d just replaced one prison with another.

My head swam as I closed my eyes. I’m fucked.

The sound of the door locking gave me something to latch onto, but I let myself drift—welcomed the vagueness, the coldness, ignoring the intermittent shivers and lightheadedness.

Sighing, I let myself tumble back into memories.

The stars above glittered in the black velvet sky. A small flurry of snowflakes made their way into my pit when the wind blew from the northeast.

Frostbite was my only friend and I lay on the icy ground with only leaf matter and mud for insulation.

I made a promise.

The first opportunity, I would kill myself. This wasn’t a life. It was servitude. I would be better off dead than alive and doing the devil’s work.

Crossing my seventeen-year-old fingers, I swore on the moon.

“I will kill myself to avoid more orders. I’ll put myself down like the predator they’ve trained me to be.”

My eyes flew open. I’d forgotten that promise. It’d been pushed to the depths of my mind as more and more travesty was layered upon me.

But I could keep that promise now. I didn’t have to search for someone to obey, so I could fall back into old patterns. I could control my own fate for once.

The pill.

My head flopped to the side, looking toward the wardrobe. I couldn’t keep putting people around me at risk. I was too messed up; I needed too much help. To think I could change was a fairy-tale. I wasn’t the handsome knight who won the girl—I was the scarred troll whose only purpose was to be killed.

It was time to end it.

The day my handler tossed me out, he’d given me a goodbye gift. His parting order had been to swallow the pill and erase myself from existence. I fought the command for days, not wanting to die.

But every day I suffered a slow death of misery.

Zel wasn’t my cure after all. There was no cure for my disease.

Rolling onto my elbows, I hoisted myself up amongst multitude of aches and spasms. The beating from Poison Oaks made my muscles stiff and unmovable. More blood gushed down my calf and thigh as my heart pumped harder with exertion.

Putting pressure on my leg hurt like a motherfucker, but I walked like normal, forcing my body to move around the injury. I’d worked with worse. I’d gone days with a broken femur or collarbone to finish a mission before I was given any medical care.

The two slashes Zel gave me were nothing.

I left a trail of red behind me as I entered the wardrobe and shoved aside rows and rows of black attire to reach the safe hidden in the back. Squashed into the racks, hidden by cashmere and cotton, I punched in the fourteen digit code and cranked open the door.

My old life greeted me in a gust of memories.

“It’s complete. Do you feel the brotherhood, the shared power and awareness?” my handler asked, stepping back and surveying his handiwork. He passed me a mirror. I held it up, angling to see over my shoulder.

My back had been transformed from adolescent skin into a canvas of disaster. Every symbol closed my throat in fear—they’d marked me forever. I would never be free.

Keeping my despair hidden, I nodded. “Yes, sir.” Those two little words. The only conversation we were allowed. Every response required nothing more than ‘yes, sir.’

“You did good. You took a while to see reason, but you obeyed in the end.” He slapped my burning shoulder, smearing fresh blood from the tattoo. “Do you agree?”

My eyes flickered to the small boy’s corpse in the corner of the room. Lifeless, blue, starting to smell. I’d done that. It’d taken me weeks to break, but they’d done it.

I was theirs.

“Yes, sir.”

The gun lay like a sleeping enemy, resting beside five hundred thousand in cash, and a small medicine bottle with one word on the label.

Konets. Russian for ‘end.’

This was the end.

Unscrewing the lid, I tipped the innocent blue pill onto my awaiting palm and stared. What would hell be like? Would I survive more unhappiness?

I’d passed up all rights to go to heaven on my seventh birthday. I knew I had no chance of finding the pearly white light people spoke of.

Looking down at my leg, I frowned at the soppy wetness of my trousers. The blood hadn’t stopped. I could just bleed to death.

Take the pill.

It would be fast. Hopefully not too painful.

Working my throat, I tried to create enough saliva to swallow without needing water. My dry mouth refused to cooperate.

I couldn’t do anything right.

The weight of everything was suddenly too much, and I bowed my head against the edge of the safe. I would rest for a moment, then find a glass of water. A few more minutes before I died.

I slipped into a semi-trance state and didn’t hear the footsteps until it was too late.

My reactions were compromised. I no longer cared.

Something hard cracked against the back of my skull, and I plummeted like a rock.

I was out cold before I hit the floor.

I came to with the sharp prick of someone stitching my leg. I recognised the pull, the tightness. It’d been over two years since I’d been stitched back together, and I found in my fuckedupness that I missed the sensation of being repaired.

My head hammered with every sluggish beat of my heart, and I couldn’t swallow the foul taste in my mouth.

Maybe this time I could be put back together the right way.

My gut twisted. The pill! Did I take it and this was hell? That didn’t explain the swelling on the base of my skull or the soft murmur of voices. Someone knocked me out, and I guessed they’d used one of the smaller statues sitting on the tables around the room.

My eyes shot wide and I sucked in a breath. Zel bowed over my leg, her forehead furrowed, lips pursed in concentration. Two fingers pinched my skin together while she pulled a needle and surgical thread through the wound.

My hands clenched as the rush of conditioning doused me with violence. My labouring heart beat faster as Hazel touched my thigh. I wanted to scream at her to run, but the sharp pinprick of pain from the needle helped me retain my self-control. Shame filled me. I was addicted. They’d turned me into an addict of agony.

I clutched the bedspread, panting with heat, shivering with chill.

Her eyes rose to meet mine, bright green filling my world. “I have no idea what I’m still doing here. But I couldn’t walk out the door when I saw you holding that pill. I know what you were going to do.” Her eyes flickered to a medic sitting on the other side of the bed. Masked, dressed in white, his blue eyes never stopped looking at us. She’d brought a bodyguard? Or was the medic supposed to be the one sewing me up?

I blinked, trying to understand.

“The minute this is done I’m leaving, and I never want to see you again,” Zel muttered.

My heart tripled its beat, but I nodded. It was the only way.

Zel stabbed the needle in my skin, deliberately punishing me. “He wanted to numb the area while I worked, but I thought you might like the pain.” Her eyes held a silent conversation.

I know you self-harm, and I figured this would be what you wanted.

I nodded, battling past my headache. “Thank you.” I couldn’t say it out loud so I forced the message silently. I didn’t mean to hurt you.

Apologizing wordlessly wasn’t enough. She deserved a heart-felt apology. She deserved me on my fucking knees begging for forgiveness.

Keeping every part of myself on high alert, I captured her bloody glove-covered hand and squeezed. Swallowing hard, I murmured, “I’m so sorry. I have no excuse for what happened, and I know there’s no chance you’ll forgive me. Just…” I met her eyes, staring hard. “I need you to know you’ve helped me more than anyone, and I’ll never forgive myself for hurting you. I didn’t mean to.”

She pulled her hand away. “You could’ve fooled me. The look in your eyes, Fox. You weren’t all there. I think you need to find proper treatment.”

I wanted to tell her everything. Then and there. I didn’t care anymore about secrecy or what they’d do to me if they found out. I just needed it to be freed from inside me.

There’s a witness.

I looked at the medic. His masked face was blank; body tense. I shut down. I couldn’t discuss what I was in front of him.

Zel caught me looking at him. “Don’t worry. He won’t touch you.”

I frowned, gritting my teeth as she poked me with the needle again. “Why are you the one sewing me up? Do you have medical training?”

Zel’s lips flickered into a tiny smile. “He’s not doing this as I don’t want him in danger. You tried to kill someone who you knew—what would you do to a stranger?” Her eyebrow raised. “I have basic CPR and what I studied to earn a receptionist job at a doctor’s practice. But I’m not flying blind. Before you woke up, he helped.” Nodding at the medic, she added, “He checked your wounds while you were out and agreed nothing internally is damaged.” Her lips twisted into a wry grin. “I’m a good sewer. Ask Clue. I can crochet with the best of them, and I figured this couldn’t be much different.”

My eyes popped wide, flaming my headache. “Stitching a leg is completely different than stitching a damn pillow.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Well, I think I’m doing a damn good job and considering I’m battling the urge to stab you multiple times with this tiny needle for what you did, you can fucking sit there and let me finish.” Fire lit her eyes. “If you think you can stop me, or if you move too fast, that lovely gentlemen over there will dose you up with anaesthesia so fast you’ll be out cold, and when you wake, I’ll be gone forever.”

The needle stabbed me hard, deliberately rough. “Understand?”

Instead of being cowered by her tirade, my fucking cock thickened. My heart pumped lust thick and fast, and all I could think of was kissing her. I wanted so fucking much to be normal so I could hug her and kiss her, and thank the universe for giving me an angel.

“As long as you’re inflicting pain, I can keep it together.” The admission made Zel look up. I lowered my voice, throwing an annoyed glance at the medic. “I want you to know. Everything about me. Maybe then you can understand. I want you, Zel. The thought of you leaving fucking kills me.”

Her hands shook—the only sign of emotion. Her eyes tore away from mine, and she resumed her stitching.

We didn’t speak again as she finished sewing me up. Her touch was light and gentle, but every stab of the needle gave me what I craved. Somehow, she created a new sensation. Mixed with pain and sweetness, making me surrender to her hypnosis, giving me the strength to ignore the conditioning just for the moment.

I fell into a trance. When I next opened my eyes the medic was gone and Zel had stuck crisp, white bandages over the stitched-up wounds. It was only then I noticed she’d cut off the leg of my trousers.

Her eyes met mine before she ever so carefully, ever so hesitantly, touched a large scar on my shin bone where they’d snapped my leg and then pinned it back together after a mission.

I sucked in a breath, clenching my fists. Without pain the conditioning echoed in my brain.

“Did you do this snowboarding as a child? Or perhaps falling off a motorbike when you were a teenager?” Her voice stayed low, none of the anger and heat from before.

She wanted to know.

Joy lit my heart. She wouldn’t leave until I explained. I’d answer any fucking question she had if it helped her forgive me.

For now emotions between us were pure, almost as if the fight had cleared the air for utmost honesty. “No.” My own voice shocked me. I’d never spoken to anyone about my past. Ever. Cold chills darted down my back.

She won’t forgive you. She’ll hate you even more when she learns the truth.

“I’m waiting, Fox. Tell me who you are.”

She’d look at me with terror and loathing. She’d feel it was her duty to report me. I’d be locked up in another cage and made to stand trial for what I’d done. Overwhelming fear cracked my heart. “No.” I couldn’t do it after all.

Her face darkened and her eyes dropped. She focused on her finger trailing around my kneecap. Small X shaped scars decorated the joint where they’d stuck torture devices so I couldn’t bend when I walked. They said I had to learn how to run and move in any condition, including being almost disabled.

“Did you fall off a horse, or perhaps were hurt in a car accident?” Her voice whispered. A threat more than a soothe. Her entire body hummed with tension—anger barely contained.

“No.”

Her touch crept upward, ticking my thigh, brushing through hairs and tracing old injuries. Every inch she travelled, my stomach tightened. Confusion smothered my brain. The conditioning grew stronger with every sweep, but I clutched the bedspread, reactivating the pain from my bruised knuckles.

I wanted her to stop. My body wanted to kill her because that’s what it’d been taught to do if touched. But for once, my brain wanted more. It wanted the softness, the gentle caress.

I wanted more of the sweet torture of being stroked.

Such a novelty. Such a rare gift.

Zel never stopped her feather light touch. “Did you have a boating accident, or fall off a skateboard?” Her voice painted pictures of a carefree kid who’d had a normal upbringing. Had loving parents and a fun-filled childhood. She painted a lie. A lie I desperately wished was the truth.

“No.”

Her fingers flattened against my thigh until her entire palm pressed against me.

The conditioning increased its ferocity until I trembled, trying so hard to ignore it. Her body shifted as she moved higher, following the contour of my thigh until her hand disappeared under the torn material of my trousers and brushed against my cock.

I jerked. I gasped.

My brain had too much to filter.

Don’t hurt her. Don’t kill her. Please keep it together.

All I wanted to do was surrender to the sweet agony she invoked. My hard cock swelled to the point of pain, summoned to life by one innocuous touch.

I groaned as her hot hand clasped me, squeezing firmly. “Does that hurt?”

I couldn’t speak, but it did. It killed me from the inside out. I’d never felt such fucking pleasure. Such branding awareness. Nodding, I moaned again as her hand released me, dropping to cup my balls.

All my life I’d avoided touching it, looking at it. The one and only time I’d brought myself to release had come with dire consequences.

Zel grasped me firmly, squeezing with a mix of authority and temper. Her touch sent me spiralling into a cesspit of memories.

“What is this piece of meat, Fox?”

“Nothing, sir!”

“Then why were you jerking it like it was your favourite toy?”

My fifteen-year-old cheeks flamed. I forgot there were cameras in my room. I hadn’t meant to touch myself. I hadn’t meant to chase the delicious tightness building in my balls.

I didn’t mean to get caught.

“If this is proving to be a distraction, we can remove it. Can’t we, Fox?”

My heart ceased to beat. “No, sir. You don’t have to do that. Never again, sir. I swear, sir.”

Sir. Sir. Sir. I couldn’t stop begging.

His hard grip on my dick squeezed before letting go. “You touch yourself again, and we’ll rip it off.”

“Fox. Fucking stop. You’re hurting me,” Zel snapped. Her palm slapped my cheek, bringing a sharp sting.

My eyes flew open and I jerked my fingers away, releasing her wrist. The moment I freed her, she rolled her hand, bringing blood circulation back into her hand. Her eyes glassed with tears but they weren’t sad tears—more like rage. “Why the hell am I trying to help you? You’re beyond help!”

My heart stuttered and I grabbed her hand again, massaging life back into it. “Fuck. I’m so sorry. Are you okay?”

The mixture of uncertainty and fear in her eyes undid me, and I’d never been so close to breaking down. After everything I’d done, she still hadn’t left. She hadn’t given up, and I thanked the fucking universe for whatever connection existed between us. She persevered with me, not because of the money, but because she couldn’t walk away.

“No, I’m not okay. Everything about you tells me to run, yet I ignore myself and end up getting hurt again. I hate myself for needing to help others—it’s a compulsion that’s driving me insane.”

She squeezed her emerald eyes before looking right into my soul. “You’re driving me crazy but I’m learning and because I’m learning it makes it harder to leave. “

“What are you learning?”

She sighed heavily. “How to help you.”

I sucked in a breath, hoping, praying she was right. I’d had my moment of weakness and contemplated suicide, but now I was ready to embrace a cure. I would do anything. Anything.

I didn’t know what to say.

We stared for an eternity before she whispered, “Do you trust me to do something? I want to see if it works. If it doesn’t, I’m done. But if it does, I’ll stay and honour our agreement.”

Whatever the fuck she wanted to do, I hoped it worked.

“Yes. Do anything you want.”

She braced her shoulders and said, “Don’t ask questions. Lay back.”

I obeyed instantly. She waited for me to rest against the pillows and settled herself on her knees between my legs. My entire body thrummed from having her so close, and I forced my hands under my hips, pinning them beneath me.

“I’m going to touch you now,” she whispered.

Before I could reply or prepare, her hand disappeared up my cut-off trouser leg and wrapped boldly around my cock.

“Holy fuck,” I groaned. My brain capacity zeroed in on her hot, captivating hand. Every cell in my body gushed with need so sharp I felt like she flayed me alive.

“Concentrate on me touching you. Never stop focusing on my grip.”

I struggled to keep my eyes open as my stomach fluttered and my quads tensed to granite. Her gaze locked with mine, clouding with desire.

Another groan erupted from my mouth as her fingers tightened, moving up and down in an endless rhythm determined to shatter my brain. “Tell me what you’re feeling, Fox.” Her grip twisted around my dick, adding a new sensation.

My eyes wanted to slam closed, but I didn’t dare lose myself completely. I might hurt her. I might kill her. “I can feel how hard I am. How much I want to fuck you.”

“No. Focus inside. What do you feel?”

Fuck, I didn’t like delving into feelings. And I sure as hell didn’t want to share them with Hazel.

“Do it.” Her hand cupped the tip of me, pressing down, swirling moisture that appeared from nowhere. Shooting stars and earthquakes took up residence in my stomach, needing to release.

“Oh, my God, woman. I’m going to come.”

Her grip immediately softened, letting the orgasm fade. “Not till you tell me how you feel.”

Goddammit. “I feel torn into pieces that will never fit together. I have so much inside, I just wish I could hit a reboot button and forget about everything until the second you started jerking me off. I was taught to ignore right and wrong. I’m a fucking mess.”

Her hand increased its pressure, rewarding me. “Do you want me to stop?” she murmured.

I wanted to say yes. Tell her it wasn’t safe, that she’d pushed me too hard, but I had no willpower left. None. Gone. Non-existent. “No.”

Her fingers wrapped harder, stroking me, pumping me. Blood flowered thicker, filling my cock with an eager heat until I blazed for more. I shifted my hips, giving her better access. I wanted to be inside her. I couldn’t take much more of her possessive grip.

Zel didn’t move or touch me apart from my cock, and I was eternally grateful she kept her distance. But at the same time I was pissed off, annoyed, and wanted so badly to take control.

With her free hand, she inched the waist band of my trousers down my hips, never stopping her mind-bending stroking.

I raised my hips for her to pull the material off. Inch by inch, she slid the ruined trousers further. I didn’t care about her touching me. I didn’t care that more scars were on display.

All I cared about were the sparks and tingling tightness in my lower belly and dick. The conditioning lost its power over me. Everything ceased to exist but her.

The moment the trousers slid off my ankles, she knelt lower between my legs and squeezed. “I’m going to kiss you.”

My eyes shot wide, shattering the spell she’d put me under. The urge to grab her neck pulsed behind my eyes. I couldn’t handle her kissing me. I’d lose it.

“No. Don’t.”

Her tongue darted out, pink and wet. “Not on the lips,” she whispered. Her thumb caressed the highly sensitive tip of my cock, pressing against the hot flesh. “I’m going to kiss you. Here.”

Oh, my fucking God.

Never in my life had anything sounded so good. So fucking deliciously good. Never before had lips ever come close to that part of my anatomy.

I ceased to know how to speak. I nodded once, eyes wide, muscles tight.

She licked her lips, sending a thrill right through my heart.

The anticipation of her licking me, tonguing me, made my cock lurch in her fingers. Dropping her eyes, she bent over. The anticipation was too much. I couldn’t suck in a proper breath.

I waited endlessly for the first sweep of her tongue.

But then she stopped.

Sitting upright, she released her hold on me. My heart bucked in my chest as she stood up and moved to the side of the bed where I’d placed the leather cuff.

Holding it up, she said, “I’m going to put this on you. I want to give you pleasure but I refuse if I can’t restrain you.” Her voice wobbled; her body flushed with lust, same as mine. Her eyes fell to my straining cock, standing stiff and hot and begging for her mouth. The connection between us throbbed with rightness. Whatever we were doing was perfect. Whatever she was doing was working. I was healing.

I nodded.

Without a word, she padded back and waited for me to put one arm against the metal tree headboard. Doing her best not to touch me while securing the leather, I risked everything by leaning forward and placing a simple kiss on a darkening bruise on her neck. “I’m sorry,” I whispered, breathing in her subtle scent of Lily of the valley.

She pulled away. “I know.” Disappearing into my wardrobe, she came back with a belt. Her eyebrow raised, looking at my other hand. I kept my palms curled, hiding the III tattooed in the centre.

I obediently placed my wrist against the bedhead, hissing as she straddled me, deliberately brushing her jean-clad pussy against my extremely hard cock.

She tightened the belt before resuming her kneeling position between my splayed legs. Her hot breath tickled my upper thighs, and I didn’t know how much longer I could wait.

I wanted her mouth. Terribly.

“Tell me what you want,” she said softly.

I shook my head. It was one thing to accept what she wanted to give, but I couldn’t tell her what I wanted. Not after everything. I owed her more than I’d ever be able to repay.

“I want to hear you say it.” Her eyes flashed and her fingers squeezed me in warning.

A flush of heat threatened to paint my cheeks. After a lifetime of being told to forget about sex, she now wanted me to dive in and embrace it. Swallowing hard, I growled, “I want to feel your mouth around my cock. I want to feel your heat and hear you moan from my taste.”

Fuck me. I could’ve come just from talking dirty. It turned me on—sent comets exploding in my cock.

Zel smiled. “As you wish.”

Keeping eye contact, she bent over me, and without any warning, slid her hot, wet, exquisite mouth over the tip of my erection.

My world went from black to prismatic. I’d never felt such wonderment, such freedom, such deep seated primal happiness. My heart swelled; my limbs locked. I couldn’t focus on anything but her. Her. Her.

I groaned with gratefulness and thankfulness and joy. Her fucking amazing mouth sucked my length deep, deep inside. The swirl of her slippery tongue licked and adored, giving me no chance of remaining sane. I lost myself to Zel. I willingly gave everything to her.

“Like that?” she breathed against my lower belly. “Do you enjoy my tongue licking you, pleasuring you?” She trailed kisses from base to tip, always stroking.

I groaned, trembling with a mixture of furious conditioning and heavenly pleasure. “Yes. Fuck yes. Don’t stop.”

She laughed softly and descended once again. Her hand slid up and down, lubricated by saliva, feeling out of this world. A bonfire built deep in my balls.

I flinched, testing the restraints as Zel cupped me, massaging sensitive flesh. I couldn’t keep track of her mouth and fingers and touch.

My brain tried to revert into Ghost mode. My muscles shuddered with orders that would never be fully ignorable.

Then Zel swallowed my length and hummed. The vibrations smashed through my conditioning, bulldozed through my thoughts, and I regressed to a simple creature. A man chasing pleasure for the first time. An animal with the only intent of coming in this beautiful seraph’s throat.

The bed jangled and shook as I fought against the restraints. I wanted to touch her, thread my fingers through her hair and thrust into her mouth. I wanted to give her everything.

But the cuff and belt held me captive, leaving me completely at Zel’s mercy.

Her mouth sucked harder, dragging more and more fire into my groin. My spine tingled with need; my eyes snapped closed.

Zel was magic. She was a witch. I wanted to come forever.

The last of my undoing came in the form of her hair cascading onto my thigh. The tickling amplified my awareness of her hot, slippery mouth and her tongue swirled harder, building me faster, sending me hurtling toward the edge.

I had no choice but to let go.

I completely forgot who I was and the disaster my life had become and dropped all my walls to my soul.

I came like a fucking garden hose.

Spurt after spurt I jerked in her hold. She lapped up every thrust, swallowed every drop. No amount of prose or literature could describe the intensity, the visceral sublimity of my release.

It changed me. It gave me warmth for the very first time. It gave me fucking hope.

I opened my eyes as her tongue flicked out, washing me clean from the last of the most intense orgasm of my life. She’d taken a part of me into her. She’d completed the bond that I’d felt ever since I set eyes on her.

No one had made me feel like Zel. No one held me hostage like Zel.

She’d successfully done in ten minutes what I’d tried to do in two years.

She brought me back to life.