I wrote his name on my mental checklist and accepted the key to our room.

We were given one on the first floor that smelled like mothballs and smoke even though I’d asked for non-smoking. The small room had wood paneling for walls and shag carpeting in a deep shade of red. There was a box TV on top of an old dresser that I doubt turned on much less worked, a table with two chairs in front of the one window draped by white curtains that had a green, geometric pattern. All I cared about was the king bed centered in the room as exhaustion washed over me for the third time since arriving.

“So,” Loren said after we were all inside, and he’d taken a seat at the foot of the bed. Rich was sitting in one of the chairs staring at his phone as he checked for updates on how well canceling our show had gone while I hovered by the door. I didn’t trust Braxton not to run through it the moment our guard was down. “You have a sister.”

Braxton looked up from the suitcase she was now rifling through to look at each of us. The anger and disappointment in her eyes were momentarily replaced by guilt when she realized we were still in the dark where she’d left us nine, almost ten hours ago.

“I guess I haven’t been very forthcoming.”

Understatement.

“We should have asked,” Rich told her, hefting some of the blame onto our shoulders, which I accepted.

How could I feel this deeply without knowing everything about her?

I knew she preferred her left hand even though she was dominant in both. I knew that she held onto her grudges because she hated the truth that she was hopelessly forgiving. I knew she took her coffee black, gorged on action movies, and preferred sleeping in the nude until well after noon. I knew she didn’t wholly believe in the God she prayed to when she thought no one was looking. I knew that her voice’s pitch had been perfected by the synesthesia she’d only hinted at when she told Loren the lyrics he was working on sounded blue.

I knew all of that, yet there were large and notable gaps that needed to be filled. I was also sure there was nothing else I could learn that would alter my course and that scared the shit out of me.

“I have a younger sister,” she supplied with a nod. “Her name is Rosalie.” Standing with the items she needed for her shower, she stared at the floor as her mind turned over the thoughts and fears plaguing her. “She wanted to be a doctor someday.”

I wasn’t sure how many dots she expected us to connect with that, but Braxton made it obvious she was done sharing when she disappeared inside the bathroom before closing and locking the door.

My eyes had barely opened the next morning when I was thrown on my back by Houston, who I’d apparently draped half my body on top of while I slept. He quickly settled between my legs, keeping me trapped with his weight as he peered down into my eyes.

He was angry, and I understood why.

Last night, I refused to talk when I knew they were eager to listen. I’d made demands with no explanation of why I needed them. They hadn’t complained. They simply gave. The only exception had been letting me run away from my problems.

The sweet and woodsy scent of his clove soap wafted off his warm skin, so I knew he must have taken a shower last night. Combined with the intensity of his green gaze, I felt like I was standing in the middle of an evergreen forest. If that forest also smelled like vanilla.

“I know you’re mad,” I blurted when he shoved his sweats off his hips. He then reached over Loren, still sleeping deeply next to us, to flip open the wallet he’d left on the nightstand. I knew already what Houston would grab from inside.

“Mad? No.” Plucking a condom free from Loren’s wallet, Houston tore it open with his teeth before I watched him roll it down his long, thick dick. “I’m livid, baby.”

I tasted cherries on my tongue while my head was scrambling to figure my way out of the trouble I’d landed myself in.

“Okay, I hear you, and I’m ready to talk now.”

“I’m sure you are,” he returned dismissively.

I felt him tug my panties to the side, the only thing I’d worn last night, before testing my readiness with the head of his dick. I was wet for him, but he already knew that.

He slowly pushed inside once he was done teasing me, and he didn’t stop until I’d taken every inch. Still unused to him, he stole my breath even as my legs fell open to make room for him. I felt his mouth skim my neck as he took his time fucking me, and lost in the sensation, I turned my head to kiss him.

As if the war he waged on my body wasn’t enough, he chose to play with my heart as well when he dodged my lips.

“Houston,” I heard myself whine.

I tried to kiss him again, but he continued to elude me. Turning my head away in frustration, I saw the hint of his smile from the corner of my eye and hated him even as I loved what he did to my body.

Houston inevitably picked up the pace, making the bed rock and the headboard slam into the wall as he fucked me harder and deeper under the covers while Loren and Rich slept next to us. I knew I must have worn them out yesterday since they didn’t stir once the entire time Houston fucked me.

We didn’t even try to keep quiet.

If Loren and Rich woke up, I’d let them have a turn too until they were sated, and I was drained of every drop.

I was the whore of Faithful, after all.

The scarlet who’d corrupted good Catholic sons.

The incarnate Hester Prynne who didn’t just stop at one or even two.

I moaned as Houston rose onto his forearm. His other hand then gripped my hip as he wildly slammed his hips against mine with short, brutal thrusts that told me he was close to coming.

Panic and desperation rose inside me even as I cried out from the pleasure.

I wasn’t there yet.

I was close but not as close as him.

It didn’t occur to me the punishment Houston intended to enact until he shoved inside me one last time with a groan as he flooded the condom.

Still breathing hard and seeing the confusion on my face, he quickly leaned down and finally kissed me. I was already wrapping my legs around his waist, eager for round two, when he abruptly ended the kiss. Houston didn’t offer a word of explanation before throwing my legs off him and rising from the bed.

I quickly sat up, holding the covers to my chest as I watched him saunter toward the bathroom while removing the condom from his dick.

He couldn’t be serious.

When he closed the bathroom door behind him, and I heard the lock turn, I realized he had no intention of finishing what he had started. After peeking at Loren and Rich, who were both still sound asleep, I slammed my back onto the bed with a frustrated growl.

I could wake them up, but I couldn’t handle being rejected three times in one morning. I may have deserved it. I may have even loved whenever they used me for their needs, but being here was having the opposite effect.

Suddenly, I was sixteen again and standing on a scaffold.

Instead of the boys whose faces and names I couldn’t remember, it was Houston, Loren, and Rich staring back at me. It was their fingers pointed my way as they forced me to bear all the blame.

My heart rejected the possibility even as the bitter aroma of olive oil assaulted me. Shame was the reason I always stopped myself from talking to them about Rosalie—my reason for joining Bound. It meant revealing everything I’d done and why I was given no choice but to leave home.

Even with five years and hundreds of miles between us, Faithful hadn’t forgotten me.

I didn’t realize Houston and I were no longer the only ones awake until the bed shifted, and the covers were snatched from my body.

There was no time to react before my panties were discarded, my legs pushed open, and a head with hair as dark as black ink fell between them. His warm tongue swiped my wet opening, soothing the soreness there and making me forget my woes. Soon, he began to attack my throbbing clit, bringing back the orgasm Houston had stolen from me as the sweet smell of berries pushed away the shame.

Winding my hips as I pushed my fingers through the gorgeous stands, I tossed my head back and sighed his name.

“Rich.”

We sat alone at the back of the quiet church.

Communion had just been given, and after receiving it, the congregation belonging to the Angels of Purity & Faith fell into reflective silence. Houston, Loren, Rich, and I went ignored but not forgotten.

There was only one sweet exception.

My sister turned in her seat once more since learning I was here and smiled brightly as if she was seeing me for the first time today.

I smiled back.