“Why can’t you just leave?” My voice breaks and an onslaught of tears blurs my vision. “I already let you go.”

“But I didn’t.”

God, he really needs to stop saying shit like that because I can’t hold in the influx of emotions hitting me out of nowhere.

“If you stay, they will kill you.”

“They?”

“The elite group of the brotherhood.”

Both his palms wrap around my hips, and it feels familiar, his touch, the sensation of his hand on me. “Not you?”

“I’m part of the brotherhood, Kyle.”

His grip tightens on my hip. “My question was clear. Will you do it?”

“Why can’t you just leave?”

“You just answered your own question. I can’t just leave.”

My fist tightens in his shirt and the first tear falls on to his cheek. The vow I made to Mom to never cry in front of others, to never show weakness to any other human being starts crumbling right in front of me.

I can’t even stop the tears because I’ve been so brutalized in the course of one day. Not only was it the goodbye, it was also the unbearable depression that came with it.

And I guess I’m exhausted. I’m just too exhausted, and that allows me to freely admit that a large part of me is relieved

That relief burns.

Because even though he’s here, he has to leave so he can stay alive.

Kyle flips me so I’m lying underneath him, and I squeal, holding on to his shoulders. The sound slowly disappears when he slides his fingers under my eye, wiping the tears away.

“Why are you crying when I was the one beaten up?”

“You think I liked that? You think I enjoy seeing you like this? You asshole. Jerk—”

My words are cut off when his lips capture mine with raw hunger that confiscates my air. I taste metal from his cut lip, and I attempt to push away so I don’t aggravate it, but Kyle thrusts his tongue between my teeth and twirls it with mine as if he’s been starving for my taste.

The pungent smell of lust and something more potent permeates the air as he robs me not only of my breath, but also my sanity. He smashes every brick I carefully placed around my heart to the ground and walks all over it.

He nibbles down on my tongue, and the sharp sting of pain quickly heightens my arousal before his head pulls back. “You don’t fucking push me away.”

“You…don’t understand…” I’m panting so harshly it’s a miracle I manage to get those words out.

“I understand perfectly. It’s you who doesn’t. You’re my wife. My. Fucking. Wife. Do you understand what that word means? It means we belong together, not far apart.”

“But—”

“No fucking buts.” His fingers latch onto the corners of my underwear and he pulls them down my legs.

I could fight or push him away, but what’s the point when I’m burning for his touch? There has always been an explosive chemistry between Kyle and me. I denied it, tried to escape it, but the fact remains that it’s existed since the first time Dedushka introduced him to me. Back then, I thought he was only a conceited killer; I had no idea he’d invade my whole world in no time.

Maybe if I have, I would’ve acted differently and avoided being tangled up with him. But even as I think that, a small voice whispers that I wouldn’t have been able to change anything.

Kyle’s fingers tease my clit as he kisses my throat, his teeth nibbling on the sensitive skin before he sucks it into his mouth, no doubt leaving a mark. I wrap my arm around his back, clawing with every sharp bite of his. That only makes him pick up his pace until my whole body is stimulated to the point of no return.

“After this…you’ll leave,” I manage to murmur, not sure whether it’s directed at him or to reassure myself.

The sound of his zipper echoes in the silence of the bedroom and I drag in a breath, repeating, “You’ll leave…right?”

My voice catches when he thrusts balls-deep inside me. Even though I’m soaking wet, Kyle is big and the stretching is real. God, how could I forget the way he’s able to fill me until he’s the only thing that matters in the world?

He slides a hand underneath me and lifts me up so he’s sitting and I’m splayed all over his lap. Holy shit. If I thought he was filling me earlier, the depth right now is nothing like I’ve felt before.

I wrap my legs around his waist and dig my nails into his shoulders. I think I’m going to orgasm and he hasn’t even moved yet.

When he does move, every powerful stroke feels different, almost like he’s touching me for the first time. His thrusts leave the confinements of my body and hit something different inside, almost as if he’s fucking my soul.

“There will be no more goodbyes between us, Princess.” He speaks against my neck, his voice raspy, aroused, but also angry.

I pull back, still looping my arm around his nape, and stare at his face…his beautiful, ethereal face that’s now bruised and bloodied.

Kyle powers into me with the same depth, but his pace isn’t fast. Maybe he also wants to stare at me. Maybe, like me, he feels that our joined bodies are only a bridge for our battered souls.

My fingers stroke the skin of his cheek lightly to not hurt him. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“For what happened to you. No child should ever go through that.”

“I thought you were sorry for poisoning me.”

“You know I did what I had to do for the brotherhood.”

He wraps a hand around my throat and cages me firmly in place. “How about your fucking husband?”

“It’s because you’re my husband that I wanted you gone.” I strain against his hold, and before he can say anything else, I seal my lips to his. I kiss him slowly, tentatively, as if I have no clue how to kiss. Truth is, before him, I never took the time to learn. I hardly had interest in the other sex or sex in general, but he somehow became my deepest, darkest desire—the one I can’t survive without and the one who might also kill me at the same time.

Kyle’s rhythm picks up and he rams inside me with the urgency of a man who has nothing behind him or before him so he can only live in this moment. Our tongues and teeth clash together, and I keep tasting the metal of his blood, but if it hurts, he doesn’t pull away.