Arthur didn’t do tender. He didn’t do soft and loving. I was utterly in love with him and had been for many years. I had no idea if he felt the same. He never gave anything away. Had never once let himself slip up in my presence, no matter how many times we’d been together.
But there was something different about him today. My body was steeped in dread. Whatever it was, it wasn’t good. “Arthur,” I whispered, capturing his hand and bringing it to my lips. I kissed his palm and heard his quick, stuttered exhale.
But Arthur ripped his hand back and lifted the hem of my jumper. He yanked it over my head, then pulled down my jeans and threw them across the floor. My bra and knickers went next. I lay naked on my bed, Arthur stroking his cock faster and faster, his desperation evidenced by the clenching of his jaw.
“Suck it,” he said, his thick East End accent causing my body to respond as always. I crawled to my knees and swirled my tongue around his slit. Arthur tensed as my mouth lapped at his flesh. I glanced up and saw his eyes glued on me as I wrapped my lips around his tip, then took him into my mouth. Arthur’s head snapped back and his hand threaded into my hair. He pulled tightly on the strands, and my body thrived on the pain as it always did with him.
He gave me something I had never known I needed. I seemed to give him something too. Arthur guided my head up and down, and I took him as far down my throat as I could. I cupped his balls in my hands; he grunted and thrust harder into my mouth. By now I knew what he liked. And he knew exactly how to get me off.
We were a fucked-up dance of needs and pain and wants. And only we two knew the choreography.
Arthur pulled my head from his dick and threw me onto my back. I hit the mattress with a thud, and he threw my legs over his broad shoulders. I frowned as I saw a bandage on the back of his arm. I didn’t have time to think on it too long—Arthur swiped his tongue along my pussy, making my back arch off the bed and taking all thoughts from my mind.
He sucked on my clit until I saw stars. He worked me hard and fast, giving me no reprieve as he made me come. I screamed out in ecstasy, and before I even had a chance to come down from my high, he had flipped me over to my knees and held my hands on the bedframe.
As I was still feeling the throbbing of my orgasm, Arthur slammed inside me. He pounded into me harder and faster than ever before. I gasped at the aggression, at the maddening pace and the feel of him coming loose inside me. It was like he was fucking the demons out of his soul. But then his head fell to my shoulder and he laid a soft kiss there. Goosebumps broke out on my skin. The kiss was such a contrast to the violent thrust of his hips. Then his fingers squeezed mine. I couldn’t look away from our joined hands as he weaved his fingers through mine on the headboard.
He was holding my hands.
He was fucking me like a whore but cherishing me with his mouth and gentle touch. I didn’t know why, but tears built in my eyes. Arthur never held my hands. He was rarely affectionate. I had always accepted it as just who he was. But I had dreamed of the moment he would show me he cared. That I was more to him than just some posh bird he got his kicks out of by fucking once a week.
I couldn’t fight back the orgasm building inside me. I wanted to savour this moment, bask in it some more. I didn’t want this to end. Because this had to end. I was getting married. This, right now, was it.
Arthur kissed up my neck as he thrust inside me. I didn’t know where he began and I ended as I trembled, crying out his name. Then Arthur stilled and I felt his heat flood inside me. My arms and legs were numb in the aftermath, and I could barely breathe.
Arthur rested his forehead on my shoulder again. Only this time, I felt him shaking. At first I thought it was due to exertion, but then I felt the tears trickle down my back. My heart dropped.
He was crying.
I guided our still-joined hands off the headboard and turned my head. Arthur drew his head back, and I saw the track marks of tears on his cheeks. “Arthur,” I whispered, hearing my own voice quiver in empathy.
I lowered myself to the bed, bringing Arthur down with me. He let me guide him against me to rest in my arms. A burst of heat washed through me as he laid his head on my stomach. He had never let me hold him like this before. Never let me cherish him and care for him. And he had never done the same to me.
“It’s okay,” I soothed, feeling Arthur’s shoulders shake and his unrelenting tears pool on my stomach. He held me so tightly, as if I might disappear if he didn’t keep such fierce hold. A lump formed in my throat, and I knew that I didn’t want to hear what had happened to him. Because whatever it was had crippled him. Arthur, who had always been the most unbreakable, formidable man I had ever met, had been destroyed. I ran my hands through his hair, trying to make him feel safe, feel wanted, feel loved.
I wasn’t sure how long we lay like that. But Arthur’s shaking shoulders calmed, and his tears on my stomach all but dried. He was awake. I knew this because he was drawing lazy, hypnotic circles on my stomach. And he hadn’t pulled away. That affected me more than I was willing to admit.
“They’ve gone,” he finally rasped out, his tired voice sounding like broken glass in the silent room. I tensed. “Dad’s in a coma, but they don’t think he’ll ever wake up.”
My eyes widened in the darkness, then I inhaled slowly, trying to organise my scattered thoughts. “Who has gone, baby?” I asked tentatively, keeping my voice soft and quiet. I had never called Arthur “baby” before. But I couldn’t help it as I held him so protectively in my arms.
“All of them,” he said, his finger moving up to my breast. “My uncles, my father … all the bosses of our firm.” My stomach sank as I realised the gravity of that information. His father and his men were notorious. Infamous gangsters, the most feared men in London, in England, and, hell, in most of Europe.
“Gone where?” I asked, stupidly, but needing to hear the actual words from his lips.
“Dead.” Arthur held on to my waist as if the admission would take his strength away. I squeezed my eyes shut in sympathy for the pain he must have been in. Then it dawned on me. Arthur was Alfie Adley’s son. That meant Arthur was the heir, and thus …
Arthur leaned over me, his stomach pressing flush against mine. He put his hand on my cheek, and I instinctively leaned into its warmth. I kissed his wrist and heard his almost silent hiss at my touch. Arthur’s gaze tracked over every part of my face as though it was the last time he would see it. I could still smell the whisky on him and knew that the only reason he ever would have allowed himself the liberties of shedding tears and touching me so intimately, lovingly, was because he was drunk.
“It’s my time now to rule over hell.” His words cut through me like a knife. “It’s my time to embrace the darkness, princess.” He dragged his thumb over my bottom lip, the move I always loved best. He’d done that on the yacht in Marbella all those years ago when we’d first been together. Even now it made me crave him, brought me strictly under his command.
“Arthur, don’t,” I begged, not wanting him to talk this way. It was too disturbing, too sad, too final.
He smiled at me, and it almost stopped my heart.
“My soul isn’t mine anymore,” he said, leaning down and kissing across my breasts. “It’s Satan’s. And, tomorrow, I will become the devil on earth.”