Damn it. Are those two words supposed to be such a turn-on?
“You owe me at least three dates for that,” I grumble.
My body goes still when something I’ve never witnessed before happens.
Creighton throws his head back and laughs.
It’s heartfelt and happy and causes my toes to curl.
And I think maybe, just maybe, I’m in too deep with this beast.
I’m in so deep that I will try everything in my power to understand him.
Even if he doesn’t like it.
17
CREIGHTON
“Are you ghosting me?”
The question is accompanied by a kick to my side, a poke, and a subtle shove, tumbling me out of bed.
I fall to the ground with a thud and I groan as I sit up, then glare at my deranged cousin.
Landon grins and makes a rectangle with his thumbs and forefingers. “Perfect expression. You’re art material, Cray Cray. How about you model for me?”
“How about you give up asking me that?”
“Not when you could change your mind.” He sits on my bed—the one he kicked me out of—and stares down his nose at me. “You didn’t answer my question. I sense ghosting vibes.”
“Shouldn’t it be me who senses those?” I stand, punch him out of my bed, watch as he falls down, then sit so that I’m the one staring down at him. “You’ve been stalling for the information we agreed on.”
“Not the face, you bloody sod,” he curses while smiling. “And I wasn’t stalling, I was just piecing the puzzle together to form the bigger picture. I can’t reveal anything until all the pieces are where they’re supposed to be.”
Ever since we were kids, Landon and Eli have been obsessed with chess and have done everything under the sun to win. They’ve gone as far as challenging Dad, Uncle, and Grandpa Jonathan. As in, the strongest chess players we know.
They each managed to win against both Uncle and Grandpa—the latter, I think, because he let them.
Dad remains the reigning champion, though.
They also never win against each other. In fact, Eli and Lan are still playing a game they started years ago.
Landon, in particular, has always viewed the world as his chessboard and the people in it as his pawns.
Me included.
And while I don’t give a fuck about that as long as I get what I want, something’s been bugging me since the fire.
Lan watches me carefully before he throws his weight on the bed across from me. Once he’s sure I won’t kick him, he smiles like a creep.
“I’ve been thinking,” I say.
“Oh? How did you find time for that between the excessive sleeping and eating enough for an army?”
“Were you behind the fire that burned the Heathens’ compound?”
“Haven’t you heard? They’re blaming it on the Serpents. Nasty bunch, those ones. Venomous, too, last I checked.”
“Did you set them up?”
“Do I look capable of such satanic acts?” When I remain silent, he grins. “Fine, I am capable of that and more, so who knows? If events can be falsified, why can’t the truth?”
I spring to a standing position and haul him with me, nearly choking him with my grip on his collar. “I don’t give a fuck about your plans, or lack thereof, but you will not, under any circumstances, put Annika in danger again.”
His face turns blue from the lack of oxygen, but instead of fighting, his grin widens, turning proper monstrous.
I release him when I’m on the verge of strangling him to death. This fucker is abnormal, and if I hadn’t let him go, I would’ve probably killed him and he wouldn’t have moved a muscle.
It’s not that Landon isn’t violent, he is, but that happens on his terms, not anyone else’s.
I honest to fuck have no clue what Dad sees in him and why he chose to personally nurture him. He’s deranged.
And that’s saying something, considering my and Eli’s character.
Landon falls on the bed, that creepy permanent grin still plastered on his face. “How would you have had the chance to be a Prince Charming if she hadn’t been in danger?”
“So you were behind it?” I reach out to him again and he ducks and rolls out of bed.
“Once was me being courteous, twice and I’ll fucking kill you, Cray Cray. We don’t want Uncle Aiden sad, now do we?”
“I mean it. Play your games far away from what’s fucking mine.”
My lungs burn with the words and how true they are. Annika is mine. She was mine long before I even considered it, and I’ll fuck up anyone who attempts to hurt her.
No, I’ll destroy anyone who causes her discomfort. That’s enough to land anyone on my shit list.
I’m not sure where this obsession with her will lead, but I’m committed to seeing it through until the very end.
Especially after the semifinals fight last night.
I was thinking of ways to chain her to me, but she went ahead and got on her knees for me. To Remi’s horror, I’ve never been interested in getting head before, but the moment Annika put my cock in her mouth, I turned into an animal who’s solely driven by primal instinct. And when she let me face-fuck her and swallowed my cum, my beast soared to the surface.
Landon circles me slowly, taking his time with the act. “I thought you were no longer interested in pain, but it seems you’ve found a permanent purging outlet. As I thought, Annika Volkov is the reason you’ve been absent from our bonding time. Is that interesting or what?”
“Erase whatever you’re thinking.”
“Oh? This is way worse than I could’ve anticipated.” He taps his lips with a forefinger. “Take my advice. Stay away from her and her brother and her whole fucked-up entourage. It’ll only screw you up.”
If he thinks that whatever the Heathens do would scare me away, he has no clue what lengths I would go to keep what’s mine.
“Want to go to the club? Vary your tastes?”
I shake my head. The thought of touching anyone but her makes me physically ill.
He shrugs, heads to the door, then stops and speaks over his shoulder, “Still don’t want to join the Elites?”
“No.”
“One of these days, you’ll change your mind. Oh, and you might want to check your phone.”
Then he’s out.
I lie back on the bed and retrieve my phone.
Usually, I do that only to find out if Annika has sent me any texts. She’s the type who likes to take pictures of all the little things she encounters in her daily life and send them over with ‘Isn’t this so cute?’ or ‘I wish I could take this home with me.’
They’re typically cats or dogs or any small creature.
So imagine my surprise when I find no text from her in the past…two hours.
Now, that’s rare.
Normally, she’d be demanding a date or she’d lure me in for a conversation.
Not tonight.
I scroll to the group chat that Remi insists I stay part of. I mute them whenever they start blowing up my phone with notifications.
Remington: Who wants to partyyy?
Eli: Don’t throw it in the house and you can do whatever you want.