I didn’t give anyone control, and yet I’d watched and let it happen. She’d shown me what it was to be with her, and fuck if I didn’t want it all. Her smile had fucked me harder than her body ever could physically. I craved her smile more than I craved her cunt, and that couldn’t happen. I’d made her feel insignificant, worthless, and made sure she thought I found her body lacking, and what the fuck did she go and do? She got blown the fuck up.
That had almost taken me to my knees, but I’d watched her in the flames as she pushed off the concrete, and everything within me had tensed. She’d stared at the car and then at her sisters, noting her injuries. She’d walked out of the fire stark-ass naked and stared at me, uncaring that everyone was freaked out that she wore her flames. She’d been fucking hot, and it had little to do with the fire raging on her flesh.
Her eyes had changed, pupils blown, and she’d tilted her pretty silver head before lunging at the shooter. Aria was fierce, her mouth wrapped around her victim’s throat, and those razor-sharp teeth had made me ache. The noises she made? They fucking hit me with the force of a hurricane. I’d never wanted to purr for any woman, but for Aria, I purred uncontrollably because something inside of me had demanded I return her call, giving the beautiful creature praise.
Then she’d tried to fucking dominate me, and it was the cutest shit I had ever seen in my life. Naked, sex oozing her pheromones, and that little bitch smirked, hunting me down. I’d never been so fucking turned on in my entire fucking life as when she’d walked me in a circle, fully intending to fight me so she could fuck me.
Instead, I’d claimed her, and she’d made me come unhinged with the scent of her body secreting pheromones to draw in a mate. I’d bent her over the porch and fucked her hard and fast just to ensure she reeked of my scent. Fuck her out of my system? It wasn’t fucking possible with her. I couldn’t even stay away from her. It was like she was connected to me in some way that either of us had yet to grasp, but it was fucking there.
When she needed to fuck, she didn’t just go find some random cock to ride; she searched me out. She was a fucking hunter, and I was her prey. Soon, I would begin hunting her down, so she knew what it was like to be hunted and claimed by a predator.
I can’t fuck her enough, and that was a fucking problem.
Her body was built for mine perfectly. I fucking hated her, and yet I felt the need to protect her. It was a visceral emotion that I couldn’t turn off. I forced her to fight, knowing she wouldn’t lose. I baited her beast, and it let Aria fight her own battles. Her beast sensed me trying to bring her to the surface and refused me.
Whatever dwelled inside of Aria Primrose was strong and intelligent, even if she assumed I wasn’t mate material. That straight-up pissed me off because she damn well couldn’t find better. I wouldn’t let her find better, not with how much I craved her. Call it selfish; call it whatever, but that girl was mine.
I didn’t save people, and yet I fucking paid the House of Alphas millions of dollars per pussy, just to send Fallon’s bitches back to the Nine Realms. Why? Because I didn’t want Aria to feel that pain if she entered Dimitri’s domain, and found them fighting over scraps, stretched apart from those fucking mutts tearing their bodies to pieces to breed them. Aria was soft, her heart was on her fucking sleeve, and she needed to shove it back into her chest. I sent my brother to protect her sister, Luna, to heal the little wolf before Aria felt the pain of her death. Why? I was sent here to drive the little witches back into the Nine Realms, and instead, I fucking saved one.
Aria kissed Dimitri, and it took everything I had inside of me not to rip his head off with his spine still attached. The way she danced, it fucked me inside. She taunted me, moving with her eyes on me. Aria fucked me on that dancefloor, and I felt it in my balls.
My date, if you could call her that, assumed my dick got hard for her. It didn’t. I didn’t even catch the little bitch’s name because I didn’t care. I wanted her jealous, to see me with another woman, and what did Aria do? She found an alpha and kissed the fucking mutt. He put his hands on my property, and I had every right to end his life, but I didn’t. Why? Because she’d fucking feel it, and the only thing I wanted Aria to feel was me fucking her.
I’d followed her out of that mansion and watched her swan dive into that creek. She’d come up screaming. The pain in her cries tugged at me viscerally, and fucking killed me as they exploded from her. I don’t care if women cry. I don’t care if they hurt, and yet her screams bothered me. It made my insides twist, and fuck if I didn’t want to pull her close and promise everything would be okay. It wouldn’t, of course, because I was about to destroy her fucking world, and yet I still wanted to promise her that everything would be okay? No. Absolutely not fucking happening.
I was the bad guy in her story, the man who was about to destroy her kind. I had spent hundreds of years planning their fall from grace, and then she walked right in, looked me in the eye, and my insides ignited from the flames that burned within her gaze.
“You ready?” Killian asked, and I turned, staring at my brothers and the men who had helped me plan their fall.
“I’ve been fucking ready,” I growled, standing from the couch I’d almost fucked Aria on. Her scent was everywhere here. It was on my bed, in my fucking library, and it was all over my dick—and no amount of washing it had removed her claiming scent.
Chapter 48
Knox
* * *
My men had noticed her scent on me, and yet they’d remained silent. They weren’t stupid and had watched how she acted, and worse, how I fucking acted. I’d been locked in my library or inside the Nine Realms, looking for clues as to who her father might be. If I’m not searching for answers about her, I’m watching from the shadows for her. She was being hunted by more than just the creatures we’d been handling; she had fuckers coming out of the woodworks to hunt her, either by scent or someone powerful was pursuing my little monster.
“You need to wake the fuck up and realize what is at stake here,” Brander snapped, his eyes filling with the embers of his inner fire as he stared me down. He was lucky he was my brother and not someone else.
They’d been silent until right fucking now…assholes.
“Excuse me?” I asked, watching Brander as he scrubbed his hand over his face.
“She’s your enemy, our enemy.”
“I know who the fuck she is, asshole. I also know that, while she may rock my cock, she is my enemy still. The plan hasn’t changed.”
“Hasn’t it? You were supposed to see what the fuck she is, but she keeps slipping and ending up on that dick of yours.”
“You don’t think I’ve tried to get her creature to show its true form? I’ve pushed her creature around. I drove Aria to tears and made her feel like she’s nothing after I fucked her virgin cunt, and all she fucking does is come up swinging. I have held Aria beneath the water and watched her damn near drown, and still, the beast was silent. I fucked her every which way but the right way, Brander. I fucked her hard, harder than I have ever fucked before. She took it, and she fucking smiled when I’d finished. She got blown the fuck up and walked out of the wreckage in flames, and she fucking owned the flames like they were hers to command. Aria made them look fucking good. She fights me, and then she fucks me. You tell me, what the fuck more can I do other than murder her to expose the beast within? You tell me what the fuck you want me to do, and I’ll fucking do it.”