Violet seems to have the uncanny ability to waver between all of those things. Exiled but worth my time. An irresistible enemy.
“You don’t have any artwork,” she says. “No pictures, even…”
I consider what I know of Violet Reece. I did some digging this week, just simple internet searches that gave me a variety of information. An article in the Times had a few quotes from her after a performance of Don Quixote with the Crown Point Ballet. She was raised by a single mom who sang her praises in public. Dad wasn’t on the scene, although another search turned up an obituary for him.
Violet was seven when he died.
She grew up in Rose Hill, New York. The same town I grew up in, although we went to different high schools—her the public one a town over, me to an elite private school. She lived in a house that would sell for a fraction of the price of my dad’s in the current market. It’s not a particularly bad neighborhood, but it’s isolated. The homes are old. I took a tour of it on a real estate website, clicking through staged photos. Still, even the real estate company couldn’t completely erase Violet.
She had a purple room with a waterfall mural on one wall. Her two dressers were white with sky-blue tops, the paint chipped and worn. The drawers looked like they had seen better days. Her twin bed was made, the white-and-purple comforter tucked tight enough to satisfy a military drill sergeant.
Where her mother and her went after that is a mystery. But her childhood was in that old house.
I wonder what year she met Willow Reed. Knox thought it was in high school, but I crave to know the details that I can’t get from a search. The first public photo of the two of them wasn’t posted until their junior year. And then there was a slew of them shortly after that, from summer at a pool party, their arms looped around each other’s waists, all the way to starting at CPU together.
Violet was thinner then. Her neck seemed longer, more slender. More breakable. She stood with the same grace that she does now, but there was more self-assurance.
I took that from her. I ground her down into whatever she is now.
And right now, she’s moving toward the one thing I actually care about: a family photo album.
It’s pure sentiment that made me keep it. That made me haul it all the way from New York to Crown Point. There are photos of my mother in there, smiling into the camera. Her on her wedding day, her expression happy and content next to my tall, brooding, asshole father. Her pregnant. Her with me as a baby.
After the wedding day, I couldn’t find another picture of my parents together.
She picks up the leather-bound book and runs her palm over the front. It’s stamped with Devereux on the front, in simple, slanted font. A gift from my cousin on my mother’s side on my sixteenth birthday.
That was the last time I saw anyone from her family.
“Put that down,” I snap.
She doesn’t. She flips it open to the first page, and a photo of my mother and me—one at a water park, if I remember correctly—stares back at her.
Her eyes move as she takes in every single detail, and I’m stuck in the middle of the room. Unable to snatch it out of her hand, unable to order her to drop it again.
She flips the page, and I catch a glimpse of a wedding photo. The cake-smashing one. Candid’s that my cousin printed. I don’t have any professional photos. Nothing father-approved. I can imagine her standing off to the side, raising the disposable camera to her eye. The scrape of the dial, loading the film into place, and the click-and-flash.
The noise rings in my ears, and when she turns the next page, my muscles unlock.
I stride forward and grab it, slamming it shut and dropping it back to its spot on the low bookcase. I grab her by her throat and walk her backward, until she hits the wall. Her eyes widen, and her lips part.
“Don’t touch that,” I hiss.
The breath goes out of her in a quick exhale, and she lifts her hand to hold my wrist.
“What’s wrong with a few memories between friends?”
I curl my lips into a sneer. “I know my friends. You’re certainly not one of them.”
“Am I your enemy?”
“You very well may be,” I retort. I haven’t decided yet—but I don’t tell her that. Instead, I increase the pressure. Her pulse jumps under my fingers, but her expression doesn’t change. “You went with Steele.”
Her eyes narrow. My grip isn’t so tight that she can’t speak. Not yet.
“What was I supposed to do?”
“Call me,” I growl.
“You don’t even like—”
I squeeze, cutting off her words. Her lips move soundlessly. I live for this control over her, and I wait for the spark of fear to come. Because I want to keep pushing her, even when she’s trying to drive me away. Someone broke into her house, but that won’t fly.
I’ll make sure the whole fucking world knows Violet belongs to me.
“There is no like.” I lean in and brush my lips along her cheek, sweeping back toward her ear. My tongue flicks out, tasting her skin. She smells like wildflowers. “I don’t have to fucking like you to own you. There’s no affection between us. You’re mine. Your mouth is mine. Your cunt is mine. Every fucking thought that runs through your head belongs to me.”
She shudders, and I let up long enough for her to breathe. I miss her expression, because I bite her ear and she shivers again. I press my body to hers, pinning her with more than just my hand at her throat, and let her feel how hard she makes me. How her helplessness turns me on.
I bite her ear again, rougher, and then move to her lips. Her lower lip was bleeding earlier, but there’s no sign of it now. I take it between my teeth and tug, and she gasps. Her pulse is a hummingbird’s wings beating against her skin. It singes my fingertips. I bite until the metallic taste seeps across my tongue, and then I bite harder.
She whimpers.
The sound drives me fucking wild.
I release her throat and attack her clothes. I shove her leggings down and her shirt up, exposing her breasts.
No bra.
My mind blanks for a second. Her breasts are perky, smooth and pale. Her nipples pebble. I stare and lick my lips, tasting her blood again. My cock is so hard, I might explode on first contact. But there’s urgency, too, and it seems to infect her as much as me.
She unbuttons my pants and pushes them off my hips. I step out of them and look down. Her panties are white. The picture of innocence. For a split second, I wonder if she’s a virgin. I dismiss it almost immediately. Her ex-boyfriend wouldn’t have let that pussy remain untouched for two fucking years.
I tear her panties off. The material rips easily, and I lift the fabric to my nose. I let her see my expression when I inhale her scent, and my cock twitches.
“Mine,” I repeat, dropping the material to the floor and hoisting her up.
She locks her legs around me, and I slide into her with one thrust.
God, she feels like heaven. She’s wet and ready, and her head falls back against the wall when I pull almost all the way out. I force myself back inside her. Her cunt clenches at me, tight and hot. Perfect. Fucking perfect.
I fuck her like a madman. Her spine hits the wall with every movement. Her breasts bob. I lean down and bite her skin, leaving a trail of wet marks as I home in on her nipple. When I have it between my teeth, she shrieks.