The kiss is anything but sweet. It’s twisted, and toxic; a poison masked in sugar, making you love the taste of death.
But for the life of me, I can’t stop.
His lips break away, trailing bites and nips along my jaw and down my neck, my head falling back on a moan as I cling to his shoulders. His fingers tighten their grasp on my waist, his hand leaving my hair as he lifts me up and spins me, the front of my body smacking into the back of the couch, my arms scrambling for purchase. His palms run down my sides, his thick erection pressing into my ass, his face resting in the crook of my shoulder. He slides his arm across my chest until his hand wraps around my throat. My nipples harden, a spike of heat thundering through me.
Goose bumps sprout when he glides his touch down the flat of my stomach, slipping underneath the boxers I’m wearing until his palm cups between my legs, his fingers sliding through my folds.
My abs tense.
“You think I’m crazy?” he rumbles into my ear. “You make me fucking crazy.” His teeth sink into the juncture of my neck right as his fingers plunge into my core, the sharp pain piercing through me and mixing with the pleasure of being filled.
My head flies back onto his chest, eyes rolling at the sensation.
“Tell me you like my hands on you, pet,” he demands. “Tell me you missed the way it feels.”
“I… missed—Oh, god.” His thumb presses firmly on my swollen clit, rubbing in sharp circles while his digits move in and out, his other hand manipulating the airways to my lungs.
My head is dizzy with lust, heat coiling tight in my womb and spreading outward, spinning me into oblivion until I’m on the verge of explosion.
“Do you apologize for breaking my rules?” He slows his movement.
My hips buck into him, desperate for the contact, so close to a release that I can’t focus on anything else. “Yes,” I breathe.
His fingers slip back in, curling inside and hitting something that makes my back arch, my mouth opening on a gasp.
“Good girl,” he purrs.
Pleasure from his words burst inside of me like exploding stars, wetness dripping down his fingers and pooling in his hand.
His pressure on my windpipe increases, my breathing now constrained to tiny sips of air. Panic starts to seep into the moment, the darkest recesses of my mind screaming at me—begging me to remember that this man threatened my life less than twenty-four hours ago—that he could end it all right now if he wanted, and I’d die a pathetic, turned-on mess.
“And you’re not going to disobey me again, are you?” His teeth nip my earlobe, tingles racing down my spine.
“N-No,” I force out through the tightness of my throat. My insides squeeze, legs trembling, my hair matted to my face as pleasure makes my mind delirious with need. I whimper, my body screaming for release, teetering on the edge of bliss.
“That’s my girl,” he whispers against my skin.
He pinches my clit, his fingers tightening on my neck until he cuts off my oxygen, and that combined with his praise makes my body combust, millions of bright lights dotting my vision as I come apart under his hands.
Sucking in lungfuls of air, my inner walls flutter rhythmically around him, and as I come back down to earth, my logic slowly starts to seep back in.
My body trembles against his, chest heaving from my heavy breaths.
He removes his hand, bringing it to my mouth and sliding his cum-covered fingers between my lips. The taste of myself combined with the salt of his skin sends aftershocks of pleasure trickling through me, and I lick him clean while he holds me upright.
“Don’t ever try to leave me again.”
I want to argue. Want to tell him that I wasn’t leaving. That it was his stupid “first mate” who said I could go outside. But I’m too tired to fight.
So I nod against his chest, choosing to live in my bliss for a little while longer, before the shame and grief resurfaces and swallows me whole.
36
James
I’m not quite sure what my purpose is with Wendy anymore. When Smee told me she was gone, a hundred different scenarios played out in my mind. Did Peter take her? One of my other enemies?
It wasn’t until I was all the way back to the marina that I realized my thoughts were centered around worry, and not around the fact that, if given the first opportunity, she would flee from me and never return.
And that makes me unbearably angry.
Both the fact that she would leave and the fact that I would care.
But avoidance is something that never gets you far in life, it only brings you trouble. True mastery of control is accepting your emotions and then learning to wield them despite how you feel.
My issue now is Wendy makes me lose that precious control.
And that’s never happened before.
I release her and step back, logic filtering into my brain, even though my cock is throbbing against my slacks.
She slumps on the couch, her body rising and falling with her heavy breaths, and I stare at her, shock reverberating through my bones. She didn’t fear me, even though I’ve all but promised her death.
She calls me crazy, but any person who allows their life to be so fragile in my hands is the true one who’s out of their mind.
I was angry that she made me worry.
I was raging that she makes me feel.
And I’m now left reeling with the thought that she’s actually come to mean something; something beyond a tool, or even simply a good time.
Somewhere along the way, I’ve started to care.
The realization that I no longer wish to use her against her father slams into me, sucking the breath from my lungs and making my tortured heart skip a beat. But if I give her freedom, she’ll run far, far away.
She leans her head back, eyes closed and lips parted as she gasps in air. My heart kicks in my chest as I soak her in. “You’re quite beautiful, you know?”
Her eyes pop open, and her tongue appears, slowly licking along the seam of her bottom lip. Blood flows to my groin, my already hardened length pulsing against my leg.
A lazy smile spreads across her face. “I bet you say that to all your hostages.”
“Hmm,” I hum. “Quite the mouth on you, though.” I walk toward her. “You know, I believe your snark has gotten worse since you’ve been under my protection.”
She snorts, her head lolling to the side as I take a seat beside her. “Is that what we’re calling it now? ‘Protection?’”
I shrug. “Do you truly believe you’d be safer out there than you are with me?”
Her eyebrows draw in. “Hook.”
The nickname makes my stomach twist; the way it always does when she says it. I don’t like her knowing me as Hook, especially when she’s the only person in this world who makes me feel like James.
“You have literally threatened to kill me multiple times,” she continues.
Leaning in, I brush her hair off the side of her neck. “That didn’t stop you from coming all over my fingers, naughty girl.” My hand trails along her collarbone, enjoying the flush that spreads across her skin. “Does it excite you when your life is in danger?”
She scoffs, jerking from under my touch, and I relax back against the couch, a smirk lining my face.
My phone rings, and even though I want nothing more than to ignore the world and stay in Wendy’s bubble, I remove it from my pocket, seeing Starkey’s name flash across the screen. “Speak.”