How much will he take? xoxo
*WARNING SEXUAL CONTENT * DOM She had no idea what she was asking for. Or maybe she did. Miles was playing a dangerous fucking game. She thought if she made this just about pleasure, she could keep herself safe. That if she played the game just right, she wouldn’t get burned. Too late. I leaned in, close enough that my lips brushed against hers, but I didn’t kiss her. Not yet. "Take what I want?" I whispered. My hands braced against the wall, caging her in. Daring her to run. She didn’t. Her chin lifted defiantly, though her breath hitched. I smirked. "I don’t think you could handle everything I want." Something flickered in her eyes. Hesitation. Maybe even fear. And for just a second, she faltered. Her fingers clutched at the hem of her shirt, gripping the fabric tight, like she needed to hold onto something. Like she wanted to cover herself. Fuck. I had pushed too hard. Regret punched through me, swift and sharp, but before I could say anything, she
MILES His confessions made my skin blaze. Something deep inside my chest was unlocking, that painful pinch that made me breathless trying to consume me. He talked like he thought about me all day. Like he could imagine nothing more than to be buried inside me. The earnest tone in his voice had fear clawing its way up my throat, but the sensations of his movements made my mind go blank as I came. "Mine." I would have frozen up if I wasn't coming so hard against his bulge. I almost thought I was imagining things. I didn’t even have time to be embarrassed that all it took to get me off was a little dry humping. But I had heard it, and it was all that occupied my mind. I guess he hadn’t realized what he said since he didn’t stop his movements until my climax was over. "Mine." The word circled my brain even as he gently put me on my feet, kissing along my neck in sweet, soft pecks, holding me tight. Even as he cupped my cheeks in his hands to kiss me softly on the lips. "Mine."
MILES I tried my best to avoid Dominic for the rest of the day. We usually didn’t run into each other for classes. He didn’t seem to mind it either, which was better for me. I couldn’t be bothered to glance at him as he picked me up from the library after practice, and he couldn’t be bothered to say a single word to me on the way home. It would have been a nice, quiet ride if not for Marcus’s need to ask too many damn questions. "The hell? You guys fighting already?" Marcus flicked a fry at me from the passenger seat. "It hasn’t even been that long since you finally got along." I said nothing. Just kept my eyes glued to the window. Dominic’s grip on the wheel tightened, but he didn’t speak either. Good. I needed space. I needed air. Because I couldn't stop hearing his words. "Just forget all those things I said. I was in the heat of the moment. It didn’t mean anything." I wanted to believe him. I needed to. But the memory of his touch, his voice, the way he looked at me—none
MILES Marcus came to get me for dinner. I wasn’t hungry—not in the slightest—but I knew Maverick would be expecting me. He made it a personal mission to ensure I ate. If he noticed the way my mother looked at me in disdain, he didn’t let on. "Come on, Miles. The fight couldn’t have been that bad." Marcus walked beside me down the stairs. The fight? No, it wasn’t a fight at all. A fight I could handle. Yelling, anger, slamming doors—I could deal with all of that. But this? This was different. It was quiet. Unspoken. This was him making it clear. It was me realizing I cared too much. "It wasn’t," I finally answered. "We simply made our... situations clear." Marcus made a noise low in his throat, something close to a scoff, but I could hear the undertone of frustration. "What a fucking idiot," he muttered under his breath. I didn’t ask who he meant. Then, softer—"Are you okay?" My first instinct was to say yes. That was always my answer. "I’m fine." Or maybe, "Yeah
DOM Something was happening right before my eyes, and I had no idea how to go about it. Marcus almost never said things without reason. Even a joke or his teasing always had relevance. He liked to control mindsets and steer them in the right direction... or sometimes the wrong. He was quite good at it. It didn't take me long to figure it out when we were younger, but when I did, I learned to read the room like he did. It was a skill I needed in order to succeed in law, so I adapted quickly. Sometimes, I'd let him steer me. Sometimes, I didn’t. But I knew this: Marcus always had the best intentions for good people. But the ones who crossed him? The ones who stepped on the weak? He made them pay. That made him dangerous. And right now, he was turning the wheel. Miles’s abuser. He knew. I knew he knew. I had suspected it back when he suddenly started coming over more, when he suddenly had more time to check in on Miles. But that comment in the cafeteria—the one abo
MILES "You guys coming to The Cliffs this weekend? There's supposed to be a wicked storm coming through. A buddy of mine said the view is superb for a bonfire on the north end." "Won't the waves get too crazy? The north end is too close." "That's the thing. For some scientific reason, the waves don't touch the north end. It never has. My buddy says it's Branshire's tradition to bonfire during a storm. The parties are known to be epic." "Small town folks sure are creative... but I'll take the bait. Pick me up at eight." The Cliffs bonfire. That’s all Branshire University had been talking about. It was the kind of tradition that had been around long before any of us were even born, passed down like a ritual no one dared to question. I couldn’t count how many times I heard someone say “Shit always happens at The Cliffs.” Some said it with excitement, others with something else—something that didn’t sit right in my gut. I didn’t believe in superstitions. But still. There was somet
MILES I felt like a different person. The moment Dominic got close to me, my heart went on a rampage, my body flushed with a mix of excitement and dread. I should have pushed him away. I should have made an excuse to leave, to put some distance between us before I did something reckless. Instead, I stayed. His scent—warm, masculine, familiar—was clouding my thoughts. His presence was suffocating in a way that I didn't want to escape. "Is. It. Her?" His deep voice vibrated through me, hitting every nerve like a plucked string. His body was so close that I could feel his heat radiating into mine, and I hated that it soothed me. I didn’t speak. I couldn’t. But my nod was answer enough. His hands flexed at his sides, the tension rolling off him in waves. The golden flames in his eyes darkened into something unreadable—something I should be afraid of. "That explains a lot." His voice was low, sharp. I searched his face, trying to gauge his emotions, but I couldn’t tell if he was
DOM I was silent for several seconds, trying to process what the hell this woman was telling me. Not even the sight of her delicious legs under that skirt I told her not to wear could distract me. My entire focus was on her words, the weight of them, the implications. She was insinuating that her mother had murdered a man. I swallowed. Carefully. Slowly. "Is that not how he died?" I asked, keeping my voice even. I needed to be cautious—Miles believed this, but my mind worked differently. I needed facts, evidence—I needed to be sure. Her eyes locked onto mine, burning like a storm. "That man was as healthy as a horse. He was thirty-seven and constantly bragged about his fat percentage. His death didn’t make sense. But I knew my mother worked at the hospital. She knows how to make things look a certain way." A sharp, twisting dread curled in my stomach. "You’re saying she—" I stopped myself. "How do you know it was her?" "I heard her." I blinked. "Heard her... what?"
MILES Miles: Marcus Miles: Where are you? Miles: I swear, when I lay eyes on you, your balls are going in a vice. Miles: Don’t make me find you. I sighed and tossed my new phone into my bag, the screen blacking out like it was tired of me too. Marcus was avoiding me like the plague, and Dom—he was holding something back. I could feel it. Taste it in the silence between us. See it in the way his hand would twitch like he wanted to reach for me... and didn’t. “They’re probably pissed at you,” Kenzie had said earlier over the phone. She had called to “check in,” which in Kenzie speak meant scold me for not dying harder. “I know I was,” she went on. “If you hadn’t already flatlined and come back, I would’ve killed you myself.” “I’m still alive, you know.” “Yes, and you’re lucky.” Her voice cracked just enough to make my guilt spike. “You flatlined for a full fucking minute, Miles. Don’t think you hid that from any of us.” “You talk to them?” Another sigh. “Of course. You can’
DOMINICI didn’t realize how loud it was in my head until everything else went quiet.The sound of lockers slamming, cleats against tile, water running in the showers—none of it touched me. I was stuck. Floating somewhere between rage and guilt, fear and this fucking ache in my chest that wouldn’t go away.Marcus walked in, tossing a water bottle onto the bench beside me.“You’re spiraling.”“Wow. Thanks for the diagnosis, Dr. Phil.” I didn’t look up. “Where the hell have you been?”He sighed and plopped down next to me. “Dealing with Mommy Dearest.”That was all he said. I didn’t pry. Not here. Not yet. Not with our teammates still around. The walls had ears.He patted his lap. “Come on, lay back and tell me all about it.”I grimaced. “Dude, no.”“You know you want to. You’ve been giving me those ‘comfort me’ eyes for days. It’s calling to me.”The way my eyes were slapping his face—over and over—“Don’t deny me.”I didn’t want to talk about it. But fuck—I needed to. Everything from
DOMINIC I heard it. "She's fucking crazy. Like--an actual psycho," said Tanya's friend. Followed by: "Did you hear what she said? She basically risked her life for the adrenaline." "Kinda wicked though. She's got a serious vag on her to pull that kinda stunt and come out with a few broken bones." "Right? I think I love her. Who is she?" Exactly. Who was she? Her shoulders didn’t slump anymore. Her eyes didn’t wander the floor. She didn’t shrink from whispers—she stood taller, looked people dead in the face. It should’ve made me proud. It should’ve felt like progress. But all it did was twist something deep in my gut. Because it almost cost her everything. I watched her walk out of that classroom, head held high like she hadn’t just shaken an entire room of people without even raising her voice. She was becoming someone else. Someone harder. Sharper. And maybe that was the point. Maybe that was how she survived. But it scared the shit out of me. Because I remembered the
MILES Lunch was over way too quickly. The second Dominic and I stepped out of the library, the stares returned like they'd been waiting for us. Silent, sharp. Hungry. Added by the whispers. "Think she's the jumper?" "What kind of psycho jumps off a cliff unless they’re trying to die?" It shouldn't have bothered me. And it didn’t. Not really. But the attention? The spotlight? That made my skin crawl. The worst part was that Dom looked like he was barely holding it together. His jaw ticked every few steps. His hand twitched at his side like he wanted to grab mine. Like maybe that would ground him. Or maybe it would ground me. It didn’t even matter what they said. They were going to talk. They were going to look. Not because of me. Not just because of me. But because of him. Dominic Black. The golden boy, the prince of the campus—was hovering over the broken girl who looked an awful lot like the one who jumped off a fucking cliff. Earlier in class, I heard people whisp
KENNY Miles acted like nothing had happened. Like she hadn’t unraveled in my arms. Like she hadn’t called my name with my hands on her skin, my mouth against her throat. Like she hadn’t begged me to make her feel something. And fine. I could play along. But I wasn’t stupid. The way her fingers hesitated sometimes when she reached for something. The way her gaze flickered, just for a second, when I got too close. The way her lips parted when I made her laugh, like she had almost forgotten she could. She hadn’t forgotten. I could tell my the way her cheeks would flush when my hand brushed hers. She was pretending. And I let her. I still made her coffee the way she liked it. I still teased her when she got flustered. I still called her Mimi, just to see the corner of her mouth twitch in that almost smile. She never pulled away. Never put space between us. But I knew where the line was. And I never crossed it. Until today. I was behind the counter at the diner, wipi
*WARNING EXPLICIT SEXUAL CONTENT* KENNY "You can't take it from me," she whispered. Her voice curled around my ribs. Tangled in my lungs. "But you can give me something else." My throat bobbed. “Miles—” “Something to feel.” And there went my self-control. Miles barely had time to breathe before my hands were on her—gripping her waist, yanking her against me. My mouth crashed against hers, and she took it. Took everything I gave like she had been starving for it. A low moan hummed from her throat, vibrating against my lips, and fuck—I was already gone. I had wanted to kiss her for days. Wanted to feel her. Wanted to take away her pain. Her fingers slipped into my hair, nails scraping my scalp, pulling, tugging, making me groan into her mouth. “Kenny,” she breathed, and I felt it. Felt her heat. Her desperation. The way she arched into me like she wanted to climb inside me, crawl under my skin and stay there. I grabbed her thigh, hoisting it up, pressing my k
KENNY Her eyes were hauntingly beautiful. A storm in a purple sky. Lavenders on a cloudy day. Such beautiful damn eyes. If only they held a little bit of light in them. I remembered the first time she walked into the diner. It was late afternoon, the kind of heat that clung to your skin like a second layer. I thought she was a customer at first, so I grabbed a menu and made my way over, only for her to throw her hands up, a nice coral blush tinting her ears. “Oh, I don’t have any money,” she said, biting her lip. “I saw the help wanted sign and wanted to apply.” Her hair was windblown, strands sticking to her forehead from sweat, and she smelled like the sun… and honey. It wasn’t perfume—just her. Fresh, a little wild, like she had been running through an open field before stepping in. I should’ve said something. Anything. Instead, my brain short-circuited as I followed a single bead of sweat trailing down her freckled cheek, over the curve of her jaw, disappearing beneath the
MILESDominic met my stare with something unreadable in his golden eyes. Even as I pulled him closer, still, he held back."Scared?" I dared, knowing he liked a good challenge.But instead of that knowing smirk—the one with those delicious dimples—he inhaled through his nose and gently pulled my hand from his shirt. He stepped back until he was leaning on the nearby bookshelf.I had expected him to come stomping into the library like a storm barely leashed, dragging his rage with him. I had expected his sharp tongue, his impatient sighs, his suffocating protectiveness that had only gotten worse since I woke up in the hospital.What I hadn’t expected… was this.Silence.Now, he stood in front of me, hands shoved into the pockets of his jacket, jaw tight, eyes stormy. I had chosen the farthest, most secluded corner of the library to eat my lunch, but of course, he found me anyway.Of course, he did.I swallowed my last bite of an apple and leaned back against my chair, resting my good a
MILES Maybe I thought I would be prepared to return to university. Maybe I believed that after everything, walking these halls would be easy. I had decided to go despite myself, just to prove a point. That I wasn’t weak. But that weakness crawled out from the dirt I buried it in as soon as I entered my first class. I had spent the morning in the library, hidden in the quiet while Dom and Marcus were at practice. It was the first time in weeks I had been truly alone—no watchful eyes, no questions, no hovering hands. Just silence. Then, I left. And as soon as I walked—no, limped—into my first class, the whispers started. You would think the stares were because of the brace on my ankle, the sling keeping my shoulder in place. But no. It was because Dominic Black had his hand on my waist, his grip steady as he helped me to my seat. "Who the hell is she?" Someone whispered. "Why does she seem so close to three of the hottest guys in school?" "She’s probably fucking them." "No,