Tryst Six Venom (Tryst Six, #1)

by Penelope Douglas

“You know what I want?” she questions. “I want you to stop lying to me.”

“Because I know exactly what pleases you.” She meets my gaze. “Despite what comes out of your stupid mouth.”

“I can’t leave you alone,” she whispers.

“Sometimes my feelings for you are good and sometimes they’re bad,” she tells me, “but they’re always strong, Liv. Like no one else.”

“I want to taste you,” she begs. “It’s my turn.”

“You will,” I say. “Pay attention to what I do to you. What you like. So you know what to do to me, okay?”

“God.” I kiss her cheek, lightly taking a chunk between my teeth. “You’re so tight. I can already tell you’re going to be so fucking warm.”

“So fucking tight,” I murmur in her ear. “I want to go deeper, Clay.”

She squirms in my arms, and I wanna fucking die, my arms so charged with how good this feels. I massage her clit again. “Open your cunt,” I whisper. “Open.” She sucks in a breath but finally nods like a good girl. “Okay.”

“I wanted to be the first girl to kiss you,” she says. I look down at her in my arms. I wanted you to be the only one to kiss me.

“I know I’m not your first,” she says. “But you’re mine. I want to be sacred to you.”

She’s such a cunt, but then she says things like that and I just want to give her everything she wants. I want her to know that I wish to God this didn’t feel so good and that she didn’t feel so good.

“Baby,” I mouth against her skin, “you make me melt.”

“Well, I always thought it would be a huge endeavor,” she sighs. “I’d know exactly when it was going to happen. I’d be in total control, planning out every detail.” And she lists on her fingers. “The location. The music. Protection. Looking my best. I’d do everything I could to make it perfect.”

“But the perfect moment found me, instead.” Her voice softens, serious. “And I couldn’t stop it.”

“She was better than I’d dreamed,” she tells me against my cheek. “Nothing could tear me away from her.”

“I’d dreamed of her a lot before we did it,” she says. “Sometimes I’d lock my door at night and take off my clothes.”

“I like ponytails,” I tell her, layering our lips. “I need a good handle on you.”

It was a helluva thing, to put this burden on people. To stay someplace you weren’t happy. To support people who expect rather than appreciate. To know that a richer life is out there and not have the freedom to seize it. For a long time, I’ve known that Macon is just as trapped as I am, but for the first time, I pity him, because he must know this is all for nothing. Even now, he must feel it. Are we worth saving?

Macon’s closed door. There’s no light coming from underneath, and for the first time, I realize he sleeps in the room where my mother killed herself. Every night he sleeps in there.

This will all be for nothing. But I’m going to have her for as long as I can. I stare at it in my palm, the sharp copper glinting in the twinkle lights wrapped around my wrought-iron headboard. When you’re in the eye of the storm, the only way out is through. You win, Macon. I’ll protect the family.

And that look and tone—possessive and jealous and all for me—sets me on fire again.

“Mine.” She pants, rubbing her thumb across my lips. “Until graduation. Okay?” “Yeah.” She tips my chin back and kisses slowly down my neck. “No one has to know, but you better.” “I know.” I nod. “Don’t worry, I know.” I’m yours. Just don’t stop.

“I know why you like octopi,” she teases. “Octopuses,” I correct her, moving in for her mouth again. “And there are so many reasons to love them.”

“They all have venom, even just a little, and they have nine brains—each arm can act independently from the others. Isn’t that wild?”

“See you later. And if you stand me up again, I’m going to kill you, okay?” “Understood.” She leaves, and I bite my bottom lip, because there’s just something about how even her threats are a turn-on. I shake my head clear. But yeah, I won’t stand her up. She’ll really kill me.

“She acts tough, but everyone’s the same,” he goes on. “They just want someone to love, and when a Jaeger gets attached, it’s as quick as flipping a switch, Clay. It’ll be sudden, and she won’t be able to turn it off.”

“I brought you something to remind you of me.”

“Pink?”

“Thorns.”

wouldn’t be. “I’m full of thorns,” I say softly. “But there are things about me that I hope are worth it.” After a few seconds, I feel her hand in my hair. “I hate Romeo,” she says, stroking my scalp. “But I’m starting to understand him. Fuck you for that, Clay.” I half smile, because I know she’s bitter, because she’s cracking, and I want that. I want what Trace promised. That the switch would flip, and she’d be mine. I peel up her sleeve and gaze at the octopus on the inside of her wrist. “This is mine.” I smooth my thumb over the ink. “Forever mine. My piece of you.” And then in a murmur, “‘Within this inch . . . I’m free.’”

“Because for four years, if I wasn’t sleeping, I was thinking of you,” she murmurs. “And even then sometimes, in my dreams.”

Within this inch, I’m free. It’s a paraphrase of a quote from V for Vendetta. A part of us that we’ll never sell—a small piece we keep to ourselves and covet and hold tightly for dear life, because it’s the only place inside us we truly live. Just an inch. But it’s ours.

“You’re so pretty, Liv,” she breathes out. “You know you’re never getting away from me, right?”

“Say ‘yes, I know,’” she orders me. “Yes.” Holding the knife, she peels down my underwear. “You know you’re mine. Say yes.” “Yes.”

“God, what are you doing?” The world tips sideways, and I close my eyes. “I’m so wet for you.” “You’re never getting away from me,” she says again. I know, baby. I know. God, what is she doing to me? Just when I think I’m in control, and I have a handle on her, she sweeps me away.

“Come on, Jaeger,” she breathes out, grinning up at me. “Let me hear you. Make some noise.”

“Louder, Jaeger,” she orders, using my last name again to remind me she’s my team captain and our soon-to-be prom queen, and she really likes slumming with the bad girl. And I like it, too. Right now, her double life is such a turn-on.

“Liv,” she whispers, working it in farther inch by inch. “God, you make me crazy.” “Fuck me,” I beg.

“God, you’re so wet,” she whispers. “So hot.”

God, what I wouldn’t give for Callum Ames to see his prom queen between my legs.

“He doesn’t need to know,” I tell her. “Just fuck me, Clay. Fuck me harder.” I’ll still be sneaking off to screw her ten years from now, because that’s how much I love this with her. It’s perfect, and I hate how much I’ll sacrifice to keep it, but I know I won’t be able to stop.

“Stay with me now,” I whisper. “Tonight is mine.”

Because it’s not about the sex. Liv feels good to me. Everything feels good with her, and I crave her every moment, but it’s not about the sex. It’s about everything that comes with it. Talking to her. Touching her. Her scent and the promise of more. The feel of how she loves my body, and how being with her and doing things that make her breathless reminds me that I feel just a little bit lonely with everyone else in my life, except her. It’s about having someone to look forward to who wants your love.

My parents are splitting up. I don’t want to go to Wake Forest. I’m infatuated with someone that everyone else will make their business if it ever gets out. But I’m okay, because I have her.

“I want you to make me show it,” I say. “Why don’t you make me show it? Why do you let me act like a coward?”

“Because I’ll never do anything to bring you more pain. What we’re doing has a shelf life anyway. It’s not worth it. It’s just fucking, Clay.”

It would take a lot more than Valium to get me into bed with him. To get me to want him. To get me to forget about her.

“Baby . . .” she bites out, interrupting me. “If I think you’re not mine, I might make a scene. Be very careful what you say next.” Her hard voice cuts into my ear, the sudden threat a surprise. And I smile, despite myself. I do like Clay’s jealousy. “Are you threatening me?” I gibe. “You haven’t seen what I can do yet.” “Oh, I know what you can do.”

“You ever eat raw oysters?” she goes on. “I want to watch you eat and get you drunk and hot on tequila and sweat with you and fuck you in the back seat of my car. And I want to do that as many times as I can before we have to leave each other in August, because nothing feels better than you, Jaeger. Nothing.”