Under an Endless Moon (Moonlit Ridge, #2)

by A.L. Jackson

“I don’t think so, Otto. I don’t think there was anything that either of us could have said or done that would have stopped her from pursuing him.”

“That right there, Raven. What I just saw play out in those beautiful eyes. The demons and scars that remain. That’s why I’ve been terrified of giving into my love for you. Because I bear the same wounds, but they are so vile and ugly and gnarled that I know the only thing I’m going to do is taint you with it.” “I hate them, too,” I admitted on a devastated whisper. Sorrow pulsed through his features, and he ran his callused palm over my cheek before he set it on my jaw. “I don’t just hate them,

Raven. I want to destroy them. End them. And I won’t stop until I do.”

“I’m sick with the need for revenge,” he continued, his voice coarse and jagged with the admission. “So sick that I hate that someone else got to end four of them that day. Hate that they took the vengeance that was mine. Have hated them for so long for taking that from me. But no one is going to steal the vindication of ending the rest.”

“That’s why, Raven. That’s why you should stay away from me. That’s why I’m terrified I might be the reason someone is after you. That’s why I’ll never be good enough for you. I’m fuckin’ sorry I’m not better. I want to be. Fuck, I want to be better. But I’m not, and there’s no stopping this part of who I am.”

“I’ll take you back to River’s.” Is that what he thought? That I’d reject him because of this? I flew around and had myself plastered around his back in a flash, my arms banded around his body. I pressed my face into the side of his neck, gasping as I breathed him in, and I told him the one thing that I could manage. “Do you think I could ever blame you? They’re monsters, and none of them deserve to live. Not after what they did.”

“Thought I told you I didn’t want you to leave my side,”

“I knew you’d come to me,” Raven murmured over the din, glancing back at me as she leaned her weight against me. “I’ll always come to you, Moonflower.”

The feel of her. The smell of her. The taste of her. “Otto,” she whimpered as I somehow pulled her even closer, my dick rocking against her ass, seeking friction. “Need you,” I mumbled, half delirious. Okay, I had to be completely delirious since I was basically mauling her in front of everyone. “Then take me. It is your birthday, after all.”

“You tryin’ to wreck me, Little Moonflower? Make me lose my mind?” “Think I lost mine a long, long time ago.”

With the bottle still in one hand, I looped an arm around her waist and hoisted her up, and she wrapped those toned legs around my waist.

I carried her two steps to the long table that sat in the middle of the room and propped her on the edge, never stepping out of the sanctuary of those thighs as I tipped the bottle back to her mouth.

“Raven.” Her name was praise as I set the bottle aside and fisted the fall of her hair up in my hand. I angled her head so I could kiss along her neck. “Sweet fuckin’ Raven.” Though the woman didn’t look so sweet right then. So goddamn fierce and powerful in that skirt. “So fuckin’ beautiful, I can’t see. Blinded by you.” A charge flashed through the room. Sharp nails dragged down my chest. “You’ve always been the one I’ve seen, Otto. The one I needed. The one I loved.” “I’m right here, honey, and I’m not goin’ anywhere.” I shifted so I could capture her mouth. In an instant, a fire lit. Our kisses frantic and crazed as we struggled to possess the other.

I jerked her closer to the edge of the table as she yanked at the button of my jeans. She had me free as I was pulling the slip of lace covering her pussy aside.

I drove inside her. So damned deep. Pleasure ricocheted through every cell of my body, no better feeling in the world than my dick buried in the throbbing clutch of her cunt. So fuckin’ tight a rush of dizziness spun through my head. She cried out as her fingers clawed up the back of my neck. “Otto. God…how…every time?” “You love it, Raven? You love being stuffed full of my cock?” “Yes. I love it. I want it. I need it,” she rambled, close to incoherent, nothing but pleas rolling from that sweet tongue. I splayed my hand over the base of her spine and brought her to the very edge of the table, her ass hanging off the side. I pulled out then drove back in.

“You are my heaven, Raven. Fuckin’ paradise. Everything I never thought I’d have.” “You had me all along.” “I’m never letting you go.”

“You are the light inside of me, Raven. Only thing that could ever lead me out of the dark. Gonna love you through it all. Under every endless moon. And when dawn finally breaks, I will watch you rise.”

Pleasure glowed like a halo around her. Girl a beacon that would forever guide me home. “Otto.” “You feel it?” I demanded. “Yes,” she gasped. I shifted her so I could reach my hand in between us to get to her throbbing, swollen clit. I rubbed my fingers against it as I pounded into her in torrid, frenzied thrusts.

“Want to hear my name coming from that sweet mouth when you come, Little Moonflower. Want to hear you shoutin’ it.” “I’m going to⁠—” I swept in and took her mouth, stealing the words as I shifted her back, driving into her so fuckin’ hard as I swirled my fingers over her engorged nub. “Let me have it, Raven. Give me your pleasure.” “It’s yours. It’s always been yours.” On the next thrust, I felt her splinter apart. An orgasm rending through her on an obliterating wave. Racing through her as she shouted my name.

“Raven. Fuck, Raven.” I poured into her hot needy cunt, pulsing and pulsing in spastic quakes. My fingers sank into her thighs as I dragged her even closer, so close there was no room for anything else. Just us. Just us. She kept clutching me as she searched for the oxygen that’d gone missing. Sweat slicked our skin, the flames still licking through us, though they’d been subdued.

“I love you, Raven Tayte. For every single one of my days.” “I love you so much, Otto. You’re my favorite person.” There was no tease to it that time. Only stark adoration as she brushed her fingertips over my lips. I grabbed them and kissed across the tips. “No one can compare.” We stayed like that for a moment, just gazing at each other through the lapping darkness of the room before I pulled out of her, more than reluctantly, and started to tuck myself back into my jeans as I helped her readjust her underwear. But it wasn’t soon enough before the door crashed open behind us.

Not soon enough to conceal what we’d been doing. Not soon enough to stop the fury that lanced through the room. Because River was there, raging in the doorway, Kane’s key hanging from the lock, his mouth twisted in venom. “You fuckin’ lying piece of shit. I fuckin’ knew it.” Then he was storming across the room toward me.

“You fuckin’ vile piece of shit. You think you can touch my sister? Behind my fuckin’ back? You fuckin’ swore to me, you bastard. Come on, you twisted fuck,” River taunted. Otto didn’t take the bait, though, he stood stock-still, welcoming the malice that oozed from my brother. “River,” I begged, trying to break through the madness. “You don’t understand.” “Oh, I understand perfectly, Raven. Can’t believe you’d let this disgusting prick touch you. After everything you’ve been through? Thought you knew better.” River spat it like an accusation, one I wasn’t sure if he was issuing to me or Otto. But it was the one thing that got a rise out of Otto, his own fury brimming to the surface. “Don’t fuckin’ talk to her like that.” Cold laughter rolled out of River, and his face pinched in disbelief. “You think you have something to say to me about being her brother?”

“Stay back, Raven.” A hollow sound echoed from River, and he lifted his chin at Otto. “Is that it? You tell her what to do? Manipulate her? Take advantage of her vulnerabilities? Of her trauma? Use her up the way you use the rest of the women you burn through?”

Punches and grunts and kicks as they fought to outdo the other. I jumped off the table, rushing up to them as a shout tore up my throat. “Are you kidding me? Just stop it. Stop it! Both of you!” It didn’t come close to penetrating the tumult that raged between them. A commotion suddenly burst through the door, and Kane, Theo, Cash, and Trent came barreling through. Charleigh, Eden, and Sienna hovered at the door behind them, their eyes wide as they took in the scene. The guys rushed forward to the tussling pile that was River and Otto. “Enough. Break it up.” Theo and Kane grabbed ahold of Otto who was currently on top, and Trent and Cash hauled River away. River tried to break free, sneering at Otto from where he was being dragged across the room. “You’re dead. Fuckin’ dead to me.

The one thing I ever asked of you?” Hurt curled through his features before he spat, “Can’t fuckin’ believe you.”

“What? You think I have no say? That I’m so small and insignificant and vulnerable that I can’t make my own decisions for myself?” Hot tears streamed down my face as I looked at my brother. “He fuckin’ promised me, Raven. Promised me he’d never touch you.” “And what about what I want?” Pain fractured through his expression. “Then you want the wrong thing.”

“Stuck seven years ago. In that moment when I failed my sister. In that moment when I’d tried to retaliate but instead it was me who was about to be buried. In that moment when I was saved for God knows what reason except to be able to take these monsters down.” My chest tightened with the onslaught of emotions. With the truth that had come to fruition over the last month. One that I’d been avoiding for so long but wouldn’t ignore anymore. “In that time when I broke your sister’s heart because I thought it was the right thing to do. Because I thought I couldn’t give her the life she deserved. Because I thought I wasn’t good enough for her. And fuck, I’m not…don’t think there’s a man alive who’s good enough for how amazing she is, but I’m going to spend every one of my days trying to be. Trying to be good enough for her. Trying to give her that life she deserves. Whatever she wants it to be.”

Could barely swallow as I forced the words up my throat. “I love her, River. I love her so fuckin’ much. I’ve fought that love for seven years, and the only thing it did was hurt her, and you can hate me for it, but I refuse to fight this love for a second longer. We’re going to get her back, then I’m never going to let her go.”

“We have to,” I reiterated, looking at her, a silent promise that I wasn’t going to let this bastard hurt her.

Desperation streaked through my veins when my cell rang, and I yanked it from my pocket. My lungs closed off when I saw it was Cash. I fumbled to answer it, praying to God he had news as I pressed it to my ear. “Please tell me something good.” “Think I got a lead.” “What is it?” “Been hunting for anything on Gideon since you asked me for information.” The repercussions of that request hung heavy in the dense air. Echoes of his warnings of what my thirst for revenge might do. “I finally got a possible hit. The spelling of his last name was different, but the birth date and social security number matched. It was a marriage license to one Sienna Perdue. I was able to locate

picture of her. It’s from about five years ago, but I’m ninety-nine percent sure it’s the same Sienna who met Raven at the club last night. I thought she looked familiar, but I didn’t make the connection until this morning when I got the call that Raven is missing.” “Oh fuck,” I wheezed.

“She rented a house over on Pine. Way on the outskirts of town,” Cash continued. “Saddle up. I have the address incoming. Theo and I are already on our way. And this time, this motherfucker is going to feel the wrath of us all. Of this entire family. The way it’s supposed to be.” He ended the call.

River looked at me for a beat before he stretched out his hand with the stacked Ss tattooed on the back and muttered, “That’s fuckin’ right. That’s what this club does. It’s what this family does. Now let’s go get your girl back.”

“Always. I will always come for you. It’s over. It’s over.” Hot tears kept bleeding from my eyes and into the fabric of his shirt as I choked and whimpered. “I’m so sorry,” he mumbled, trying to get me closer. “I should have⁠—” I shook my head and fisted my hand in his tee. “No more I should haves. All that matters is the now. That you’re here. That we move on from here. Together,” I rasped.

“Thought I was going to die when I got to Moonflower and found you missing.” “Were you coming to tell me how much you love me, my burly bear?” I wound as much lightness into it as I could manage, though it was thick and soggy. “Yeah, baby, I was coming to shout it from the rooftops and pray you’d shout it back.”

“You’re my favorite person in the world, Otto Hudson.” Otto reached down and hooked his pinky with mine. “And you, Raven Tayte, are mine.” Then he dragged me across the bench seat to tuck me to his side. He put the truck in drive, then curled his arm around my shoulders as he whipped a U-turn in the road. “And now, Little Moonflower, I think it’s time you learned exactly what that means.”