A Vow of Hate (A Vow of Hate, #1)

by Lylah James

I asked for a compliment and I got a criticism instead. What else did I expect from my husband?

Killian and I had come to an unspoken understanding. Civil and in love. Until the end of our contract.

Gabriel had a thing for married women. It was his hobby – to use and defile those women before sending them back to their clueless husbands. I remembered his words clearly. A virgin was a risky fuck; they grew attached too quickly and too easily. But married women? Easy fuck and experienced – without any need to form an attachment. He was the reason for many failed marriages.

“Your taunting will cost you dearly, wife,” I warned thickly. “I thought you didn’t like me docile,” she shot back. “It appears that sometimes I would prefer when you shut up. If you don’t know how, I know a few ways to help.”

Julianna cracked a smile. “Very well, then. Would you mind helping me with that?” “What?” “Shutting me up. You offered to help me. Go ahead. Shut me up, husband.”

“That’s very bold of you. Don’t challenge me; you don’t want to see what I can do.” “I’m very curious, Killian. What can you do?”

Oh, she was feeling brave tonight. My wife wanted to play and so, I would grant her this one wish. One little game to be played.

“I almost brought you to orgasm at our dining table, in front of my father – we both know very well what I can do.”

“That was a rare circumstance. I was just–” “Needy? So deprived of a man’s touch that you almost came from me barely even touching your cunt? I am the man you despise and yet, you were greedy for more.” “– caught off guard, I was going to say,” she growled. Such a pretty liar.

My wife could despise me as much as she wanted – but she burned for my touch. Her body responded to me like we had known each other for a lifetime, like she was born to be mine. Greedy. Wet. Needy. I could almost taste her yearning on my tongue – sweet and bitter.

“Do you touch yourself at night, when you’re alone in bed… at the memories of my fingers between your ...

I knew very well Julianna hasn’t been with a man since our marriage – I was only taunting her, pushing her buttons because I quite enjoyed the look in her eyes whenever she snapped. And even if she did take another man to her bed – I would have found out and the poor man would have been dead by now. His body, with all its shattered bones, dumped into the ocean, dragged away by the waves into the depth of the sea. Where no one would have found him. His existence very easily erased from history.

“Tell me, do your nipples ache at the reminder of my touch? Does your clit throb when you close your eyes and think of how good my fingers felt between your thighs?”

“Need I remind you, our thirty-nights were over last night.” “So, is tonight foreplay?” she questioned, her nails digging into my shoulders, and I almost winced. “Does foreplay include me strangling you because I’m very tempted.” “I might be into choking, who knows.”

Oh, for fuck’s sake. I was this close to throwing her out of the window. When I married Julianna, I thought I ended up with a docile, compliant and dutiful wife. A sacrificial lamb. A meek woman repenting for her sins. Somewhat tamed and obedient. What I didn’t expect was a sharp-tongued woman who would get on my goddamn nerves every second of the day.

“You’re a fucking thorn, Julianna.” “We’ve established that,” she said coyly.

“You told me once that Gracelynn would have hated the man I had become. Well then, let me ask you this.” Killian sneered, taking a step toward me, forcing me to move backward. “Would Grace ever forgive you? For taking her life? For taking away her chance at happiness and love?”

“Don’t you think… Gracelynn would have hated the woman you have become?” he snapped, throwing my words back at me… so carelessly, so heartlessly. “You’re not the Julianna your sister loved either. How hypocritical of you to judge me when you’re the exact same.”

“You drive me utterly mad,” he repeated, his voice still soft, against the back of my neck. “With that fucking cello. Looking like a goddamn angel under that chandelier sent to taunt me with her pretty fucking grey eyes. Playing the cello like a sad love song, your broken soul bleeding through it.”

“So fucking haunting. So goddamn beautiful. How dare you, Julianna?” Killian rasped into my ear. “How dare you make me look at you as someone other than Gracelynn’s killer? It’s not fair for you to have such power over me.”

The longer I stayed in this cursed castle, the harder it came to hang onto my sanity – or whatever was left of it. These ghosts haunted me, reminding me of how this castle held nothing but tragic love stories.

My repentance came with a cost. My bleeding heart. My shattered soul. And my fragile sanity. Have I atoned for my sins now? How much more before it’s enough?

“Julianna and I made a deal–” “I don’t care about your deal with Julianna.” He stabbed a finger into my chest. “You. Are. Married. You have responsibilities. You want to be the President of the United States? Well, guess what – figure out how to keep your marriage together first before you try to keep a whole goddamn country together. I don’t doubt for a second that you have all the characteristics a future leader needs and you’re capable of being someone big, someone with much power – but right now? You’re just a wounded man. Figure out your priorities, Killian. Before it’s too late.”

Your mouth tastes of cigar and sorrow, I like the way my name sounds on your lips. But your smile will fade come morrow. It is wintry and I am lonely, Please come back. Your mouth tastes of cigar and sorrow, I like the way you hold me, Even when I know it is all a ruse – a bleeding arrow. For you still envisage her when you bed me. Your mouth tastes of cigar and sorrow, I like the way you touch me, So coldly, like the dead wings of a sparrow, And I have begun to crave your warmth. Your mouth tastes of cigar and sorrow, I do not like the way you left me without a second glance, After your soft caress had been so thorough. Please come back. - A

“Traumatic? That’s an easy word to describe looking into your sister’s bloodied and mangled face for three hours, staring into her dead eyes with the pungent scent of death cocooning you. That’s not trauma, Simon. That’s hell.”

It hurt. But I liked the pain. I needed it. It called to me. Pain soothed me and I submerged myself in it.

My body was tensed with supressed anger. The poison of it ate at my flesh, sinking into my bones, into the marrow of me until I became one with it.

My fury churned within, hungry for destruction. It hovered over me like a morning fog, clouding my judgment. Rage was deceitful, but goddamn it, right now – it tasted so fucking sweet on my tongue.

Something twisted in my gut and my dick twitched in my slacks, hardening at the sight of my wife, standing in front of me – offering herself to me. Her surrender. Her devotion. Her undoing. Fuck. Julianna Spencer was so goddamn maddening.

I didn’t know what I expected when I came to her room, but it was definitely not me being aroused by the simple sight of her bare skin.

“Hook your left knee over the armrest and spread yourself for me, wife. I want you to delve into your deepest desires and show me the woman behind the prim and proper façade, the expensive gowns and jewelleries.”

Julianna slowly brought her leg up, hooking her left knee over the armrest, just like I had ordered her to do. So vulnerable – there was beauty in surrender and it looked decadently sinful on Julianna Spencer.

“I’m doing you a favor, wife. Accept it or leave it – but know this, I won’t be gentle with you. I will hurt you.”

“What do you think about when you touch yourself at night?” I asked, my voice gritty and rough to my own ears. “You,” she breathed.

Julianna Spencer wasn’t only a good actress, a pretty manipulator and dubious liar – but she was also a tantalizing seductress – an intriguing combination of innocence and lust.

Angry at her ugly deception. Furious at myself for feeling something at the sight of her naked and flushed body, needy and so goddamn… beautiful, like the temptress she was. It wasn’t fair that Julianna had such power over my thoughts, my heart and now my dick.

I didn’t want to look at Julianna when I was fucking her, didn’t want to look in the eyes that haunted me. I was merely doing my husbandly duty. There would be no pleasure from this. Not for her. Not for me. Our intimacy started and ended with this. A simple fuck.

“I told you,” my chest rattled with a harsh growl, “I won’t be gentle. I will hurt you. Wreck you. Possess you.” “Shut up and fuck me,” Julianna hissed. My lips curled, feeling both pleased and cruel. “Gladly, Beasty.”

I liked the sounds she made. Like she was fighting pain and pleasure, craving both – needing both.

My eyes darted to my semi-hard length, stained with blood, and I flinched. What have I done? She was a virgin. Had been. Like me. Goddamn it. All this time… I thought… FUCK!

I was a goddamn virgin until tonight. I had fucked Julianna thinking she was already spoiled – not a virgin – that another man had already broke her in. Made the job easy for me. It would have made this less intimate, less meaningful. For both of us.

Jesus Christ! Guilt gnawed at me. I remembered the way her body had tensed underneath mine. Her pained whimper. Her clawing at the bedsheet. I had hurt her. In ways I never should have.

She always hid behind that black fucking veil. I wanted to rip it off her face and expose her truth to the world. That she was a deceitful woman. And that three years ago, she killed my heart. Oh, how I loathed her for it.

For the first time in my life, I felt seen and wanted. Desired. I felt… important. And I wanted more. Not knowing that it would be the reason I would later lose everything.

I swooned. For the third time in my life. All three times had to do with Killian Spencer.

“I’m not sure if you’re an angel or a she-devil, you temptress,” he muttered. “Why can’t I be both?” His lips quirked with a half-smile. “I approve.”

I nodded my head, voicelessly. Killian’s eyes flared with adoration. His lips touched mine. And my heart withered. I was a deceitful woman.

“You won’t be calling me a gentleman when I’m between your thighs and taking what belongs to me, Miss Romano,” he said, in a gravelly calm tone.

“If I were to slide my hand under your dress right now, would you let me? Would you let me feel just how warm and wet you are for me? How needy you are?”

Sweet hell. What was he doing to me? How could he have such control over my body?