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Good girls like her weren’t made for guys like me. And bad boys never fell for girls like her.
I was fucking trembling. My fists clenched by my sides, my nails digging into the flesh along my bloody palms. He would never fucking touch her again. And neither would I. Not now. Not after this. I didn’t deserve her, and she didn’t deserve this.
I was empty before she came into my life, and now, I was flooded with shit I didn’t want to deal with. I hate you. Hearing those words cut me deeper than I thought possible. But they were needed. They were needed in the most tortuous way.
Gemma and I locked eyes. My fingers ached to dip underneath her tank top. My mouth begged to be on her warm skin. The perfect bow shape that her lips made opened as a soft breath floated around me.
She meant too much. I’d already hurt her.
But she wasn’t theirs to touch. She wasn’t my father’s to touch either. Or mine.
“I wasn’t lying when I said fucking you was like fucking an angel. Or that it was nice and pure.”
“Every time I fucking touched you, it was like touching an angel, Gemma. Perfect and captivating. I felt unworthy every single time.”
“Just make her hate you. It’ll be the easiest way to resist her. There’ll be no chance to fuck her.” To fuck her. Like that was all I cared about when it came to Gemma.
I cocked my head at my two friends and dropped my voice—“seeing your hands on her body made me want to strangle you almost as much as I wanted to strangle my fucking father last night.”
Gemma had found her footing in the last few weeks. But I’d lost mine. In fact, I was pretty certain that I’d lost myself in her, and she’d found herself in me.
“Gemma, baby. I want you to breathe.” My forehead came down and rested along hers. It was sweaty, and I shut my eyes, wanting to take everything away from her.
I didn’t know what I was taking, but I would take it. I would take her hurt and make it my own.
“Make it stop.” I’d do anything she told me to do at this moment. My head was telling me one thing, but my heart was telling me another.
Our lips touched, and I drank her in like I’d never survive without her taste.
Our breathing was in sync, our bodies pressed together, and just like that, the world stopped. Everything stopped. Everything but her and I.
This. This was it. Fuck regret. Fuck tomorrow. This was exactly where I wanted to be. I just needed one last little taste.
“You’re mine,” I whispered against her sweet taste. “Give me everything you have. I’ll take it.”
I wanted her forever. I saw nothing but her. I felt nothing but her.
Wetness coated me, and I wanted to watch her come undone. I was drunk on her. A high I’d always be chasing.
It wanted Isaiah despite everything. It wanted his touch. His kiss. His soft whispers. My body knew I needed that solitude again. Reckless. Irrational. That was what I was when it came to him, and it was rebellion in the form of a single touch.
“The thought of someone else's hands on you makes me fucking crazy.” He bit onto my lip, and I yelled out, feeling the curl in between my legs tighten.
“I think I might fucking love you, Gemma.” My heart stopped as my eyes shut, trying to push away the uncertainty of everything to come. “But I can’t.”
Isaiah was comfort and warmth and strength all wrapped up into one person, and with just one single touch, I felt at home. I felt whole.
“You scare the hell out of me because you are my weakness, Gemma Richardson,
Scars. Cuts. Scrapes. Bruises. He had touched her, and she didn’t want him to. He hurt what was mine.
I said it before, and I’d say it again: Gemma Richardson was the one person I’d give up my humanity for.
“Let me touch you, baby. Please.”
“I’ll protect you, Gemma. Even when you’re gone.”
“Feel me inside of you. Fuck my fingers and know that you deserve to be worshiped. Do what feels good for you and only you.”
“There it is, baby.” His mouth was on mine, and his teeth sunk into my bottom lip. “I fucking love feeling you come apart for me. I fucking love feeling you move against me, chasing that high that you deserve over and over again. It’s addicting, and I can’t stop myself from wanting every single part of you.”
“You are fucking beautiful, and you deserve the world,”
“I fucking love you, Gemma. So much that I would burn the world down for you.”
“I love you, and I will not stop trying to make the world a better place for someone like you.”
Gemma and I together could put stars in the sky. That was how it felt when we touched. It was…intense and powerful. All-consuming. Like the fucking universe swallowing everything in its path.
“You think you can catch me?” Her white teeth sunk into her lip, and I hurriedly swiped my thumb over it. I gazed into her eyes, feeling myself snap in two. “I won’t stop until I do.”
“Even when you’re far away from here, I’ll never stop looking for you.” His lips moved over my mouth. “I will find you, Gem.”
I was an entirely different person when he and I were alone. Like my body did the speaking for me. It craved him. His lips on mine. The way he got lost in me. The way I got lost in him. I loved it. Everything else just disappeared, and that was enticing as hell.
He made me feel worthy and like I deserved more than I was given.
“But when things are safe, I will come for you, Gemma. So take this”—Isaiah pulled out a black Sharpie and threw it onto the table—“and mark where you’ll be, because I will come for you.”
“Gemma, breathe, baby. It doesn’t matter what he has planned, because he doesn’t get to hurt you anymore.”
And I trusted him. I trusted him with my secrets. My body. My mind. Everything. I trusted Isaiah Underwood, and although my heart felt torn to shreds, I loved him with those tiny, frayed edges.
don’t want to let her go, Cade. How did you do it with Journey?” Cade’s answer was distant as his footsteps faded. “I had no other choice.” I think Isaiah knew right then that neither did he.
“Seeing you smile is my favorite thing. You need to do it more often. Promise me you’ll smile
“Trust me when I say he will never ever touch you again. I said I would burn the world down for you, and I meant it.”
I loved him. And he deserved my love. Every bit of it.
“Oh, wow. It’s…it’s confirmed, Tate. Gemma Richardson is your daughter.”
um wtf
I used to think I didn’t have a working heart, but I did. I did, because it beat for the girl that was taken so suddenly from my hands.
My heart was in my hands, beating for her and only her, and it canceled out every single thing going on around me.
And if she didn’t wake up, there would be no victory in this. Nothing would matter anymore.
