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Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
Angel Lawson
Read between
March 14 - March 17, 2023
“Good girl.”
“What the—fuck you! This is my bed!” Archie flattens his ears and hisses so bodily that his fuzz shivers with the intensity. Sy’s eyes go flinty, fists and teeth clenching. “I swear to god, I will punt this motherfucker all the way back to East End.”
Sy’s eyes bug out. “What did I do to him?” He holds up his hand, littered with scratches. “He’s been terrorizing me since day one. Fucking glorified rodent, running around here like he owns the goddamn place.”
The realization doesn’t hit me so much as it just… arrives. I’ve been waiting for this. No. I’ve been hoping for this.
“I think she’s the first person that ever took care of me.”
I knew it the minute my ink buried into her flesh, when I marked her. She became mine.
If I had any kind of real attachment to Remy, I might even feel threatened. But I don’t. Definitely not.
“I have no idea what I like. I… I’m not sure anyone’s ever asked me before.”
Because Remy touches me like I’m precious. Important. Special. And it makes me fucking burn for him.
“Those old things were dragging you down. You’re not a cutslut. And you’re made for more than hand-me-downs, anyway. You’re Royalty. You’re the Duchess.” He tugs me close, leaning down to whisper, “My guiding star.” The kiss isn’t deep and consuming like the ones earlier. This one is pure sweetness, his lips sealing against mine slowly, gently. It isn’t any less hypnotizing. “Mr. Maddox isn’t going to know what to do with you,” he says, offering me his hand as I sling a leg over the motorcycle, “but don’t you think for a minute that I don’t.”
It’s about making her surrender. Feeling her beside me as we jump. Knowing that she’s with me as we fall.
Vinny is here. She’s real. She’s mine.
“Once we do this, there’s no going back, Vinny.” I gaze down at her as I hold myself steady, the tip of my cock slotted against her slick heat. “This will make you mine. Not just your body. Not just because you're my Duchess. You understand, don’t you?” I can’t say the words, but I know she can hear them. I can see it in the furl of her brow, the lightning overhead making her eyes flash with terror. Sy can take her body. Nick can claim her mind. I want her soul. “I know,” she says, chest heaving with these huge, gulping breaths. “Take it.”
I didn’t just see the stars. I felt them.
The object of my obsession is talking to Verity and cleaning up the leftovers, and my eyes are drawn to her like a magnet.
I’d never admit it, but it’s the satisfaction of making her look like that, sound like that, that makes me come, hard and fast—too
You’re into Lavinia and you can’t handle it, so you’re sabotaging it like a fucking headcase, buy a clue.”
He picks up his bag and wordlessly—so fast and subtle that he could be a Baron—slides the cookie in front of Lavinia before stomping away. She stares at it for a long moment, eyes narrowed. I almost expect her to offer it to Remy, turning this into the endless circle of pitiful cookie-giving, only she puts her palm over it and swipes it toward her torso protectively.
This is a selfless act. That means somewhere, buried deep under layers of Daniel Payne and the stench of death, Nick Bruin actually cares about something more than himself.
“I know my love isn’t worth anything to you, Lavinia.” His other hand brushes mine where it hangs, limp at my side. “But maybe theirs will be.”
Nick loves me. I can see it in his eyes when the mask wavers, but mostly, I just… know. There’s a good possibility he has for a long time, and the trouble is, I couldn’t take it. I understand that now. It settles over me, the knowledge that I’d rejected it because it didn’t make sense to me. I wasn’t made to be loved. Worshiped. I was made to be hidden—shoved into dark, hidden holes and left there. I was made to be alone. I was made to be lonely. What he feels for me is twisted and selfish, but maybe I could have shaped it into something that didn’t hurt so fucking much instead of starving it
...more
I go to the greatest source of warmth I know. He’s resting on the left side of the bed when I push through his cracked door. He keeps it open for me now, ever since the first time he pulled me out of the darkness.
the moment I try to tell him something—anything, nothing—another wretched sound breaks free. Sy’s face collapses and he tugs me back into him, letting me wind my arms back around his neck. He whispers, “I don’t know what to do.” But he tries, knitting his fingers into my hair. Sy cradles my head against his neck, letting me cry and clutch,
Remy leaves my bra and underwear, peering up into my eyes as he pitches forward to kiss the tattoo beside my hip. “Come here.”
“She wants me,” he says, thumb brushing the wet skin beneath my eye, “But she needs you.” He swings his gaze to Sy, jerking his head in invitation. It’s a relief to feel the room bathed in darkness again, to feel Sy’s weight behind me,
Sy hovers behind me, close enough to feel his flesh, but far enough to be dissatisfying. The whisper he pitches to Remy is almost too quiet for me to hear over the rushing in my ears. “Like this?” Remy’s hand leaves my cheek to reach behind me. He grabs Sy’s wrist and drapes it over my waist. “Like that.” Sy’s fingers twitch before dipping around, pulling me up tight to his chest. Yes. Just like this.
I warned you that night on the cliffs that it’d make you mine.” When I glance up, she’s staring at me, eyes wide and wary. “Not just my Duchess or my steady fuck. I let you in. You get that, don’t you? I opened my soul to you, Vinny. I know it’s ugly—maybe it doesn’t even mean anything to you, but—” “It does,” she argues, frowning. Her fingers thread tentatively through my hair, my eyes fluttering closed at the sensation. “I’m just trying to take care of it,” she whispers, voice rough as gravel.
She’s protecting me.
Later, at the party, after Sy has gotten his victory tattoo, I watch from the couch as he and Vinny cross paths at the bar. It’s pretty packed tonight, so they shift past one another full-bodied, him reaching out to steady her by the hip. I’m not sure anyone is expecting it when he dips down to press a quick but no less sensual kiss to her lips, licking out to meet her tongue before smoothly gliding away. Vinny blushes and twists to watch his retreat, licking the taste of him from her mouth.
“It’s sexier than I even thought.” “The tattoo?” She makes another futile attempt to look at her own chest. “Seeing you marked.” I run my hand down her body, over her tits and down her belly. Fuck. This is all mine. Mine to mark. Mine to play with. Mine to dive inside.
Sy finally recovers, eyes dropping to her body. His fingers reach out for the tattoo, ghosting over the outline. “A butterfly?” he asks quietly.
“Little Bird, your opinion is the only one that matters.”
There’s a softness there I’m not used to seeing, something cautious and already defeated, as if he’s expecting me to turn away.
Forsyth is about to learn that West End doesn’t belong to Saul. It belongs to us.” He reaches out, and I’m not expecting it—the tenderness in his touch when he curls a finger, brushing a knuckle over the bruise on my cheek. “Just like you.”
If I’m going to be anyone’s weapon, then I’m going to be hers.
“I don’t know what happened or how it feels to do that to someone.” She looks right into my eyes as she says it, her mouth pursed tightly. “But I need you to come back to us now, okay?”
“You do it because you’re a good man. I know that. You want to take care of the people you love. But sometimes, all people see is what you can do for them.”
This breaks my fucking heart. Having a mental disorder and then a parent who fully twists and feeds into it to make you even more confused. What the fuck 😞 poor Remington
I think I might love her.
I try not to take it as a rejection. I don’t think it is. Because she’s so strong, so bossy and determined, I forget that Lavinia must feel lost sometimes—just like the rest of us. I swallow. “Whatever. I was just wondering.” She turns to face me, eyes holding mine. “There would be worse things than being Simon Perilini’s girl.” “Yeah?” She nods and kisses me, light and soft on the lips. A contrast to the violence before. It’s not until later that I realize that although she didn’t say yes about being my girlfriend, she also didn’t say no.
“Jealous, Little Bird?” I immediately scoff. “Hardly.” He doesn’t look convinced, eyes dropping to my mouth. “I see how it is. I can’t have you, but I can’t have anyone else, either. Is that right?” It is right. I can’t rationalize it
“You’re right. I can have any pussy in this place. But in case I haven’t made it clear,” he ducks down to speak into my ear, “it’s you or nothing. Never doubt that.”
Red is violence, energy, chaos, overwhelming. Yellow is grief, sadness, pain (emotional), death. Blue is calm, comfort, trust, goodness. Orange is betrayal, lies, deception. Purple is lust, but there’s a note beside it: Pain (physical)? Green is sickness, white is healthy, renewal, clarity. And black… Regret, reprisal. Black means sorry.

