Ruin Me, Rewrite Us

“ Now try again…”

He was so close. The heat radiating from him addled her mind. His scent invaded her nose; she doubted she would ever get it out. Feeling trapped, cornered like prey, she flipped it on him.

“Why don’t you tell me why you care so much?”

She lifted her chin to glare at him. A kitten snarling at a bulldog. She didn’t have time to do anything as his expression darkened.

“Impossible woman.” His voice cracked, raw as a stripped screw, and then he was on her.

Shoving her up against the wall, sandwiched her between it and his firm body. His mouth hovered over hers, so close hers tingled. Her ears rang, her heart soared, and her hands twisted in his lapels to anchor herself, almost tearing the fine fabric.

She didn’t know when she’d grabbed him. Two brief words dripped with repressed want, finally pouring free.

“I tried,” he hissed against her parted mouth.

It was a prayer sent, and a curse leveled before his tongue stole her reply.

She had expected nothing when he first grabbed her—maybe a chaste press he’d regret in an instant. This was a claim. The cold brick bit into her spine. His gloved hands caged her hips like he was afraid she might vanish.

Her whimper gave her away. The daydream of this moment had nothing on reality. The icy wall seeped through her skimpy attire, the pale silk robe slipping off her shoulders to pool at her elbows as he kissed her.

It was clumsy and starving, a clash of teeth and tongue that soon turned into a kiss so consuming it scalded.

She reveled in the bristling scrape of his beard, the nervy flick of his tongue as she clung to his jacket. Liquid heat pooled thick and fast between her thighs. She moaned into it, forgetting someone else might hear.

He broke the seal on her mouth as the sound faded out in the dark. He stepped back, panting as fear flashed in his eyes. And she knew he would leave and never return if she didn’t do something.

Pushing up on her toes, she looped her arms around his neck. “Dont start something if you won’t finish it.”

Her sharp teeth nipped at his plump bottom lip in emphasis, rubbing herself against his chest until he took the hint. Whatever had kept him away from her now fled the building as he retook control.

Fire rapidly built inside her. Sweat prickled over her skin as he shoved a knee between her trembling thighs and pinned her to the wall again.

It was the only thing holding her up as he owned her mouth and stole her wits right out of her. No one had kissed her like this in so long.

As if the world could end right outside, and he still wouldn’t stop. Her knees were water as her hands pulled his hair, and she ground down on his muscled thigh.

He broke away with a curse. She almost reprimanded him until his guttural words settled her months of frustration. Warmth bled into her marrow as he admitted his truth.

It was a growl grazing her lips. “You’ve been driving me insane for months. That skirt you wore in Tokyo? How you hum when you write?” His head shook, breathing harsh as he laughed darkly. “Christ, Kenzi—you’re not just…”

He couldn’t finish. He didn’t have to.

This is how I ruin him. Us.

But his gloved hands were a forge brand on her hips, his breath infused her lungs, and she’d sign the order tomorrow if it meant keeping him there.

“I know.” Was all she said before his mouth possessed hers in a surrender she felt in her soul.

Her whimper, his groan, and the rustle of their clothing sounded more akin to a scream in the dark void of the hall. The fever it incited spread from her heart, trickling all the way down to her legs. She tasted salt on her lips, sweat or a tear; she didn’t want to know.

She needed to feel him everywhere. Until she was senseless, running off pure instinct. Just a woman and a man, dancing on a pyre of their own making. She wasn’t entirely aware of their movement until he picked her up.

Her legs instinctively wrapped around his waist, hands necklacing his throat. He let her go to open the bedroom door. He locked it behind him. She’d never find out how, but heard it click into place as he kissed her and carried her over to the king bed.

The room was a charcoal haze, with hardly any light to see it. He seemed to know it blindfolded. Her breath was his as he maneuvered them. She straddled his lap as he sat down on the edge of the bed.

She sighed through her nose, surging closer as he bit her lip. The surrounding skin of her mouth already abraded and pinkened, tingling with the scratch of his beard. The smell of his skin—cinnamon and cedarwood—clung to her tongue.

It was a sweet poison. One she’d gladly swallow if it meant one more stolen hour. He was hard enough to drive nails under her; wetness soaked her shorts as she ground down on him. Smiling when he shuddered.

Another unarmed mewl left her throat. She thought it was because of the ache between her parted thighs. She soon recognized it was the terrifying certainty that this would bankrupt her far worse than any headline ever could.

Fuck it. For one night, if this was all she got, she’d let herself have him. As she arched in a slow slide, his hands framed her waist and his hips jerked into her, sending shivers through both of them.

Too many clothes stood in her way. Her greedy fingers sought bare skin, hissing into the kiss when she found none.

He sensed her need reaching a boiling point. Tyler tore free of her mouth and roughly tugged her robe off. His gloved fingers shook slightly. She didn’t mention it. Hers fared no better as she leaned back, letting him take off his suit jacket.

She watched it flutter to the floor in slow motion, a puddle of black blood on the fluffy white rug. It was a warning neither of them heeded.

She turned back right as he undid the tie. Her helpless little whine at the arresting sight would shame her later. His smirk made it worth it.

The tie slithered free like a serpent shedding its skin. She wondered which of them was the predator here.

Or were they both the prey? She purred his name to ignore it.

The sound was a cattle-prod to his restraint. Snapping the last thread of his control. It was visible in the clench of his jaw, the feral swamping of obsidian pupils devouring the blazing sapphire.

Mine, they seemed to say.

His breath hitched, a wounded sound, like an animal caught in a trap. Which of them had sprung it?

His gloves—still on, hiding the wounds of old wars with himself—ghosted her ribs. For a petulant heartbeat, she hated them with all she had. Hated every barrier left between them.

She wanted to tear them off with her teeth, rip the leather to shreds. Allow them to bleed onto her hands. So they could destroy each other properly.

Her nipples hardened painfully, heat scattering its glittering, searing trail down her torso. Hips rocking, seeking friction as he unbuttoned his shirt. Revealing a chest as chiseled as the rest of him. Graffitied with cruel scars.

Her fingertip traced the longest one. It was a jagged silver river from collarbone to sternum. A slicing stone had lodged in her throat, cutting off her air.

The savage blaze of her desire stole the rest. He flinched. She half expected him to pull away. Thanking god when he didn’t. She did not voice her curiosity.

What happened to you?

He heard it anyway.

“Walked into a knife,” he murmured. “Six years ago.”

Her teeth ground together, eyes narrowing, and she swore she tasted smoke. She flattened her palm over the scar, feeling the strong, frantic beat underneath. Alive. Real. Her fantasies transformed into flesh and bone.

Her pulse thudded in harmony with his. Her mouth watered, voice little more than a phantom whisper as she said, “You survived. Did they?”

Her hand pushed harder into the old wound. As though she could absorb the violence engraved there. An electric thrum sparkled between them. His heart still raced. Desire blending with the ghost of the fight he’d never fully left.

“No.” His hand fisted in her hair, tilting her gaze to his. “And now I’m here.” His fingers tightened in her roots, drawing a gasp from her as her scalp crawled with lovely pain. “Every stitch was worth it.”

The silence that followed was a hammer hanging over them. Blunt. Final. Proof that survival wasn’t pretty. That survival came at a cost neither of them could undo.

She didn’t think they’d try, even if they could. Fate or lucky happenstance, she wouldn’t question it. He was here for the time being. She’d make the most of it. A horribly empty ache bloomed like a bruise inside her.

Her pulse flickered wildly in her throat, her ears a roar of blood pounding. She knew she’d started something, but he was going to finish it.

Kenzi swallowed hard, the tension between them so thick she tasted it. She gave in to the need to touch him.

Her hands traveled up his broad chest. Fingers mapping the silken skin and watching the play of muscles bunching and jumping under her touch. His chest rose and fell rapidly as she latched onto his lips. Smiling when he immediately opened for her.

He tasted of mint, cold, brand new, but somehow familiar, and something unique to him. Too addictive for her own good for her.

Their starving fingers roamed freely, goosebumps spread in their wake. They yielded to desire, and he helped her quickly remove her clothes.

Unveiling her creamy flesh piece by prickling piece. Soon, she was naked, spread out on the bed as he told and removed his. His gloves were last. He peeled them off finger by finger. Eyes hooked onto hers, like he was undressing twice.

She bit down on the inside of her cheek and clamped her thighs together. Needing him to ease the hollowness inside her more than she needed to see another day.

She longed to switch on a light so she could memorize every glorious part of him. But the darkness only intensified the thrill of partaking in something so forbidden.

Her mouth dried as he crawled over her. Warm, calloused prying her legs apart and he settled between them. She thought she’d feel embarrassed. Too exposed. But she wanted him to look.

Wanted him to touch and taste and make her his own. Obliterate the fantasies with reality. His bare hand at last skimmed her ribs. Her skin twitched under the caress, pulse ratcheting higher and higher.

His hand crept lower and lower, index finger dipping into the seam of her, finding her scorching wet. He grunted, pleased, teasing her clit with a featherlight flick.

Her hips jerked, a relieved sigh slipping through her teeth. All of her screaming for more. No patience left for foreplay. No time left to waste. He gripped himself in hand. The blunt crown of his cock slid through her drenched folds as her ass lifted.

His eyes met hers, a question there as he taunted her entrance. She nodded, silent permission that made his eyes fragment, black fighting blue, endless. He inhaled sharply. And then he moved.

Her mind flashed between dream Tyler and real Tyler as he ground inside her tight cunt inch by glorious inch. He knocked the breath from her, making her quake so hard the bed shook.

She hadn’t even come close to how good he would feel as he bottomed out and slumped over her. The fullness was almost too much to bear as her muscles locked up.

The intense stretching sensation picked at the fine strands barely holding her together, willing herself to loosen before they snapped. His forehead pressed to hers as her legs braced his hips. His eyes bored into hers, trembling just the same as she.

Her mind couldn’t let her have the moment guilt-free.

This isn’t a fling. We’re free-falling. And I’m too selfish to care who finds the wreckage… Screw it all. It’s worth the bone-crush.

His voice strained as he paused, hanging above her, letting her adjust. Every muscle he had strained with it. “Tell me to stop, Kenzi. Right now, or I swear I’ll—” There was a piercing sting deep inside her chest, a pain that would echo long after he’d left her body. She hadn’t heard him sound so devastated before.

Kenzi cut him off, arms winding around his neck, fingers burying in his hair. Nails cutting into his scalp. Melding herself to him and damning the consequences.

“Don’t you dare. It’s too late. Don’t stop.”

If they went down in flames, she’d find a way to love him in reverse once the smoke cleared. She took three shallow, ineffective inhales through her open mouth.

She thought she might burst out of her fragile seams, from the incredible sensation of him filling her taut wet cunt.

He gave her time to get used to him, cock jumping inside her as she made tiny shifts of her hips to stir him inside her. Waiting, both of them breathing harshly as she slowly softened.

Her entire body gradually went loose and pliable. She writhed as the want for friction became an irritant once more. Wetness seeped from her to ease his path. The slide of him was obscene, a wet, filthy sound that should’ve shamed her.

It only fed the hunger.

More, more, more, her mind ad-libbed after every soft smack of flesh meeting flesh. There were two sides of her in her head. One wanted to revel in him.

The other wanted to be cautious and temper her reactions. Save her from herself. Protect him from her, too.

Both sides waged a fierce war, but she’d already chosen him as her hill to die on. So many emotions tangled her up that she couldn’t name any of them.

One thought rang through her mind like a death knell.

This was wrong; if anyone found out, he’d lose his livelihood. She would be the Wicked Witch of the East Side.

Her heart cracked and bled, but he felt so good, so right. It was easy to push it all aside and burn beautifully in their shared ardor. A dam had crumbled in Tyler; he couldn’t seem to keep from talking to her.

He stopped again as he said,“I tried… tried to stay away. Couldn’t do it. Fuck, Princess…

“ His voice splintered mid-sentence, full of a familiar yearning that had eaten her alive all these months. She wondered whether he meant the statement for her or for himself.

Her hips snapped up, settling him deeper, urging him to move in response to the pet name he’d ripped straight out of her nightly rituals. She arched under him, intentionally tensing herself around his length to force him to move.

Friction. She needed friction to ease the aching, fiery want roiling in them both. He took the hint. Withdrawing with a hiss, almost all the way out of her before slamming back in.

She swore as a flare of roasting nerves licked up her torso. He sobbed as she gripped him like a snare. Not allowing him to leave. Rules be damned.

Lust didn’t follow the rules, nor did she want to. He claimed her mouth in a feral, famished kiss. It felt like heaven and hell all at once. Gorgeous, bloody…irreversible.

His tongue chased hers, tasting and taunting, as if he was etching her flavor into his cells.

This is how wildfires always start. Just a spark. Then we’ll burn the whole world down.

Burn it. Burn me.

He did. He moved like a man unchained for the first time in years. Retreating from her cunt’s unrelenting grasp, sliding back to the hilt with a whimper of his own, picking up speed. She helped him, hips rolling to meet his emphatic thrusts.

Her doubts scattered to the winds as she moaned into his mouth. She had fucked him in her head countless times these months, but the tremendous reality was something she couldn’t have fathomed.

He was relentless, not letting her breathe. Only to grab her leg and hook it around his waist, fingers bruising.

He used it to give him more leverage. Settled between her quaking thighs, dragging her closer.

With his other hand braced beside her head, staring into her, a man wholly undone. He bent her backward, settling so deep her nails carved burgundy streams down his back.

He grunted, cock driving harder, his usual restraint not in the same stratosphere anymore. She couldn’t get enough air in as the pores on her skin seemed to seal shut, and she realized she’d just sentenced herself to another heartbreak.

She’d always crave this. Crave him. Hidden behind the intoxicating desire and pleasure, she’d hoped this would get him out of her head. Not tattoo him there and leave her a dripping, clenching mess.

Unsure if she wanted to sob in distress or delight. She pushed it down as tension coiled and coiled within her. Later.

She’d berate herself later. He struck that ruinous cluster of nerves high inside her, turning her very vocal. Her desperate whines only urged him on.

He spoke in a shattered voice, saying, “You’re going to destroy me, you know that? My career, my sanity… everything.”

She retracted her nails from his shoulder, slapping her hand over his mouth. They were a terrible idea wrapped in an even worse decision. Two fractured people on a collision course to disaster.

Why do his hands feel the only thing holding me together? His cock is splitting me open, and I’d sell my charred soul to keep him locked inside.

She didn’t say any of that as she found her voice, every word sundered by the volatile emotions and twisting tension pushing her towards a release she’d never recover from.

“Then wreck me back. Harder. Make it worth it.”

An animalistic noise shredded from somewhere in the caverns of his chest at her. Her hands clawed at the bed, his arms, his shoulders.

She clung to him as he followed her orders. Shameless as she moaned his name, earning her a brutal slam of his hips that made her teeth rattle together. Still, she demanded more.

He gave her everything. His low growl of possession slithered like a shiver through her firing nerves. Tyler slid an arm under her and lifted her up, settling back on his haunches so she could ride him.

Salt and musk and them, fragranced the hazy air. Shadows and silver light flickered like camera shutters over their pebbled skin. The thought almost made her stop. Her panting question threaded into the air between them.

“The cameras? They’ll notice you’re gone. Hear us.”

His head shook, smile lupine. “They’re on a loop. Don’t worry about it.”

Her breath caught as she bounced over him. Brain slow on the draw, but her laugh unhinged as she understood she hadn’t stood a chance. He’d planned this better than she ever could have.

“James didn’t need you, did he?”

His lack of response and the mischief in his eyes spoke for him. He helped her move, thrusting up to meet her every serpentine slide down. His hands planted violets into her waist.

He was gritting his teeth, tendons in his neck popping as her slippery inner walls clasped tight around his cock. She kissed him as the pressure built within her.

It rose too fast, swelling higher with every stroke of his cock engulfed in her saturated heat. Her bones turned to white-noise. The hot ache in her thighs only heightened it.

She was very far from her stage persona as she moaned, and the warbling sound vibrated against his teeth. He swallowed it down. His bristled lips abraded and soothed, his tongue curling against hers.

She sank her teeth into his bottom lip to hear him hiss again. She tried to ignore the warning pulse of release rippling through her. Wanted to make it last. Head dropping as she fought the tide. His mouth was at her ear, sensing her struggle.

“Let go. Show me how bad you wanted it.”

She heard what he didn’t say; show me you craved me as much as I craved you. Don’t leave me alone in this.

She could only follow his command, her whine dissolving into a whimper, melting inside and out. Her entire body quivered as she pushed up on her unsteady knees, the sheets damp under them.

The luscious drag of his cock against her sensitive flesh tightened the tension in her to a level she couldn’t withstand. Her tormented cry alerted him to her inner battle.

His hand slid between their sticky bodies, fingers dipping into her wetness. Finding her swollen clit and helping her over that edge.

The first clumsy brush of his fingers on that bundle of nerves made her jolt, hips stuttering and lifting again as he coaxed her along. She arched, a guitar string turned too sharply.

Her stammered howl was the dissonant wail before the snap. Trembling with it, he bit her neck and sucked at her pounding pulse as she babbled incoherently.

The tension severed with an audible sound. The flick of his tongue on her neck was reverent, as if he were setting his mark in. His fingers circled her clit incessantly, and she slammed down, impaling herself on his cock again and again.

It all worked in tandem. She broke like a threat. One she’d courted and asked for. Waves of white-hot pleasure crashed into her. Blood molten, flame scouring her veins to ash.

Her scream of his name was a litany she’d hear every time she was alone. The orgasm cleansed and annihilated every fear she had. She grabbed hold of the ephemeral moment, seizing it as tightly as her cunt squeezing around his length.

She screwed her eyes shut against it, seeing nothing but white light behind her lids. She was making too much noise but couldn’t stop it. He was talking, but she was deaf to it. He laid her on her back and fucked her through it, hunting his own end.

She clung to him like ivy as he prolonged her agony, drawing it out until she was pleading with him in her mind to give her respite. Still, she took every lunge. There was a tinge of yearned-for pain braiding with pleasure as he overwhelmed her.

The lewd racket of their bodies clashing and his harsh groans wove together. Creating sinful music as she sobbed and thrashed her head.

Tyler eyed the mess he’d made of her with a distinct male pride clear in every line of his handsome face. Each flutter of her addicted cunt made his eyes darken to violet.

She wasn’t human as she felt his cock jump inside her, anticipating his release, relishing the thought of him marking her from within too.

But he pulled out with a moan so decadent she would never find the words to put it into song. She blinked as he palmed his cock, her name a broken whisper on his tongue.

She couldn’t look away as he shuddered violently before wiping his hand clean on the sheet. She arched a brow, sluggishly determining it would be his side.

Part of her wanted to be mad about him ruining her clean sheets, but most of her glowed at his consideration even while lost in a frenzy. She could always make him wash them before he scurried off to fulfill his duties.

As his shaking body blanketed her, the open-mouth kisses he planted on her throat kept her from voicing her silly thoughts. She trailed her nails down his back, scratching softly, and he made a sound suspiciously like a purr as she repeated the action.

It was a while before either could speak. Everything she thought of to break the humming quiet didn’t seem enough. She smiled, racing heart skipping itself, his beating through her chest when he broke the calm silence.

The wind of his words ghosted her, salted her skin. “I don’t do this. Ever. But you… you’re not just a job anymore.”

The confession curdled like cream in her throat. Aftershocks still jumped under her skin, breathing shallow as she held him. Her inner dialogue, making a wish far from careful.

Don’t let this be a one-time thing. Don’t make him walk away. Even if we’re doomed, let us blaze a little longer.

She said none of it as he shifted, rolling them until she lay sprawled across his chest. Her face hidden in his neck, inhaling his scent to infuse in her lungs. She’d never forget that scent.

Her eyes were at half-mast as she mustered the will to speak against his staccato pulse. “Stay. Just until the alarm goes off.”

“It’s disabled. I’ll reset it before dawn,” he said in a rough undertone, breath ruffling her sweat-damp hair.

She nodded, skin glued to his as his arms tightened around her. His large hands splayed wide, as if he were trying to touch as much of her as humanly possible.

There, in that dark oasis, moonlight glimmering through the skylight, it all seemed so simple. Effortless. Why shouldn’t they have this?

Why couldn’t she have one thing for herself, only for her?

You know why. Best prepare for the worst before the worst prepares you.

She exhaled as his heart slowed. Too late. The levee had already burst. And lacking a plan, she—she knew she couldn’t plan for any of this. It would have to play out on the world stage.

They wouldn’t solve it tonight. She strangled the worries, giving in to the potent lure of the first deep sleep she’d had since he’d come under her employ. He was stealthier than a cat stalking a spider.

She didn’t wake until the sun beat through the windows. Alone again, but the pleasant soreness between her thighs and the raw skin around her mouth tingling under her fingertips banished any negative feeling.

The note he’d left on her pillow kept a sappy smile on her face. She crumpled it in her hand and stuffed it in her robes pocket, so she could put it in the box she kept all her favorite memories in.

She wrapped the bedsheet around her sore body. A blend of him and her emanated from the fabric. It was a perfume she never wanted to wash off. But she dutifully padded into the en-suite to shower.

To patch the cracks and ensure only she knew they were there once she faced the rest of her household. And to catalogue the evidence he’d left in bruises, bites, and beard burns on her flesh.

She’d wear them like diamonds if she could. Even as she washed their night together down the soapy drain, Tyler’s note never left her head.

Your security detail’s been… adjusted.

Don’t fire me.—T When she tip-toed back to her bedroom in a robe that only skimmed her thighs, sneaking as she heard Stefan laughing in the kitchen as they swapped shifts, she found a token left on her nightstand.

It was a gesture that made her veins collapse and rebuild in a microsecond.

A single folded black leather glove.