If we just shut up and let it sing.
God. Apparently getting off the sauce made my father a sage.
I forgot how sharp he could be.
And it’s amazing to see it shining out of him like this when I thought his light was dead and dark and empty.
That sends my thoughts spinning back to Roland.
I think about the light in that man, and how the darkness of his vengeance quest has smothered it so completely he’s willing to be filthy to buy a little peace for his soul.
As filthy as the same people who disillusioned my father. Who broke him and made him forget the beauty in the world, and in himself.
How would Dad feel, knowing I’m falling chaotically in love with a man like that?
How do I feel, trying to reconcile the Roland in my heart with the person he is? The real Roland and the man he won’t let himself be?
How do I fall out of love with the monster Roland believes he needs to become?
* * *
“I’m not in love with you, lunk. I’m not.”
I whisper it to myself as quietly as possible.
Because I’m also whispering it to Roland’s sleeping face, and if he woke up and caught me, I don’t even want to think about how that would go down.
Maybe he’d laugh it off and tease me.
Maybe he’d shut down, swear off everything, and kick me to the curb.
We haven’t dared touch the L-word. We haven’t touched a lot of things, really, when most of our private time is spent with me on my back. He’s left me sore and exhausted again tonight.
I reach up to pull my hair gently, feeling a sweet ache in my scalp.
He fisted my hair into two taut ponytails tonight, shoving me under him on all fours, mounting me with all the greed of a bull in rut.
Even now, I remember his roughness.
I remember how much I liked it.
I remember his cock filling me again and again, his body crashing against mine like a high wave off Lake Michigan on an ancient cliff.
I remember how he sank his teeth into my neck—part vampire in more than teasing name only—certain to leave a fresh mark or two tomorrow.
Some days, I try to cover them up with high necks and breezy summer scarves.
Some days, I don’t bother.
Call me twisted, but I love being marked by Roland. I love that he’s so overwhelmed with need that he has to brand me.
Just like I’ve fallen in love with the obsessed flare in his eyes when he looks at me naked.
I’m just as obsessed with his growl.
Like tonight when I was bent over and taking his punishing strokes, his free hand crashing against my ass as he pulled my ear to his lips and whispered, “Callie, you’d better.”
That’s become a caveman-like abbreviation for you’d better fucking come with me. He’s too overcome, his throat too tight, to say the entire sentence.
But God, he needs my pleasure.
It’s almost ritualistic now.
He needs to wring me out, absolutely “dry” even though I’m actually drenched.
He needs the scream that sticks in my throat when my core ignites, when I squeeze his cock, when I feel him let go, his body heaving with release and punching mine to total ecstasy.
Always angry.
Always possessive.
Always unfathomably sexy.
I’m ruined. I’m so effing ruined for this madman that I can’t imagine going to bed with anyone else and enjoying it.
He makes the dark, rough things feel as normal as the sweetest kisses. He isn’t afraid to spend hours teasing me with the softest touch or sinking his teeth into my skin and painting my ass so red with his palm that it glows.
He isn’t afraid to fuck me with his entire soul.
And I’m scared that I’ve given up mine to him.
Possibly forever.
About as frightened as I am of slipping up and muttering something infinitely dirtier than any of our pillow talk.
The dreaded four-letter word.
Love.
But if there’s some silent rule about any mention of love, I can’t imagine he’d react well to it being broken.
Maybe he’d be hurt or heartbroken or guilty as hell.
That’d be a really crappy way to find out he actually cares.
I’m trying my hardest not to care, so I won’t get busted up when this turns out to be nothing but a casual way for him to blow off steam.
“I am not in love with you,” I whisper again. “I won’t fall in love, either.”
Roland’s quiet, relaxed face doesn’t change.
His nostrils flare and he gives a cute snore.
Yeah, he’s really out of it. It’s no wonder when something stoked that devil’s fire in him, and he’s been working later and later every night.
Tonight he only stopped when I reminded him that he needs to eat dinner sometime.
Technically, dinner and me.
I typically don’t mean me, but that doesn’t stop him from devouring me after he wolfs down his food like a starving man who didn’t realize his own hunger until dinner gets plopped down in front of him.