The Prophet (The Cloister Trilogy 2)

He hasn’t said that he didn’t kill Georgia. I haven’t asked. And I won’t, because I already know the answer. The misery consuming him at this moment is truth enough. Sarah is the first innocent he’s sacrificed. I wish I could tell him that I’m here to make sure it never happens again. To end this place for Georgia … and maybe even for us. But some secrets are best left unspoken.

Instead, I say, “Someone bought me.” The words should strike me as absurd, but they don’t. Evan Roberts is all too real, his threat palpable.

“I know.”

“Don’t let him take me.” God, I sound weak, and I hate it.

“I’m going to do whatever I can to keep you away from him.”

“Like what?”

He doesn’t hold back, giving me a frank gaze and the truth. “I don’t know yet, but I’m working on getting us out.”

“I punched him in the dick,” I blurt.

He smiles. Jesus Christ and all the angels, he’s actually smiling, and I can’t believe how much I long to see more of it. Pure and warm—nothing like the darkness that usually envelops him.

“Your eyes got so big right then.” He streaks his fingertips along my temple.

“I’ve just never seen you… happy.”

“Tell you what. You keep dick-punching that motherfucker, and I’ll keep being happy.”

I smile and press my lips to his. “Deal,” I whisper against him.

He doesn’t need more of an invitation. He grabs a handful of my ass and yanks me against him as his tongue wars and wins against mine. His embrace is warm, and delicious, and wrong in so many ways, but I crave it all the same. Throwing one leg around his hips, I scoot closer. He surges forward, his cock pressing against me, the only things separating us a few layers of inconsequential fabric.

After a while, he shifts away from me, and I find myself panting, wanting more of his kiss.

He squeezes my ass again. “I have to hurt you. For the camera.”

“Oh.” I press my open palm against his chest. “You don’t like hurting me anymore?”

“I love it.” He snakes a hand up my stomach and grips one breast, kneading it roughly. “But only on my terms. Not for anyone else. Just us.”

“Us?”

He covers my hand with his. “Us.”

We’re both raw, trapped animals, forced to perform for the crowd night after night.

“Let’s do this for us, then.” I kick off the blanket, then rise onto my knees and strip my dress over my head.

He tenses and scores my body with his gaze. My already-hard nipples start to ache as he stares at them. Something dangerous lights his eyes, and a shiver courses through me.

“All fours,” he grates.

I prowl down to the bed and watch him.

“Oh, little lamb, you know what I like.” He lifts himself onto his knees beside me and presses my face and chest to the bed with a steady hand on my upper back. He smooths his other palm over my ass in slow circles. “I can’t leave a mark on you.”

I can only breathe into the mattress as his circles grow smaller and smaller until his fingers dip between my legs and stroke my wet folds. His touch sends sparks of tension swirling inside me, the threads holding me together pulling tighter and tighter.

“But what I give you right now will fade.” He rears back and brings his hand rushing forward with a loud slap, a rush of pain following behind like thunder after the lightning.

I grip the sheet and try to take a breath, but the blows come hard and fast, each one sending stinging pain through my skin and a jolt up my spine. God, it hurts, and I’m almost to the point of trying to stop him when he dips his fingers between my thighs again, pulsing them against my slick core and moving quickly.

I moan, and he speeds up, his touch verging on too rough and not enough. I rock my hips, searching for the one electric road leading to my release.

“Not so fast, little lamb.” His fingers retreat, and his hand comes down on my ass again, slap after stinging slap.

“Adam!” I push against the hand holding me down, but he doesn’t let up.

More pain and then his fingers snake between my thighs again, demanding my compliance. I give it, grinding myself against his fingers as the cocktail of pleasure and pain shoots through my bloodstream, taking me to a new high. Right there, on the edge of release, I tense, so close to that perfect explosion.

He takes his fingers away. I scream into the mattress and buck when his hand comes down hard again. He doesn’t show any mercy, only hits me until I’m a quivering heap, everything inside me drawn relentlessly tense. When his fingers press against the hot, needy flesh at my core, I moan low and long.