Cruel Temptation (Underground Kings 1)

“That’s not important right now, baby. Let’s shower. We have had a hell of a day, and it’s only six in the morning. Let’s wash up and sleep.”

“You perv,” she said on a yawn. “You totally watched me.” She had dark circles under her eyes with a new bruise on her cheek.

“I should cut off his arm for doing that to you.” I ghosted my finger over the black spot forming on her jaw.

“Nice change of subject.”

“I don’t want to joke right now,” I stated and reached in the shower stall to turn the water on. “What happened today shouldn’t have ever happened.”

“Don’t do that. Don’t blame yourself. If we want to play the blame game, blame me for not believing in you ten years ago because if I had none of this would have happened.”

“That’s not true. He would have found a wa—”

She laid her finger across my lips and silenced me. “Then it doesn’t matter. I just know that I love you. And I wish our past could have been different, but it can’t be changed. You know what can be? Our future. It’s ours now. We own it. There are no threats to haunt us anymore. It’s just you and me against the world now.” She wrapped her arms around my neck, tilted her head back and looked into my eyes while she started to sway. Not because she was tired but because she wanted to dance. There was no music. No sounds.

It was our breathing. Our heartbeats. The rush of our blood. The beat of the water against the stall. I closed my eyes and breathed her in, smelt her hair, felt her skin, and I got lost in the sensations of having her close, safe, and all mine.

“God, I love you, Quinn.” It hurt how much I loved her because I couldn’t express how much love I possessed for her. Quinn was my obsession; had been since the moment I saw her licking that damn vanilla cone outside Sweet Tooth back in our hometown.

I knew right then and there she’d be mine.

“Whatever. You only love me because I fucked myself on my fingers, and you got to watch when I had no idea.” She smiled against my lips, and I couldn’t help but to grin in return. I was caught.

“Okay, this time I am guilty,” I said, then roamed my hands down to her ass and squeezed, “but I’d bet you’d like to know that I jacked-off myself watching you. I came all over that mirror when you did. It was the hottest thing I had ever seen.”

“You’re insatiable,” she giggled, and her hand slid down my torso and then cupped me. “I know a way we can forget about the day.” Quinn kissed the side of my throat. It was impossible to deny her what she wanted. She obviously needed to get lost for a while and have her mind on something else other than Brian.

“When it comes to you, I’ll always be insatiable.”

Until the day I die, I’ll want Quinn. I knew after that, when I was long gone and nothing but dust in the wind, my ghost would want her. I’d wait until our next life, where I knew I’d get to love her all over again. A love like ours, it isn’t once in a lifetime for us, it’s through all time, until the end of this universe.

Chapter Thirty

Quinn

Six weeks later

A lot had happened in the last six weeks since Brian’s death. Sebastian had been able to give the confession of Brian to the police, and today, we were going to court to testify and clear Jaxon’s name. His record would be expunged, even if the memories couldn’t be.

But all good things come with bad, as if Brian wasn’t enough bad, that night when Brian died, he ended up killing Ingrid and Louis.

We thought they had slept through the entire ordeal, but when Grayson went to check on Ingrid, they found both of their necks snapped. Their funerals were three weeks ago, and even if Ingrid was so new to us, we missed her lively rough and tough nature of telling it h

ow it was. We missed the smell of her cooking everyone’s favorite cookies, even when she was just cooking for herself.

Jaxon took Louis’s death the hardest, but we grieved, and we were moving on with our lives. This was the last chapter we had to close, and we’d be free. I didn’t tell Jaxon, but after court, I was going to take him to the tattoo shop and get my name on his chest and his name on mine. Might as well because the man was seared on my soul, and I knew he wasn’t going anywhere.

“All rise,” the deputy said.

Everybody stood, and heels and dress shoes clicked along the floor as people got their feet under them. The judge went to his seat, glasses perched at the end of his nose, and his eyes looked up from his bifocals, something Louis used to do. The judge wore a black gown draped over his shoulder, reminding me of graduation, and he had a headful of dyed black hair. I knew it was died because it looked unnatural with his wrinkled skin.

“You may take your seats,” the judge spoke clearly in the microphone. “We are here to discuss the matters of Jaxon Steel vs. The State of California. Mr. Steel? Please, come to the stand.”

I squeezed Jaxon’s hand, and he gripped mine in return. He stood, pulled the sleeves of his suit, and strolled forward. Damn, the man rocked a suit. He wore all black with a red tie. I’d never seen him wear a red tie, and he admitted that he only power and attention he wanted was him. He was power, not the color, but he said today was a special day, so he went out and bought a red tie.

All the women in the room were drooling over him, but I knew he didn’t see any of them, he only saw me.

“We are here because you said you never killed your sister and we have a confession on tape of the man named Brian Perkins saying he killed her, is that correct?” the judge asked.