Roni’s fingers play on my chest, and she traces the lines of my tattoos as we both try to catch our breaths. I hadn’t expected that she’d come around to me quite so quickly, but the second her lips were on mine, I wasn’t about to back down. Besides, I know every one of the fuckers who have kept her bed warm since we were last together, and I can guarantee this woman hasn’t been thoroughly fucked in years. Who am I to say no?

She surprised the fuck out of me today. I knew she had it in her to pull that trigger, but I thought it was going to take a little more convincing than that. I was expecting a fight. I was expecting her to struggle with her inner demons, but the second the fucker explained what he’d done, she took justice into her own hands and proved once and for all just how fucking powerful she is.

She didn’t hang around to show me just how much she enjoyed it, but I could tell by the look in her eyes that the adrenaline and power turned her on, just as it did for me.

She’s always been so strong. She’s always had the darkness in her soul, just like mine. We’re kindred spirits, we always have been. She’s just been too fucking stubborn to admit it. Roni has this need to be good, to do good, and to be the face of reason, but she’s been lying to herself.

Welcome to the dark side, baby.

I can’t say that I’ve ever fucked her like that before, but I loved it. It’s as though her body was speaking to the darkest part of me, enticing me to give it everything I had. At that moment, I wanted to make her scream louder than she’s ever screamed before. I wanted to feel her pussy pulsating and squeezing my cock. I wanted to give her everything.

She fucking deserved it.

Roni lets out a deep sigh, and I glance down at her beautiful face that hasn’t changed a damn bit in twelve years. “What is it?” I question, not sure how things are going to be between us now. Does she still hate me, or is she all mine again? Maybe it’s just angry, hate sex from here on out. If it is, that’s honestly perfectly fine with me.

Roni pushes up off my chest and sits on the bed beside me, crossing her legs and looking down at my body, not ready to meet my eyes. “I don’t know,” she finally says. “I have too many things going through my head to even know where to begin with you.”

“Start with the easiest,” I say, realizing that this could go on for a while. Roni has always been the type to pick apart every little thing. She wants to know the reasons behind everything that happens, and then she’ll go away and think about it some more.

“Okay,” she says. “Well first, I need you to know that what you just made me do out there … that’s not okay. I hate you for that. You forced me to give up a piece of me that I’ve been protecting, a piece that my father had always tried to take from me. I don’t want to be like you. I’m not some psycho killer.”

“But you enjoyed it,” I tell her, pushing up onto my elbow and running my knuckles down the side of her face. “You liked the adrenaline, the power you felt holding that gun. You liked being the one who got to deliver justice and put the fucker down. You don’t hate me, Roni. You hate that you’re like me.”

“I’m not,” she rushes out. “I’m nothing like you.”

“Just give it time, baby, and you’ll see. You’re just like me, but you have this wall up that you’ve buried it all behind. Don’t you remember what it was like in high school? You used to love those parts of yourself, but then you went to college and learned how to hide it. This hoity-toity, stuck up chick that you’re pretending to be, that’s not the real Roni, and you know it. It’s time to spread your wings.”

Her eyes flick to mine for the briefest second, and the desire in her eyes tells me that she’d like nothing more than to slip back into the girl she used to be and truly let her shine. But in a second, she glances away, and that look in her eyes vanishes. “You’re insane,” she tells me. “That was just high school bullshit trying to look tough in front of my boyfriend. That wasn’t who I was. This here, the woman who sits before you, this is the real me, and you need to stop trying to make me into someone I’m not. She doesn’t exist anymore.”


Tags: Sheridan Anne Rejects Paradise Romance