“You love me. Truth or lies?” this sentence comes out as question more than any of her previous ones. This one she doesn’t know the answer to before she asks it. She knows I care about her. I even like her. But love, that’s on a whole different level.
“I love it when you scream my name when you come,” I wink at her. Thrusting again to try to get us off this topic. But she’s determined. She wants a real answer.
“That’s not what I mean. Do you love me? Do you have a heart? Are you capable of loving?” she presses against my heart with her palm.
“Do you love me?” I ask.
“Can a slave ever love her master?” she says back.
“Can a predator ever love his prey?” I snap back.
Her face grows determined. She wants me to admit weakness. Admit I love her when she could never love me in return.
“I’m not capable of love, Kai. We are fucking, nothing more. I care about you sure. I want to protect you and keep you alive because I want to protect the broken. But when this is over, when one of us is declared Black, this is over. You want to be free; I’ll find a way to make it happen the second this twisted game is through.”
“You’re too evil for love, and I’m too broken.” She smiles sadly. “Just making sure before you start proposing to me for real.”
I chuckle and kiss her lips. “You don’t have to worry about that. This is the best we will ever have, with anyone. Neither of us can love. Neither wants to get married. Neither wants to start a family. But this connection we have. It’s special. And it’s real. And it can be the best damn thing we have. Because not being capable of falling in love is the best damn gift either of us has ever received.”
She nods. “Fuck me and remind me what I have instead of what I’m giving up.”
So I do. I fuck her hard, quickly moving back into our rhythm together. Our blood pumps, and it might as well be flowing through me to her as in sync we both are together.
I drive in harder.
“You like that, baby?”
“Fuck, yes.”
“You have nothing to fear. You’re safe—always.”
I fuck her harder. Deeper. Longer. Until I know we are both going to spend the next few hours passed out in the bed from a sex coma instead of what I need to be doing—finding a way to protect her.
She screams and pants her orgasm out until her screams turn into silent pleas. A single tear rolls down her cheek.
I kiss it away, hoping with its removal so too am I removing her pain and her anger. I know we aren’t capable of forgiveness any more than we are capable of love. But we are capable of moving forward no matter what. We are survivors.
We collapse on the bed next to each other. We both pant hard, and I’m too tired to get up to even remove the condom.
We both close our eyes as sleep begins to come for us. But not before I realize what I have to do to keep her safe. And she isn’t going to like it.
7
KAI
I LOVE ENZO BLACK.
I love him.
I shouldn’t. It should be the last feeling I ever feel. But I do. I love him. I thought I was too broken for love. I thought I was undeserving. But nobody told my heart any of those things.
Enzo is cruel. He’s dangerous. He’s evil.
He sold me, but not out of malice, but because he loves me too, and it hurt him too much to imagine me with another man. It hurt so fucking much he had to get rid of me. He needed me gone in order to survive.
But he’s so broken he will never admit he’s capable of love.
Love is weak.