We fly into Syracuse a few hours later. Harper tries to play it cool, but she can’t keep the smile off her face for most of the trip. Everything impresses her—the flight, the service, the landing. I pick up our luxury rental and take her straight to the hotel. Seeing her this happy has me horny as hell.
“So, this is what it’s like being rich,” she marvels as I hand the keys to the valet and lead her to the glass elevator inside. “You better watch out or I’ll get spoiled like you.”
I wrap my arm around her waist and pull her in. “You have no idea,” I say. “I’m just getting started.”
In our room, we shower the travel off separately before we fall onto the soft bed next to the windows overlooking the city. “So, when is this college tour?” she asks, stretching her little body on top of mine. I put on a t-shirt and boxers, but she’s naked and sexy as fuck.
“Tomorrow,” I growl, palming the backs of her thick thighs. “Tonight, I’m going to fuck every hole in your body until you beg for mercy, and then I’ll fuck you one more time, just to make sure you remember who all this belongs to. I’ll give you a hint. It’s not you.”
“You’re a pig.”
“And you’re a collection of tight little holes begging to be wrecked.”
I roll us over, sliding a hand between her legs, stroking her clit until she’s wet and panting for me. When I push into her tight, bare cunt, I just about lose my mind. I savor her cries of pleasure and pain with each slow, deep thrust. Fucking her raw is like nothing I’ve ever felt, and I have to make it last, hold myself back. I make her cum before I let myself go, forcing my cock so deep into her that tears pour from her eyes when I fill her core with my own release.
Afterwards, she dozes while I order room service. We eat and then fuck again before drifting off. Being away is a relief, like we’ve left everything behind. Maybe there’s a chance for us, away from my family but close enough to go into the city to visit every few months. Away from her family and the ghosts of mine that haunt Faulkner. For the first time in three years, it seems like a possibility. Like maybe I really can start over somewhere else, without Crystal.
Like maybe the girl who’s still here, still alive, could be more important than the one who’s not.
Over the next few days, we tour the campus and get everything lined up for her admission. Since I’ve already graduated, I’m all set to transfer as soon as she’s able to join me.
I was going to bring her to meet Ma while we were up here, but at the last minute, I decide not to. It’ll happen eventually, since I’m never letting her go. I still don’t trust her, though, and I don’t want her near something as complicated and fucked up as my relationship with my mother.
Instead, we fly into the city, where we have dinner with King and Eliza. The next day, Eliza’s all too happy to leave the baby for a few hours and take Harper shopping. Thanks to her stylist, Harper comes back with some decent clothes that make her look like herself and not like she’s playing dress-up as my sister. I tell her she looks hot because I remember how much I’m supposed to care. Once, I wouldn’t have given a girl like her a second glance. But now I don’t give a fuck what she wears. I’ll just be taking them off later.
King offers to take us to the Hamptons, where he has free rein of Uncle Al’s house, but I don’t want to involve Harper in that world. Even though Al won’t be there, I’d rather take her somewhere else. One day, she’ll have to dip her toes into the Life, but not yet. I’ll keep her far from that for as long as I’m able. So, instead of going out there, we hop on a plane and fly into Hyannis, get another car, and drive out to the Cape.
“It’s pretty cold for the beach,” Harper says, craning her neck to see the ocean as we wind along Route 6 toward Chaos Cove.
“You’ve never seen the ocean,” I point out. “I’m not waiting until next summer.”
It’s late October, so the traffic is basically nonexistent, unlike the gridlock of summer traffic. I pull up to the little rental, which, after a little convincing, they opened for us despite it being the off season.
“How many times have you been to the ocean?” Harper asks as we climb out of the car. I can hear the surf pounding the beach from here, and even though I’ve been here plenty, excitement rises in me at the thought of bringing her here for the first time.
“I don’t know,” I say, shaking my head. “Enough to lose count.”
“Then how many times have you beenhere?”
“Every summer,” I say, handing her the down jacket she got in the city. “Until three years ago.”
I take her hand and lead her around the house, down the boardwalk, and onto the beach. I watch Harper’s face from the corner of my eye as she takes it in, her gaze rapt. The cold, salt air dampens our faces as we cross the sand to the water. Harper drops my hand and crouches to touch the icy water when a wave rolls in. Then she stands, just watching the ocean while I watch her.
We’re the only people on the beach, and I’m suddenly glad we didn’t come in summer. I don’t want to share this moment with anyone. I step back and let her have it for herself. The roar of the waves fills the air, but all I see is her. Her hair ripples out in the wind, and she pulls her jacket closed around her. Her little body is dwarfed by the sea, the sand, the sky. She looks so insignificant for a girl who’s endured the brutality she has, so inconsequential for someone who’s the center of the whole fucking universe.
My chest aches for both of us. She’s not just my curse. I’m hers. I’ll never be done with her, no matter how much she deserves freedom. She deserves so much more, a man who can treat her like the fucking queen she is, not some asshole who takes what he wants and doesn’t know the meaning of the word love.
But she’s not going to get it. She’s going to get me because I can’t let go. She’s my weakness, and she’s cursed with that as much as I am.
After a while, she turns and walks up the beach to where I’m standing in the dry sand.
“I should make your brothers cry more often,” she says, flashing me a grin that’s like an ice pick to my sternum. She looks so fucking happy, so free, as if the past doesn’t exist.
“What?” I ask.
She sits down on the cold beach, patting the sand until I take my place next to her. “You said this was to thank me for being with Duke last week,” she reminds me.
I shift around, then pull her into my lap, setting her between my legs and wrapping my arms around her from behind. I rest my chin on top of her head, and we watch the waves for a while.