Chapter 31

His words are a verbal freight train, plowing me over and then continuing on to demolish everything in its path. My heart feels like a rocket ship in my chest, vibrating erratically before taking flight and barreling up my throat. I can barely breathe through the pounding in my ears, so deafening that stars replace the darkness of my vision.

Without immediately responding to Damien’s proclamation, I take a moment to analyze my own feelings. My own emotions. They’re a tumultuous mixture, all of them threaded together, making them impossible for me to unravel. The second I grab one and begin to pull, the ball of yarn gets tighter and even more tangled.

Deep breaths, Nina. Deep breaths.

There’s panic, obviously. So potent that I’m practically drowning in it, the taste of decay filling my mouth. And intermixed with the panic is fear. Even a little anger at Damien for keeping this a secret.

But then there are the bright ones, shining like beacons and infusing me with warmth.

Joy.

Excitement.

Hope.

The toxic cocktail of emotions leaves me breathless and panting. I’m dimly aware of Damien placing a hand on my elbow, guiding me back to the chair I abandoned. When my body tilts precariously to the side, he automatically catches me, and I can tell how rigid he is through touch alone. Every plane of his chest is held tautly, as if he’s seconds from snapping entirely.

And I don’t know what I’d do with a snapped Damien.

His voice, however, is gentle when he speaks next, as he kneels in front of me and places his hands on my knees. “Talk to me, Angel.”

“I don’t know how I feel,” I confess in a breathy whisper, still attempting to unravel the emotions squeezing my heart in an iron vise. So. Many. Emotions. They bombard me from every direction as if I’m standing in an open field during a hailstorm. “I’m…I’m excited. And terrified. And confused. And horrified. And…” I place a hand over my mouth as Damien’s grip tightens almost imperceptibly on my thighs. “Oh God. Damien, I don’t want to deliver a baby here.”

Not in this place that breeds monsters.

Not in prison.

I can’t think of a worse fate.

But I also know that a piece of my soul will shrivel up and die if I’m forced to give the baby up. My baby up.

“You could tell the warden.” Damien’s voice is nearly inaudible, merely air that blows across my face. It’s colder than icebergs, the frigid nature of it in direct contrast to the tender way he touches my legs. “If you tell the warden, he’ll send you to a safer part of the prison until you give birth. And once you give birth?—”

“No,” I say, cutting him off vehemently and shaking my head from side to side. “I’m not leaving you guys. Besides, is anywhere really safe with the hit still out on me?” I instinctively bring my hands to my stomach, where there’s apparently life forming inside of me. A product of the love I feel for my men. I want to ask Damien more questions—if he knows who the father is, if he can tell the species of the baby or even the gender—but I don’t. None of that matters at the moment.

“I’ll protect you and our child with every power I possess,” Damien vows, placing his hand over mine. His breath hitches. “I don’t give a damn if that baby isn’t biologically mine. I’ll protect and love you both.”

My heart fills with love for this man.

Removing my hand from my stomach, I cup his smooth-shaven cheek.

His lips meet mine in a tender kiss as my other hand travels up his arm to cup the side of his face, bringing him even closer to me. His own arms band around my waist, practically lifting me off the chair.

We’re still kissing as he leads me to the ground, shifting our positions so I’m on the charred floor and he’s hovering over me.

When Damien pulls his lips away, I cry out automatically, needing my mage with an intensity that leaves me breathless. I hear him moving around, and a moment later, his bundled up jacket is underneath my head, serving as a makeshift pillow, and his lean, naked body is hovering over mine.

“Damien,” I pant as he pulls down the straps of my dress and takes one of my nipples into his mouth. His tongue swirls around the pointed peak as his other hand crawls underneath my dress, pushing away my underwear to spear me with his finger.

I gasp, my back arching instinctively, as he continues to shove his digit in and out of my pussy.

“This pussy is mine,” Damien growls out, the possessiveness in his voice nearly taking me off guard. It’s a reaction I would’ve expected from Bronson or Kai, not my normally stoic and apathetic mage.

He adds another finger to my tight channel as he moves his lips to my neglected breast, pulling my nipple through his teeth.

“These breasts are mine.” His hand grabs my tit and begins to knead the flesh as I writhe, almost mindless with pleasure. When I don’t answer, struggling to even get enough air in my lungs, he removes his fingers and stops playing with my aching breasts. “Answer me, Angel.”

“Yes,” I manage to rasp out. “They’re yours. I’m yours.”

“Damn right you are.” He pulls his lips back to mine and kisses me with a bruising intensity, one I feel in my very soul, incinerating any doubt or fear I might’ve had and replacing it with an all-encompassing and consuming love. “You and our baby…” I can practically sense the darkness permeating from him in tangible waves. But instead of scaring me, as it no doubt would a sane person, I cry out in pleasure. “Mine.”

“Yours,” I agree, desperate to touch all of him. I run my hands down his bare shoulder blades, and surprisingly, he lets me. Damien is always very cautious about touch. He doesn’t let anyone besides me touch him, and even then, he still gets twitchy and anxious. Not in the same way Cain does, but more so in the sense that he isn’t used to it. That he doesn’t always associate touch with pleasure instead of pain.

His back muscles dip low, and I allow my hands to fondle his chiseled, rock-hard butt. I want to reach between us and grab his cock that I can feel pressing against my stomach, leaving behind a wet streak, but I can’t grab it in this position.

“Damien.” It’s a plea. I’m begging for him, needing him with every fiber of my being. He’s as essential to me as breathing. I need to breathe him in and devour him like oxygen.

“Angel.” His fingers begin to scissor inside of me, and I can feel myself on the verge?—

But before I can topple over the edge, Damien removes his fingers from my channel. A second later, his hot cock slides against my sensitive folds as he slowly pushes himself inside of me, inch by inch. I gasp when he reaches the hilt, loving the way he fills me so completely, and buck my hips so he’s forced to move.

He doesn’t. At least not right away.

Instead, he stills over me, his arms braced on either side of my head and his lips a hair’s breadth away from my own.

“I never thought I would have this,” he whispers, and the sheer vulnerability lacing his tone has my heart pounding, hands shaking, lungs shriveling.

“A girl underneath you?” I tease, but I know that’s not what he meant.

“Someone to love. Someone who loves me. A family.” He clears his throat seconds before planting a tentative kiss to my lips. It’s a slow, almost careful kiss, and I can feel how tense he is above me. I want to remind him that I’m not made of glass, that I’m not going to break the second he applies too much pressure, but there’s something so alluring about the tender pecks he plants to every inch of my lips. I deepen it further, my fingers threading through his hair as he lets out a low, pained sound in the back of his throat. I shiver, my toes curling as he moves away from my mouth and back to my sensitive, aching breasts, sucking on my nipple.

“Damien…” I pull his face back to mine and part my lips automatically, searching for his tongue, and sigh in pleasure when it tangles with my own.

“I’ll never let you go.” Something malevolent enters his tone, evoking images of bloody knives and dark streets. “I’ll kill anyone who tries to take you away from me.”

Without giving me a chance to respond, he begins to move, his hips thrusting against my pelvis as his cock slides in and out of me. It starts off slow, almost as if the news of my pregnancy makes him think I’m breakable, but those notions quickly dissipate as he becomes consumed by a fervent hunger.

His hands fondle my breasts as he pounds into me, leaning forward to capture my lips in another one of his bruising kisses. I love the way his lips move against my own. As if he’s claiming me. Owning me. Loving me in a way only a monster like him can. I’m not oblivious to the darkness that resides inside of Damien’s soul, but it also doesn’t scare me. I know he’ll use every ounce of his darkness to love and protect me and our unborn baby. There’s not a doubt in my mind.

He doesn’t love often, but when he does, it’s fiercely and unconditionally.

I know he’ll move heaven and hell to see me safe and happy.

My pussy squeezes his cock as his lips travel to my throat, marking me with his teeth. I scream out my release as his hips judder, seconds before he spills his seed inside of me. His lips clasp down on my sensitive neck, hard enough to bruise, but the sensation only makes me explode again, milking him for all he’s worth.

Damien releases a heavy breath, nuzzling his face against my neck, before moving so he’s on his back and I’m lying half on his chest and half on the ground, his cock still inside of me, rapidly hardening.

Silence descends as he strokes my bare back, his fingers as soft as moth’s wing against my overheated skin.

“We need to tell the others,” I whisper, planting a kiss to his chest.

I wish desperately I could see his face when he sighs once more.

“We need to get out of this fucking prison,” he murmurs curtly, and I find myself nodding before I remember where I am.

There’s no escape. Not for me and not for the men I love.

We’re defined by our pasts, trapped in this prison by both metaphorical and physical chains.

Until death claims us, I have no doubt that this is where we’ll remain.

Sadness fills me as I think about the unborn child growing inside of me. Of the life she or he will never have.

I’m sorry, my sweet baby.

I’m so, so sorry.