Chapter 13

Chapter 13

Glory

HUXLEY”S HANDS ARE firm on my biceps, the only thing grounding me in reality as my senses swirl out of control.

I hurt.

I want.

I need.

I ache for relief, to feel that explosion I felt against Ambrose’s fingers.

My sweaty palms rub against my knees, then my fingers curl, digging into my fleshy thighs. I draw my hands back, dragging aching lines up my legs as my head drops forward, intentionally avoiding Huxley’s gaze.

“Are you okay?” he asks softly.

There’s something odd in his tone, something exciting about the way his hands squeeze my biceps so intensely. My shoulder throbs with a pulsing pain from where it jammed against the wall when Ambrose threw me in. The pain mixes with the need running through me, making my skin crawl…but in a good way. It’s like bubbles bursting beneath the surface, rippling pinpricks that tease and make me frantic to seek friction across my tickled flesh.

My head shakes from side to side and I can’t bring myself to speak, afraid of what will come out of my mouth. I press my eyes shut against the hum of need that vibrates through my core and pulses through my clit.

God, why do I feel like this?

How does Ambrose make me feel like this?

I want him so badly that I kissed him instead of fighting him harder to get free.

“Glory…” My name comes out gruffly, and Huxley shifts on his knees.

“Hux, I can’t…I’ve never…There’s something wrong with me.”

“There’s nothing wrong with you.”

“I kissed him. I wanted him.” It feels both good and bad to admit.

“Look at me.”

Slowly, and with hesitancy, I lift my head. My eyes scrape over his body from his knees, up his muscular thighs, across the bulge in his jeans…

I gasp.

Does he need the way I do?

Is he infected by this house, by this man the same as me?

I pull my eyes away from his lap with great strain, lifting them to look at his face from beneath my eyelashes. My chest heaves. My tongue slips out to lick my bottom lip before my teeth catch hold of it. When I meet his brown eyes, the strange lust building inside me snaps together into a dense ball that drops heavy and hard, pulling that need down with desperation I can’t fight.

I need to come.

I need to relieve this awful aching.

My hand slips between my legs as my knees slide apart and my fingers rush to press against my pussy. I touch myself over my jeans and the moment there’s contact, my head snaps back and I moan in anticipation of the relief I’m so desperate to find.

I can’t focus.

I can’t think of anything else.

“Glory.”

I rub harshly, though with no idea what to do to find the explosion. I should feel ashamed for what I’m doing here in front of Huxley, trapped in a cage in a crazy man’s home in the woods.

I always felt ashamed of sex before—it was always something taken from me. It was taken by my father, but not only by him. It was taken by all the other boys I’d tried to find approval from, too. I’d let so many fuck me, hoping it would make them love me, but they never did. It never felt good; it never felt right. None of them ever cared if I enjoyed it.

I don’t know if this feels right, but I know for certain that it’s necessary. And Huxley has always taken care of me when I needed him.

I need him now.

I need this so much, I worry I might lose myself without it.

“He made me come,” I whisper, feeling blood rush to my cheeks. “That was the first time I’ve ever felt that. Huxley, I need to. I need it now. I need to come again. I need it so much.”

Warm tears prick at the backs of my eyes for the way this filthy need consumes me. I feel it through every cell in my body, each molecule screaming and begging to be touched. Moments of frantic rubbing against my jeans pass, and I’m whimpering, waiting for something to strike me and show me that I’m doing what I need to do to get that relief, but it only builds frustration and fear and deep-rooted shame.

I fear remaining pent-up like this, stuck in a painful desire that will never resolve itself like a chronic ache that will plague me until the day I die.

“Help me,” I beg through a rasping breath, my eyes locking on his. “I don’t know how to…”

He just watches me and breathes, his eyes burning through mine. I know he wants to, but he’s holding back. He’s holding back and each second that passes drives me further to insanity.

“Huxley, please.”

No movement.

I quickly undo the button of my jeans and tug down the zipper. I rise onto my knees, forcing his hands to fall away from my arms. I shove my hand beneath my panties and walk my fingers down between my legs, gasping out a ragged moan at the feel of my wet, swollen flesh.

I don’t know what I’m doing. I’ve never touched myself before—I’ve never wanted pleasure and release, so I never sought out a way to get it. My mind is hectic with the whispers of my flesh as my body sends sparks of false starts and stops. My fingers are wild, rubbing and twisting, diving into my folds.

I need to come.

I need to come now.

“Huxley!” I shout at him.

I see him flinch, see his eyes lift to meet mine from where they stared down at my hand which disappears beneath the fabric. I watch his dark brown eyes as they swirl with intention, with thought, slowing to rest on mine as they still into determination.

Yes.

It’s the look of determination he gets when he’s coming to my rescue. The look that tells me he’s here for me, that he loves me, that he’s going to do whatever I need him to do.

And God, the way that look makes me feel…

I sigh as his fingers close around my wrist, as he pulls my hand out of my jeans and forces me to stop. I whimper at the absence of touch, but I trust him. I trust Huxley to help me, to make me better, to set me free from this odd desire.

His hands grip my waist and he spins me around in a flash, then snakes an arm around my waist to pull me backward against him. He shoves me down to sit between his wide spread legs, forces me to lean back against his strong chest, and the ashes of my heart spark to life, floating inside my ribcage like fiery flints drifting from a campfire.

He pulls my hair back over my shoulder and I feel his lips against my ear. “I’ve wanted to touch you forever. Are you sure you want this?”

I’m whimpering, gasping, dying.

I nod frantically. “Yes.”

His hand comes around me as he leans back against the wall and I let my head drop back onto his shoulder. I jolt at the touch of his fingers across my belly, and I look down to watch as his hand gradually sinks beneath the soft barrier of my underwear. I can hardly breathe as he groans and shifts behind me, as his growing erection presses hard against the small of my back, as his fingers walk down, down, down between my legs.

“Ahh,” I moan, my body tensing as he playfully wiggles two fingers against my opening. I slam my hands down on his thighs and grip him tightly to brace myself. “Oh, my God.”

“You can’t just rub yourself raw,” he whispers, his voice commanding with sinful instruction. “That won’t get you anywhere and will just leave you frustrated. Touch with intention, Glory.”

My back arches as his fingers curl and gently dip inside me. He nudges them a little deeper, and I can feel the pads of his fingers rubbing along my inner wall, moving precisely, as if he’s searching for something. I know when he finds it because he presses against that spot. It makes my stomach clench, and heat rushes to my core. He holds his fingers still, putting pressure against that single spot before he starts to stroke, stroke, stroke.

“Tell me which feels better. Pay attention. More pressure,” the pads of his fingers press upward harder as he strokes and my body convulses, wound up so tight that his touch has become a hair-trigger for pleasure, “or less.” He continues to stroke, but softer, gentler…

That feels good too, but I need more.

“More.”

He gives me what I’ve asked for, rubbing with perfect pressure until I’m writhing beneath him, until I’m whimpering and moaning, more desperate than ever for release.

“Fuck. You feel so good,” he murmurs. His lips are on my neck, trailing a line of soft kisses down to the nape. “God, I want to make you come.”

My eyes flutter shut. “Make me come.” I’m not sure whether my words are audible.

I sink into pleasure, enjoying the way he drags intensity to my core, letting him fill every sense and take me to a purely blissful state.

Then his thumb lands on my clit and I scream at the pleasure that shoots through me. Huxley clamps his unoccupied hand over my mouth, and God, somehow that heightens the intensity of what I’m feeling.

“Shh,” he whispers. “I don’t want to risk him hearing you if he comes back. I want this for myself.”

I moan, and I feel the way it vibrates against his palm. He must feel it too because his moan matches mine and he works his hand more intently, his focus and determination increasing. I can feel the way all his energy draws down to my pussy.

I want this for myself, he’d said.

God, the way he wants me…

“Fuck,” he groans as he circles his thumb, as he strokes his fingers, weaving some kind of sick magic between my thighs. “My thumb…too much or not enough?” His hand drops from my mouth and lands on the side of my neck. It rests there lightly, though his touch feels heavy and significant.

“It’s…” I pause to take a deep breath, “it’s perfect.”

“Close your eyes,” he says. “Don’t chase it. Just let it build. Let it pulse. Let it ache.”

“It aches.”

“Let it. Let it hurt. Let it make you desperate. Relief is coming, Glory. I’m giving it to you. Fuck, you make me need it, too.” He shifts behind me. “Can you feel me? Can you feel how much I want you? How much I’ve always wanted you?”

I breathe the word, “Yes.”

“You were always off-limits. My stepsister. This was forbidden, taboo, but fuck, the way I’ve wanted you. The way I’ve always wanted you.”

“Hux.”

His words are a rope wrapping tight around the swirling stars of pleasure in my belly, pulling them together, clustering them into one heavy star that collapses as he groans against my ear. It drops heavy and hard, then explodes, white light flashing behind my eyelids.

My eyes pop wide and my back arches as my whole body clenches, trembles, fights against onrushing climax…and my body fails to stop it. I scream, wild and uninhibited, as the most spectacular thing I’ve ever felt rips through my cunt, grips his fingers, pulses and throbs and fills me with moment after moment of pure, undeniable bliss.

And when the tension breaks, I fall limply in his hold, my body slumping against his, slipping along the floor. His fingers stop moving, but they’re still lodged inside me, still curled against my front wall, as if he doesn’t want to let go of me.

“What’s happening here?” he asks.

What’s happening here with us?

What’s happening here in this place?

What’s happening here with Ambrose?

“I don’t know,” I tell him honestly.

With care and reluctance, he pulls his fingers from my body, and I immediately miss them. His touch was different than Ambrose’s. Huxley’s touch was specific, precise, following a clear path to get me to climax. Ambrose’s touch was rough, demanding, tumbling down a hill that inevitably took me to the same place.

Both were mind-numbing, and for a girl like me, who fell into dissociation at the faintest hint of sexual activity, it was bliss.

Mind-numbing bliss.

What is this magic house in the middle of Sugar Wood?

Is Ambrose some warlock who has us under his spell?

The sexual urgency has left me now that Huxley took care of me—like he always does—but there’s a hint of it still floating in my belly, impossible to ignore because of him.

“You’re hard.”

“Yeah,” he sighs, “it’ll go away. I just need a few minutes.”

I push myself up and slowly turn to face him, sitting on my knees between his legs. “Let me—”

“No,” he grits, pinching his eyes shut. “I don’t want you to touch me as a returned favor.”

“It’s not just that—”

“Glory, no.” He reaches out, as if to touch my cheek, but stops short. His eyes fall upon his fingers, seeing the slickness from my arousal, and it stops him. For a moment, I worry it’s upset him, but then he does something unexpected.

He licks his lips and pushes his wet fingers inside his mouth. His lips clamp down around his knuckles and he hums while he sucks them clean, his eyes falling shut as his head falls back against the wall.

Slowly, he drags them out and lets his hands fall to the floor on either side of his hips. He breathes deeply, though he doesn’t open his eyes, as if savoring my lingering flavor on his tongue.

God, how that twists me up inside.

“On your sixteenth birthday, you wore a stunning red dress to the party your dad threw for you,” he starts, still breathing slowly, eyes still shut.

“I remember,” I tell him. “At The Plaza in New York.”

He nods. “Yeah. You looked so beautiful that night, and I don’t think you were even aware of it. I couldn’t stop looking at you. I always had trouble tearing my eyes away from you, but that night was when I really saw you and I knew…I knew I’d be comparing every person I ever met to you, and no one would ever be good enough.” He opens his eyes and they lock on mine. “I wanted you then. I imagined dragging you away from the worthless boys who surrounded you, taking you upstairs, getting down on my knees for you.”

My breath catches at the admission. “We shared a room that weekend…You and I stayed together in the same room.”

“And I never struggled so much in my life.” He sits up straighter, leans forward, and grabs my face in both of his strong hands. “That night I fantasized about you for hours while you slept in the bed beside mine. I thought about putting my hands on you, wondered how it would feel to touch your silky skin, fought against my urge to dive beneath the covers and wake you with my head between your legs and my tongue on your clit.”

“Why…why didn’t you?”

I’m confused. He could’ve done that, and I wouldn’t have said a word. I would’ve let him. I always let boys do it when they tried because it was easier than saying no.

“There were so many reasons I couldn’t. For one, I’d just turned eighteen and you were underage. For another, I was your stepbrother and it felt wrong. But that night, the most important reason was that you were vulnerable, and I would never take advantage of you in that state. You were upset that night.”

I nearly flinch, the memory hitting me despite all my best efforts to suppress it. My father had promised he wouldn’t touch me, that the night was mine, a celebration for me and only me. He swore he wouldn’t, but he lied.

My hair had been coiled and twisted beautifully into a soft updo. It was exactly how I wanted it to look, and I was so happy that my sixteenth birthday party would be everything I wanted it to be. But my sick father took one look at me and broke his promise. He hurt me, used me, ruined my updo with his roughness, and made me cry, which ruined my make-up, too—all in the minutes before I was going to head down to the hotel ballroom for my party.

It ruined my night…of course it had.

He ruined me entirely every time he touched me.

I can’t bring myself to tell Huxley any of those wretched details because I don’t want to remember them myself.

“My father—” I start to say, but he quickly cuts me off, his thumb brushing across my lips.

“You don’t have to say another word. I know now what he did to you, and you don’t have to say another thing about it if you don’t want to.”

“I really don’t want to.”

He nods softly. “If he’s the reason you were upset that night, then I’m glad I didn’t touch you, that I didn’t try. Any connection we would have made would have been tainted by that son of a bitch. I just…I just can’t believe I never worked it out before. I would’ve killed him myself, and we never would’ve been in this mess.”

“We still would’ve had to get rid of the body.”

“I only buried him for you. I couldn’t have you going to jail for killing him. You deserve to live your life and be happy. If I’d killed him myself, I would’ve turned myself in and happily lived the rest of my life behind bars knowing that you were safe.”

I turn my head, glancing around at the bars. “I guess we both ended up in jail anyway.”

He lets out a heavy sigh. “I’ll find a way out of this, Glory. I promise, I’ll get you out of this.”

I’ve been told a lot of false promises in my life, but Huxley has never promised me anything he hasn’t delivered on. And I have no doubt he’ll try everything to keep this promise, too…though I don’t know if he has any control over it.