Chapter 35

I’m unraveling.

Every carefully knitted stitch, held together by years of painstaking control, is coming apart in front of my eyes, and I can’t stop it.

I can’t stop the way my heart pounds for her, my little muse, and how I live to hear her laughter and see her smiles.

I can’t stop my addiction to her and how I want to be the reason for all her happiness, how I want her to think of our marriage as the real thing and not a sham, not a contract, not an arrangement.

I can’t stop my fantasies of her every night in my room when I fight my lust as long as I can, fucking my cock in my hand until I can’t stand it, until I allow myself one night per week for relief, when I feel at home sheathed inside her, feeling her orgasm squeezing my cock.

I can’t stop the burning rage coursing inside me, a cataclysmic eruption, when I saw that asshole boss of hers belittling her, doubting her, hurting her with his words. I want to strangle him, to kill him for causing my little muse pain.

And that’s why I’m stalking up the staircase, fleeing to my room instead of wrapping her in my arms and kissing her luscious lips, getting a hit I’ve been craving ever since I saw her in that gorgeous red dress looking like a fucking goddess and felt her calming touch as she completed my speech for me when she saw me floundering. I wanted to worship her in front of everyone, to thank her for knowing exactly what I need, one kiss at a time, until I don’t know where she ends and I begin.

“Fuck!” I take off my tux jacket and hurl it on the floor.

The bow tie follows .

I wrench open the French doors, letting a blast of cold air rush into the room, uncaring if the wind is bringing the snow indoors even though the storm is letting up. “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!”

I’m unraveling. My heart is swelling, aching, yearning for her.

But the curse. The branch from earlier. The omen.

I can’t fall in love with her. I can’t put her at risk.

My love is a death sentence.

I won’t survive if she dies. I. Simply. Won’t. Survive.

The vision I saw earlier in the study, Belle getting dragged to the depths of hell, black tendrils snaking over her skin and tearing her away from me, rises to the forefront.

No. No. No. I can’t fall in love with her. The curse. I can’t. I can’t—

The door creaks open and the scent of sweet lilies filters inside and every nerve ending in my body comes alive, my muscles coiling in tension.

Please don’t come in. I don’t know if I’m strong enough to withstand you.

My pleas go unanswered because Belle enters the room and walks toward me. She steps into the moonlight streaming in from the open doors; the wind billowing her dress and sending a thousand snowflakes cascading over her body.

She looks ethereal. An angel from the heavens. My salvation from eternal damnation.

My breath hitches, my heart seizes, and I lose the ability to speak.

She steps toward me, her eyes glowing with concern, with anger, with appreciation, and with so much affection I can’t think clearly, the clawing need inside me growing, morphing into a beast of its own, needing to touch her silky skin, to kiss those plump lips, to claim her.

Mine.

“Maxwell,” she whispers, standing a hairsbreadth distance away. “Why did you run off?”

My hands clench into fists so tightly, my arms shake from the restraint. “Go away, Belle. Please.”

“No! I’m done with you and your insane moods. I’m not playing your games anymore.”

“You think this is a game?” I growl, my breath fogging up the air before dissipating. “You think having the woman of my dreams living in the same house, taking my last name, infiltrating my entire life and turning it upside down is a game to me?”

She gasps, her eyes widening at whatever she sees on my face. I dig my nails into my palms, the flash of pain barely registering as I fight every instinct to touch her.

“You think having you in my life and not being able to touch you, to kiss you, to fuck and make love to you whenever I want, when that’s all I ever think about, is a fucking game to me?”

Moisture gathers in her eyes, and she reaches toward my face, her fingers trembling.

“Don’t. Touch. Me.” I jerk back and repeat the command from downstairs. “P-Please, Belle. Don’t touch me.”

“Why Maxwell? Why deny this between us?” A tear rolls down her cheek and I want to whip myself for hurting her.

“I’m not in control of myself right now. I’m losing my mind over you,” I rasp, my voice thickening. “If you touch me, I won’t be able to stop…I won’t be able to—”

“What? Save me from the curse?” Belle shakes her head, her voice ardent. “I don’t believe in the curse, Maxwell. No matter how many times you guys tell me about it, I don’t.”

Her voice grows stronger, her tawny eyes darker, fiercer. “This is my life , Maxwell. My choice. You don’t get to decide for me, because what we have…I might not be experienced in love, but what we have, I know, doesn’t come around often.”

She points to her chest, to the locket I gave her. “I feel it here. Deep inside me, and it’s a risk I get to decide to take.”

“But you’ll die. I-I can’t…if you die, there’s nothing left for me.” The words, trapped in the deepest crevices of my heart this entire time, slip out, unable to restrain themselves anymore in her presence.

The presence of the woman who makes me feel so much, who makes me feel…

Everything.

“I don’t believe it, and I’ll show you.”

She pulls my head down and presses her lips to mine.

My body stills for a brief second until my mind catches up and it’s the precious air given to a drowning man, a match dropped on gasoline, and all my thoughts shut down.

Growling, I grip her face, my mouth conquering hers, claiming what’s always been mine. Our kiss is a mess of tongues, teeth, and passion. Her sweet taste is giving me the highest of highs.

I can’t get enough of her. I grapple with her gown and her hands tear the shirt from my body. Zippers are wrenched down, clothing tears, buttons ping off the hardwood floors, but we don’t care.

It’s madness, a cyclone overtaking our bodies, our souls, our minds.

She moans, the sound a direct caress to my hard cock, already thick and swollen, dripping at the tip for her.

“Maxwell, please,” she cries as I bite her neck, my teeth scoring the tender flesh before laving it with my tongue.

I rip off her lacy bra and panties, not caring if I’m ruining them, and palm her breasts—perfect handfuls, the smooth globes swelling in my hands. My mouth moves down her body, kissing, biting everywhere I can reach, and she thrashes in my hold, gyrating her hips up and down my torso, rubbing her soft, delicious body over my cock.

“Fuck, Belle,” I groan and bite my lip. “Keep moving that pussy over my cock. Feel it dripping for you, unable to help itself. That’s what you do to me.”

She whimpers when I tug her nipple into my mouth, and my tongue laves circles and flicks at the tip. So fucking sweet and hot, my little muse.

My cock spasms as a spurt of cum leaks and I haul her up my body, wrapping her legs behind me .

“Fuck me, Maxwell. Please, I need to come,” she moans as she presses my face to her tits, her hips humping my cock, each movement causing the tip to glide into her slick folds and my balls grow heavy and taut.

I throw her on my bed. “Spread your legs, little muse. I’ve craved you for so long and now I’m going to feast.”

She whimpers and throws her head back, her thighs spread, and I dive in and taste her sweetness at the source, my lips closing around her swollen clit. She screams.

“Look at this pretty little pussy,” I slide my finger between her folds until it reaches her clit, “so tight and fucking wet…all for me, Belle?”

“Yes,” she thrashes on the bed, her breathing coming out in quick pants, “only for you.”

“Mine.” I thrust two fingers inside her tight channel. Mine. Mine. Mine.

“Maxwell!” she cries, her hips arching up and away, but I pin her in place as I finger fuck her in earnest, the sounds of her wet pussy swallowing my digits lewd in the room.

I circle her swollen clit and feel her inner walls clench my fingers. “You want to come, little muse? Come all over your husband’s fingers?”

“Yes, please. I need to come!”

I stop my movement and she cries out in frustration, “No!”

“Too bad, because I need you to come around my cock and milk all my cum out of me. Every single drop, because,” I line up the tip at her entrance, watching in fascination her juices seeping out of her pussy, “because I’m going to breed you again. And again. And get your womb full of my seed.”

The image of her pregnant sears into my mind. It hasn’t happened yet, but I’ll be damned if I don’t make it my duty to put a baby inside her. It’s something that hasn’t turned me on before until her. And now, my cock hardens, about to burst. I want to make her mine, create children with her.

I want everything with her .

My pulse roars in my ears. In this moment, I can only focus on her, on claiming my wife, my muse, of making her mine forever so we’ll never be apart.

In one harsh thrust, I slam into the hilt and a guttural groan rips from my mouth.

Home. I’m home.

“Maxwell!” she screams, her muscles tightening, her legs trembling, her back bowing to my movements.

Thrust after thrust we become one and I link my fingers with hers as a fire runs down my spine and spreads to my extremities, building, coalescing into a breaking point like I’ve never known before. This intimacy is so startling and earth shattering, I can barely breathe.

“You’re mine, Belle. Tell me you’re mine.” My hips snap against hers, my vision darkening at the edges as I climb toward the pinnacle.

“I’m yours,” she moans, “only ever yours.”

And I’ve only ever been yours too.

Her body starts spasming and I feel her walls tightening, gripping my cock, and I know she’s close.

“Fuck,” I mutter and snake one hand between us, my fingers finding her swollen nub. “Come for me, Belle, drench my cock with your juices.” I pinch her clit.

She screams, her voice probably traveling to other parts of the house, but I couldn’t care less. Her pussy strangles me as wetness gushes out of her.

I swallow her sounds with my mouth, our tongues swiping, joining with each other like our bodies below, and I fall off the cliff, the pleasure an avalanche, wiping away every worry, every doubt as I release ropes of cum inside her, my orgasm never-ending.

My body covers her, flesh against flesh, every inch of us entangled as I rain a thousand kisses on her lips.

A kiss for all the kisses I’ve withheld in the past because I was afraid of what they’d do to me…to my heart.

And I was right.

My heart swells and collides against my rib cage, surrendering to the woman in front of me, the person who has always felt like a kindred spirit from the moment we met. The other half I never realized I was searching for.

We break apart for air. I gently brush her hair sticking to her sweaty forehead, and I stare into her beautiful eyes. I can’t look away.

I want to stare at her forever.

Her lips curve in a breathtaking smile and wetness pools in her eyes until they overflow and slide down her cheeks.

I know how you feel. I want to tell her all the emotions coursing through me, a cathartic release I’ve never experienced before. But I don’t, a tendril of fear for her safety unfurling in my mind.

But I know she knows.

She continues to smile, the whites of her teeth blinding.

“I’m home,” she whispers.

Closing my eyes, I kiss her tears away, and I hope…I just hope…if the curse is real, if it needs to take a life, please take mine instead.