Vandal Read online

  Leaning up off of her a bit, I reach down and pull the small knife from my ankle strap and flick the blade out of its case with a quick snap of my wrist. Her eyes go wide with fear and her breath quickens as she watches me bring the blade closer to her. I slide the blade between her breasts, under the small piece of material, and yank the blade up quickly, slicing the bra in half. The two pieces of fabric fall to each side, exposing her breasts. I close the blade and toss the knife to the floor. Her tits are small in my hands, but firm and round, her nipples pressing against my palms as I gently squeeze and caress them.

  I kiss her lips roughly. “You’re beautiful,” I growl before I drag my tongue from her lips, down to suck one of those taut little buds into my mouth while I tease the other in my hand, twisting the nipple between my thumb and forefinger. Her body writhes beneath me; her hands finally realize they’re free and she tangles them in my hair as I feast on her breasts until she starts to moan.

  I slowly stand and move to the end of the bed, watching her intently as she watches me. I grab one of her feet and pull off one shoe, then the other. She’s chewing on her lower lip as she watches me, fighting an inner battle. Part of her wants to stop me, and part of her wants to go over the edge to escape the pain and grief.

  I reach for her waist and yank her jeans and panties down in one quick pull, and throw them to the floor. I drink her in for a moment: naked, small and pale on my dark comforter, and just so breathtaking. She looks like a little fallen angel. A long, jagged scar runs down her side, and a few more are on her legs. Of course these are from the accident. My mistakes engraved in her perfect little body forever.

  Locking my eyes onto hers, I kick my boots off, unbuckle my belt, unbutton my jeans, tug the zipper down and step out of them. She stares at the ceiling as I go to the nightstand to get a condom and quickly slip it on. My cock is hard as a rock, jutting out from my body, aching to get into her sweet pussy.

  Crawling between her legs, I run my hand slowly up the inside of her thigh, my fingers welcomed by her wet, satiny lips. She doesn’t know it, but this is just as hard, just as out of bounds for me as it is for her. I think this girl may ruin me even more than I’ve ruined her.

  Her muscles clench around my fingers, dragging me out of my thoughts. She spreads her legs for me in silent invitation and I thrust into her, hard and deep, causing her to cry out, her back arching up.

  “Holy fuck,” she gasps. Yes.

  I lower myself onto her and kiss her savagely as I pump in and out of her tight pussy, fisting her hair in my hand so she can’t move her head away from me. Our eyes lock on to each other, prying into each other’s souls. She wraps her legs around my waist and digs her nails into my back, hard, dragging them down and digging deeper with each thrust of my hips. I can feel the warmth of my blood under her nails and it feels like heaven.

  She whimpers and I kiss her lips softer. “Don’t stop,” I whisper hoarsely against her mouth. “Scratch me. Hurt me. Let all your pain out on me.”

  And she does. The harder I fuck her, the more she digs her nails into me and bites my shoulder and neck. The pain does nothing but turn me on even more, my head reeling with such euphoria that I feel dizzy and utterly lost in her. I want the world to stop right now in this moment, with my cock buried in this broken girl who is tied to me in our united, twisted devastation.

  She climaxes wildly, thrashing beneath me, nails grating into my ass, screaming everything except for my name, because she doesn’t know it yet. I hold out until she’s panting for breath, and then I move in and out of her slowly, deliberately, deeply, inch by inch, savoring every tight, wet part of her until I explode.

  She starts to tremble and cry as her orgasm fades and I pull out of her, quickly pulling the condom off and throwing it in the small bin next to the bed. Rolling onto my side, I gently put an arm around her.

  “It’s okay.” I soothe, pulling the comforter up to cover her.

  “I’m sorry … I’m just so tired, and I haven’t slept in so long …” She covers her face with her hands. “I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m so fucking scared.”

  “Stay right here.”

  I pull my jeans on and go into the bathroom, rummaging in the medicine cabinet until I find what I’m looking for. I grab her some water from the kitchen and head back to the bedroom, sitting on the bed next to her and holding the pill and water out to her.

  “What is it?” she asks, warily.

  “It’s just a valium. It will help you sleep.”

  “Here?”

  “Do you need to go home?”

  She shakes her head while twisting her wedding band around her finger. “No. There’s nothing there. I hate being there. He’s everywhere.”

  “Then take it and let yourself sleep as long as you want. Okay?”

  She looks at me with narrowed eyes. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes. Trust me, I’ve had a lot of sleepless nights. You’ll feel better if you get some rest. I’ll be right out in the living room with the cat.”

  She shrugs, pops the pill in her mouth and swallows it with some water while eying me over the bottle, then falls back onto the pillow and looks at me with a dazed expression on her face. “I have no idea who you are or what the hell just happened. I don’t do things like that. Ever. I don’t know what’s happening to me.”

  Grinning, I pull the comforter up around her, much like I used to do with Katie. “Neither do I, for what it’s worth. Now sleep.”

  Tabitha

  The sun shining on my face wakes me. I sit up groggily and look out the window at the lake. It’s pretty here, and peaceful. Almost serene. I quickly glance around the room that I slept in. Vaulted ceilings with raw wooden beams, hardwood floors with thick area rugs, cherry-wood furniture … a huge stone electric fireplace takes up one corner of the room. Everything looks rustic and expensive, and out of place for the guy who claims to live here. Heat rushes between my legs as memories of him flip through my mind like a slow-motion movie. He is like no one I have ever met before. His voice, so deep. Sexy, but soothing. That amazing long black hair. The smudged dirt on his face and hands. Muscles like a wrestler, and all those tattoos. I swear his eyes were black as the ace of spades.

  I think back on how those dark eyes bored straight into the very depths of me as he moved in and out of me. He knew exactly how to touch me, where to touch me, as if we’d been making love forever. He knew how to take control and just let me be.

  I let him touch me. The guilt of it makes me shiver. Nick would be so disgusted by me if he could see me now, and that’s how I want it. The man I love is gone, so it only seems fair that the woman he loves should be gone, too.

  I hear faint voices coming from somewhere out in the house. There’s a female voice, mixed with his deep one.

  Holy shit, I don’t even know who he is.

  You are a pig, Tabitha. A whore.

  I look for my clothes and find my jeans at the foot of the bed, and my shirt and bra on the other side of the room, torn in pieces. The knife is lying on the floor and I shiver as I remember how the blade felt against my skin; cold and sharp.

  You liked it.

  I pilfer his dresser and find a white T-shirt. It’s huge, so I tie a knot in the back and creep out into the hallway, wondering if I should go to him or just hide in the bedroom. The voices are coming from the kitchen, so I slowly make my way down the hall, hoping I’m not interrupting something I shouldn’t be. For all I know, he could be married, and I could have just slept in his wife’s bed.

  She sees me first and stops talking, her face literally freezing in mid-sentence. She turns to him. “Um, who’s that? I didn’t know you had company. Why the hell didn’t you say something?”

  “She was sleeping.” He’s making coffee, wearing nothing but jeans. Even from where I’m standing I can see the long scratch marks I raked into his back last night. Can’t she see that? Why isn’t she questioning it?

  She keeps staring at me in such a way that
makes me think this must be some sort of girlfriend. She doesn’t look mad, though; just shocked.

  “I … I’m sorry. I just—” I mumble not knowing what to say. “I should go.”

  How, you idiot? You came here with him.

  “No,” he says to me, running his hand through his hair nervously. “She’s just a friend. My cousin’s girlfriend, actually.”

  “Fiancée, actually,” she corrects.

  He makes a face at her. “Whatever.” He turns to me. “She was just checking in on me and the cat.”

  She nods in agreement. “I got worried when I didn’t hear from him last night, so I just drove up to check on him. I didn’t mean to interrupt.” She grabs her purse and keys. “I’ll be going, then.” She glares at him on her way out. “Call me later.” She turns to me. “Nice meeting you.”

  “You too,” I say, debating whether I should ask her for a ride, but she’s out the door too fast. I’m not sure I buy this story of her being a cousin’s girlfriend or fiancée.

  I stand in the hallway awkwardly, feeling as if something weird just happened, like he didn’t want her to see me here.

  “Um, I’m sorry. I woke up and heard voices …”

  “It’s fine; forget it. I was trying to let you rest. Feeling better?”

  I step farther into the kitchen and look around. “Groggy. Is it tomorrow? Did I sleep all night?”

  He nods and goes to the fridge, taking out a glass carafe of orange juice. “You did. OJ?”

  “Yes … thank you.”

  He pours the juice into a small glass and hands it to me, our fingers touching. I catch his eyes traveling down to my chest.

  “You look good in my shirt.” He raises his eyebrows and wiggles them at me.

  I’m sure I blush a thousand shades of red. I can’t believe I stood here with my nipples visible in front of his friend.

  “You ripped my shirt. And my bra. I took this out of your dresser. I hope that’s okay.”

  He hooks his fingers in the waistband of my jeans and pulls me closer to him. “I’ll buy you a new shirt.”

  Being so close to him again quickens my pulse. I’ve never had a one-night stand before, I have no idea if that’s what this is, or how I’m supposed to act now. On television, the girl usually goes home the next day and they never speak again.

  Slut. You fucked someone you met at your husband’s grave.

  I squeeze my eyes shut and try to ignore the voices. They never seem to stop.

  When I open my eyes again, I see that he’s watching me intently, as if he’s trying to read my mind.

  “No, I don’t need a new shirt. Thank you, though. I should go. Can you take me back to my car?” That’s still at the cemetery.

  He lets out a deep breath. “I was thinking … I’m staying here for a month. Kinda like a mental vacation or something.” He slowly brushes his hand down my arm and grabs onto my hand. “Why don’t you stay with me? You kinda look like you could use a vacation.”

  I must have heard him incorrectly. There is no way this total stranger just asked me to spend a month with him.

  “Excuse me?”

  “I think you need it, too. I’ve seen you in the cemetery before. I watched you.”

  I pull away from him quickly, as if he’s on fire. “What? Why? Are you sick? You don’t watch people in a cemetery. It’s a sacred place. What the hell is wrong with you?”

  He doesn’t even flinch or defend himself. He just answers me calmly. “Because watching you made me feel.”

  “What the hell could watching a woman cry at her husband’s grave possibly make you feel?”

  He stares me right in the eye. “A lot of things, actually. But envy, mostly.”

  “Envy?” I repeat incredulously. “Of what?”

  “Meaning that much to someone.”

  I wasn’t expecting his answer at all, or his raw honesty. I cross my arms over my chest and stare at him. “I really have no reply for that. I’m sorry.”

  “I lost someone too,” he says, looking down at the floor. “I meant what I said yesterday.” He looks back up and meets my eyes. His dark eyes are so full of pain. I wonder if mine look the same way. Is that what people see, when they look at me? “I can help you forget,” he continues. “To help the pain go away.”

  “How?”

  “Stay here with me. Give yourself to me for a month. Let go of everything … give me control of every part of you. Trust me, it will set you free of all this crap. It will help both of us.”

  I back away from him, trying to understand what exactly he’s saying. “I don’t understand … give myself to you? What does that even mean?”

  He closes the space between us, taking my hands in his. “Sometimes it’s better if you don’t understand it, and just let yourself feel it as it’s happening. Just let go; don’t think about it. I won’t hurt you. I promise I’ll take care of you and I’ll take it all the fuck away.”

  I shake under the intensity of his stare, and his words that could mean a myriad of things. Scary things that happen in the dark. I’ve read about this sort of thing in romance books, and I remember thinking it was sorta scary but also sensually exciting. “Will it be … sexual?” I ask, my voice trembling. I lick my lips, my mouth suddenly dry.

  “Yes, some of it. Sometimes I may gently tie you up, so you can’t touch me, and you’re at my mercy to touch, to make you feel, and all you can do is just lie there and enjoy it.” His eyes take on a spark as he describes what he wants. “Or I may command you to touch me, because sometimes it feels good to be told what to do. But more than that. It’s not just about sex. It’s much deeper than that. Much, much deeper.”

  “And at the end of the month? Then what?”

  “You’ll be stronger, and I will be too. Other than that, we’ll have to see. Neither one of us is in any frame of mind to think that far ahead.”

  This isn’t what I was expecting.

  I can go back home to the empty house, the loneliness, the overwhelming responsibility of everything, or I can stay here with this mysterious stranger and let him do whatever it is he wants to do that he thinks will help me. Nothing can get worse. I’ve already reached rock bottom with losing my husband, quitting my job, bills piling up, and contemplating suicide daily. Nothing matters to me anymore. This guy could murder me right now and I don’t think I would even care. Or he could fuck me again and make my mind sear into a hot frenzy, as he did last night, and make me forget everything for a little while with his insane body. Plus he has a stash of Valium somewhere in this house, which I can use to implement my original plan of going to sleep forever if this doesn’t go well.

  “Alright. I’ll stay.”

  Heat flashes in his eyes and he kisses my lips possessively, squeezing my hands tight in his, not letting go.

  I return his kisses with equal fervor. Something about him has rattled me. Denying him anything seems like it would be impossible and I’m just too exhausted mentally and physically to question it or him. If he wants to take care of me and take me on some erotic emotional ride, why the hell not? If it changes my life, great. If it doesn’t, then at least I experienced something different and daring, and didn’t take the safe way out.

  Vandal

  The sight of her wearing my old, white T-shirt, her nipples straining against the thin fabric and the visible bite marks going down the side of her neck is enough to make me want to throw her on the kitchen table and fuck her brains out. Damn Evelyn for showing up here and disrupting our morning. All that matters now is that she agreed to stay. Being with her has ignited a fire in me that I thought was snuffed out a long time ago.

  I lead her wordlessly down to the bathroom and undress her, then myself. I trace my finger down the scar that runs down her side. The skin is pink, jagged and new. She shoves my hand away, and I immediately place my hand back along her ribs.

  “Don’t ever push me away.” I keep my voice low and even. “Tell me how this happened.”

  “No.”
Tears flow down her cheeks.

  “You have to let me in if this is going to work.”

  She leans back against the sink. “It’s from the accident my husband was killed in. We were hit by another car. I guess a piece of the car cut into me.” She looks down at the scar. “It’s ugly.”

  I kneel in front of her and drag my tongue along the length of the scar that goes from her hip to the side of her breast, goose bumps raising on her flesh. I did this. This could have killed her. She can’t be more than a hundred pounds; I have no idea how she lived through the accident. I wish my baby had been as lucky.

  “You’re beautiful,” I tell her, and it’s true. She’s got classic, almost old-fashioned beauty. Porcelain skin, big sky-blue eyes, natural blond hair. She’s actually very cute. Too cute to ever be with a guy like me.

  “I’m not. Not at all,” she replies.

  It’s always the most beautiful people who have no idea that they are.

  We shower together, but she’s despondent as I caress her body with cream lavender soap. The hot water stings the deep scratches she made in my back last night, but I don’t care. I’ll take any pain I can from her because I deserve it as much as I want it.

  “Does your little plan include me having any clothes? And what about my car?” She finally speaks when we step out of the shower.

  I take one of the towels we just dried off with and fold it into a nice, neat square, placing it on the floor in front of me.

  “I’ll get you some clothes and take care of your car. Kneel.”

  “How are you going to take care of my car, exactly?”

  “I’ll have it towed to your house. Is there anything else that needs to be taken care of, like, at your house? You have any pets, or any shit like that?”

  “No, I don’t have any shit like that. But I’ll call my neighbor and tell her I’m going to be gone; she can keep an eye on my place.”

  I nod and point to the towel. “Kneel.”