I hesitated. Sometimes I got so damn confused with the shit she spouted. Who the hell’re the disciples? And why the hell were they f**kin’ Mae like an animal?

“And y-you? What did you g-g-get from it?” I asked, rolling my lip ring to stop from going Flame-level psycho.

Tears filled her eyes and her full bottom lip wobbled. “Nothing. I got nothing from it. In fact”—she paused and drops fell down her cheek—”I hated it. My Lord, I hated it. Every single time. None of the sisters ever got pleasure from it… We were forbidden to do so. Women should not feel pleasure. Sharing is for duty, not for love.” She took a hesitant breath. “We would be… punished. We had to adopt the position and endure it until the brother—or in my case the elder—was done.”

A pink blush brightened her porcelain skin and her lashes fluttered, her baby-blues meeting my attention. “I have never felt… gratification… from a joining. I do not know what that kind of pleasure is like… if I am even capable of feeling that kind of pleasure at all.”

My heart cracked, right down the damn middle. I moved across the room to Mae like a pu**y. “B-babe…” I wrapped her in my arms and she cried, f**kin’ cried a river on my shoulder.

I couldn’t stand it, couldn’t stand seeing her so torn. What the hell had she been through?

“Shh… Y-y-you’re outta that hell now. I g-got you… I got you… You’ll never have to go th-through that a-a-again…”

“They will be searching for me. They will not stop until they have me back in commune,” she cried.

Gripping her hair, I replied, “Far as y-you’re concerned, th-they’re dead. They’ll n-never find you here. Fuckers a-are nothing to th-the Hangmen.”

She sat up and shook her head. “The devil’s greatest trick was convincing the world he did not exist,” she said softly. “I know the guards, Styx. They are coming. They exist and they are coming. It is only a matter of time.”

“They c-come for you, they d-die,” I said through clenched teeth, and her eyes flared at my words as her hand ran down my arm.

I jerked as I felt her lips press to my bare chest, her tiny hand graze down my stomach, the sensation zinging straight to my cock.

“What should it be like, Styx? What should it feel like… to be intimate with someone… you know… normally?”

She lifted her head from caressing my body, seeking out her answer, her glossy blue eyes staring at my lips and then up to my eyes and back again.

“You c-can’t be looking at m-me like that, b-babe,” I rasped out, trying like f**k to rein myself in.

“Wh… why?”

“B-b-because you l-looking at me like that is t-telling me you f**kin’ wanna be in my b-bed… W-want me to show you how f-fuckin’ good you should f-feel taking my cock. W-w-want me to f**k you ’t-til you can’t walk.”

Then that nose twitched, and my cut covering her naked body fell to the floor, leaving her naked, on offer like a damn platter. Bare-assed naked, perfect curves on show—heavy tits, tight f**kin’ frame. Wolf eyes hooded, pink lips moist, ready for me to make her come… for the first time in her bastard life. Begging me with her eyes to make her come so damn hard.

“River…” A plea. A breathy, desperate plea slipped from her lips, like she was channelling her inner Marilyn Monroe or something. The voodoo possessive shit took hold of my controls once again. She’d called me River. I hadn’t been called that name in over a decade. She’d remembered my f**kin’ real name.

“Mae… You need a b-better man. It ain’t me, babe, no matter how much you th-think it is… or want it to be,” I croaked, my c**k painful with need and iron stiff. I couldn’t believe I was actually thinking it, but I wasn’t sure taking Mae as mine was such a good idea. I always took what I wanted, no care for anyone else. Fuck, Lois was stone-cold dead because of her want of me, but taking Mae after the last few weeks, after today, just seemed so… so… fucked up and wrong.

“Styx…” she hushed out, riding a small, needy moan. Her ni**les were like damn bullets, her hips slowly rocking with need. “It is you… It has always been you…”

And then she was on me. Mouth pressed right against mine, her tiny hand gripping my hair in her tight fist, pushing me farther against her hungry f**kin’ lips. I took what she gave, battled it, f**kin’ conquered it, and when that tongue pushed through to meet mine… I snapped.