I pulled back and looked him dead in the eye. “Fucking prove it,” I challenged.

King growled and pushed his hands up my dress, forcefully ripping my panties down my legs. We were in the shadows, but anyone walking by the side of the house could see us. The instant he touched me, I was too lost in sensation to care.

Zero fucks.

King kissed me. An all encompassing kiss. A possession. He wasn’t kissing my mouth. He was claiming me as his, and I was going to leave my mark on him in every way I could.

My entire body ignited into the flame he’d been stoking inside of me for weeks. He kneaded my breasts through my dress and attacked my neck with his lips. He lifted me up and wrapped my thighs around his waist. I grunted in frustration, gyrating against his erection. I couldn’t get close enough. I couldn’t find the friction I needed.

“You a virgin, Pup?” King asked wickedly.

“You know I don’t know that,” I panted.

“Cause I’m letting you know right now that there won’t be a question if you are after tonight. I’m going to be buried so deep inside your sweet pussy you won’t ever again forget who owns it.”

He pushed down my dress, exposing my breasts, then yanked up the bottom until I was naked except for a scrap of fabric lingering around my midsection.

“Fuck yes,” he hissed through his teeth.

After that, we were all hands and mouths. Touching, exploring, needing, biting. Teeth clacking together in an effort to get closer to one another. It was sloppy and wet and wonderful, and it wasn’t enough. King reached down between us, released his belt, and pushed down the front of his jeans. His erection sprang free. Smooth, soft, and hard as stone prodded up against warm and wet, seeking entrance.

“Yes,” I breathed. I was ready. I needed him inside me more than I needed to breathe.

King lined up his cock with his hand, and in one long thrust, he was inside of me. He groaned as he pushed his way into my tightness, stretching and filling me until I thought I was going to fall apart from the inside out. It hurt, but it was a pleasurable kind of pain, caused by the unfamiliar feeling of being so full.

The pain he caused was a pleasure all its own.

“Fuck yes,” King moaned, now fully seated inside me.

I groaned loudly, not caring who heard me. King thrust up inside me, and my insides clenched around him. Every time he pulled out, he rubbed against that spot inside that made me see stars before thrusting angrily back in.

Again and again.

“I told you,” he said. “I told you you’re mine. This pussy. This pussy is mine. Don’t fucking forget that shit again.”

He thrust hard and angry. I took him. All of him. His cock. His anger. His possession. I let him claim me with his kiss, his cock, his words.

We were fighting with our sex.

A back and forth.

A give and take.

With our sex, we told each other I hate you and I want you and I don’t want you to leave.

“Fuck, Pup. Fuck. I knew it. I knew it would be like this,” King said breathlessly.

A pressure was building inside of me that was ten times more powerful then when King had made me come on his fingers. Growing with each stroke. Faster and faster he plunged into my depths until he didn’t just give me an orgasm; he ripped it from my body.

I shouted out my release as I came and held onto King for dear life, tightening my thighs around him, digging the heels of my feet into his ass as he furiously pumped into me. I saw stars, bright and vivid, dancing in front of my eyes until I thought that I might pass out and die right there in his arms. Maybe, I did choose King being inside of me over breathing, because I couldn’t seem to catch my breath.

“Look at me,” King ordered, his voice deep and raspy like he was trying to hold onto his control. I was too lost in coming down from my orgasm high to pay any attention to what he was saying. “Look at me!”

This time he emphasized his words with a thrust of his hips. I moaned and opened my eyes.

“Don’t look away,” he ordered, holding my gaze as his cock hardened and twitched. He groaned as he came inside of me, spilling his wet warmth into my depths.

We’d said all the things with our bodies that our mouths had failed to communicate over and over again. He’d told me that I was his before, that I belonged to him. But before that night, I hadn’t believed him.

It was what his body told me that took me by surprise and shook me to my very core.

He was mine.

Chapter Twenty-One

Doe

“Come with me,” King said. Righting my clothes, he took my hand and led me back to the pier. When we passed the bonfire, we were greeted with a lot of whistling and applause.

They’d obviously heard us.

I didn’t care.

We sat on the dock with our legs dangling over the side. The fog had lifted off the water. The full moon cast our shadows over the glass-like bay, making it appear like black ice.

King held my hand in his, and when I tried to pry it away, he tightened his grip.

“King,” I started.

“Brantley,” he corrected. “Call me by my first name.”

“Brantley,” I said, testing his name out.

“I hated it growing up, but for good or for worse, it’s the only thing my mama ever gave me. Grace is the only other person who uses it.” He paused, then added, “I like the way it sounds when you say it.” His serious tone and soft eyes made me question where he was going with this, but then, it hit me.

He was letting me in.

“Okay, Brantley, what else you got?” I nudged his shoulder. He took a deep breath.

“You know about Max?”

I nodded. The girl we went to see, the one from the picture. “Your sister.”

“Pup, Max isn’t my sister,” King admitted.

“Then, who is she to you?” I asked. If she wasn’t family, then why did he have so much interest in her?

“She’s my daughter.”

Holy. Shit.

“Your daughter?” I asked, my throat tightening.

“Yeah, Max is my daughter. She’s the real reason why I went to prison, and only Preppy and Bear know the truth about her.” He squeezed my hand tighter. Looking out over the water, he seemed pained to be recalling memories associated with Max. “Do you want to know the story? Because you asked me if I wanted to let you go or keep you, and I want to let you in. I want to keep you, but it’s a hard story for me to tell. I’ve never told it to anyone. The only people who know where there in some way.”

“I want to know.”

“Do you know why I was in prison?”

“Because of your mom.”

“Yeah,” he agreed. “I don’t make apologies for the things I’ve needed to do for the sake of business. Preppy and I had shit lives growing up. We did everything we could to turn it around for ourselves, most of those things were far outside the law, but we did it. Shit was amazing for a while. But my anger would get the best of me, and I would almost always be the one who ended up in jail here and there, usually just overnight. Sometimes, for thirty or sixty day stretches, depending on the charges. The other players in the game we play know the rules. They also know that when you step out of line, things happen. Things that make you dead. But this wasn’t one of those times. I didn’t pull a trigger, or use a knife, or send someone after her.”

“Your mom?” I asked.

He nodded, then told me his story.

By the time I was fifteen, Me, Prep, and Bear were our own little crew. Just three young shitheads who just wanted to have a good time, get laid, and make some fucking money. Surprisingly, we did make money. Enough for me to buy the house.

The three of us were on top of the world for a while. I’m not gonna lie. It was the best fucking time of my entire life.

But then, I got pinched. It wasn’t the first time, and it wasn’t for anything I should’ve actually gotten pinched for. A stupid bar fight in an upscale place Preppy wanted to check out across the river in Coral Pines. Some shitty tourist spot.