Haunt (Raven Ridge Hallow Book 1) by K.L. Taylor-Lane

Author:K.L. Taylor-Lane [Taylor-Lane, K.L.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: K. L. TAYLOR-LANE
Published: 2023-10-08T18:30:00+00:00

Words breathy and soft, demanding, Billy says, “Kiss me back, Nellie.”

My lip is bleeding, stinging, pounding with my pulse where he tore into it like an animal. I feel it trickle down my chin. I am stunned. And I don’t really know why as I stare into his light eyes, grey more than blue in the shadows we find ourselves cloaked in. Because he is a brutal, savage boy, I have known this for so long, more than half of my life, nothing about this first kiss should have surprised me.

And yet…

I lick my lips. Copper thick on my tongue. I swallow hard, staring up at him. His hands sweeping up and down my arms, an attempt at soothing. Bruises beneath his palms, from where he held me to him so tightly. I swallow again, my mouth feeling as though it is on fire with the burst pressure in my lip. I keep staring up at him, something like panic dancing across his face, even beneath his pinched features, it feels like genuine concern. Perhaps it is more so for his benefit than mine. But even still, I feel something like guilt clog my throat.

“Please,” he whispers the words, dropping his forehead to mine, closing his eyes softly.

I don’t close mine, staring at his face, a faux peacefulness in his features.

I see the tightening at the outer corners of his eyes just before he says, “Nellie.”

My name cracks like a whip against my spine, I breathe hard against his lips, slanted over mine, his hands leaving my arms, splaying over the wall at my back, either side of my head. His body comes closer, elbows bending, lowering himself to me. Caging me in, hips pinning me down, his weight too much and not enough as he presses me in further against the cold stone.

I think I have romanticised this kiss, our first, in my head for so, so long that no matter how it happened, if, it was never going to be like I imagined. Something soft and gentle and warm.

None of those things represent us.

I don’t know why I would even want that.

Knowing the brutal things, he, and I, alike, can do.

We are not soft.

All hard, jagged edges, white noise, split skin and deep puncturing wounds. I feel him in my bones, in my soul, an imprint of him in every organ. I would cut myself open just to offer him my parts, rip my insides to my outsides, decorate him in my pieces, but I expected this to be different.

Something else.

Something not like them.

Vicious and cutting and violent.

I swallow hard, breathing harder and white spots dance across my vision. My legs feel weak, and my head is spinning, the ground feels like it’s about to fall away from my feet when his hands fly up from the wall, grabbing my cheeks, his nose on mine.

“Breathe, baby, breathe,” Billy’s voice drums through my head, but my eyes squeeze shut, my lungs shrivel, and my blood feels like it’s on fire.

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