Empire of Hate (Empire #3) by Rina Kent

“Is that why you’re moving on to Levi?”

“None of your business.”

“I’m making it my business. If you’re doing this to hurt Astrid…”

I’m doing this to hurt you as much as you hurt me. But I don’t say that, opting to remain silent.

“You’re a fucking nuisance, Nicole.”

“Your thing didn’t think that when it was prowling inside me.”

“A hot nuisance, and for the last time, it’s called a cock and the act goes by the name fucking, Miss Prude.” There’s amusement in his tone. “You didn’t really suck off Levi, why not?”

“How do you know I didn’t?”

“Cole was there and told me the actual story.”

I search his unreadable face. “Why did you ask?”

“Because.” He tightens his hand on my arm. “You came on to Captain, but you looked disgusted, is what Cole said.”

“Cole needs glasses.”

“So you prefer being called a whore instead of telling the truth?”

“I prefer you leave me alone.”

“I can’t.”

He pauses, eyes widening as if he’s as surprised by what he said as I am.

“You…can’t?”

He shakes his head once. “You’re actively working to make my best friend’s life hell, and I want to strangle the fuck out of you for it, but I can’t leave you the fuck alone.”

“The three months you didn’t even look in my direction would testify otherwise.”

“Maybe you’re the one who needs glasses.”

“What?”

He plucks the lollipop out of my half-open mouth. It leaves a sticky, wrinkled trace on my inner cheek and sweet drool gathers in my mouth.

Before I can think about what he’s doing, Daniel shoves it in his mouth. The motion is so sudden and erotic that I gulp.

He sucks on the sweet candy, hollowing his cheeks before he pops it out and runs his tongue over it like he did to my pussy that day.

Over and over.

And over.

I gulp, my inner thighs clenching.

Then he crunches the lollipop in a few seconds, crushing the view as if it never existed.

“You’re…supposed to savor it,” I whisper, still unable to get the previous scene out of my head.

“I prefer getting to the sweet part faster.” He leans down and captures my lips in a slow kiss.

The taste of peaches explodes on my tongue.

My forbidden fruit and my forbidden person.

My body goes into a shock reaction of emotions that leaves me breathless.

Daniel grabs me by my nape, his fingers sinking into my hair as he deepens the kiss.

It’s madness and we’re the only people in it.

The only two allowed entrance.

I lift my hand, about to touch him, to lick all the peaches off him, but something vibrates.

It’s his phone, I realize. He groans but doesn’t release me, but it vibrates again and again and he pushes off me with a grunt.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake.”

He stares at what I assume is a text, then back at me with lust and trepidation. “I have to go.”

My heart that briefly revived to life shrivels again. “To Astrid.”

“She called my brother over so he’d drive us home.”

I shove him away, my limbs shaking so hard, I’m surprised they’re working.

“Nicole.” He grabs me by the elbow, spinning me around.

“What? You have your precious Astrid waiting for you. What do you want from me?”

A look passes his features and I wish I could use up all the wishes and lamp genies in the world to know what it means. “You and I…are impossible.”

“Obviously. Good luck being Astrid’s boy toy.”

“Oh, please. It’s not about Astrid. It’s about you, Nicole. You’re vindictive and vicious and a general bitch. I don’t want that.”

“Clearly. Judging by the tent in your pants.”

“Physical reaction.”

“Were the five times you fucked me that night also a physical reaction?”

“I was drugged.”

“The drug doesn’t make you want someone you don’t, Daniel.”

“Yes, it does.”

I see it then. He desperately wants to believe that, he wants to believe that he wouldn’t touch me with a ten-foot pole if he had a choice.

But he did touch me just now and he’s sober, which is why he’s frustrated.

I don’t know whether I should laugh or cry.

So I settle for a smile. “What if I say that wasn’t the case for me? What if I told you I wanted that night? That I felt it like nothing before?”

“Then you’d be lying, because your plan was Chris.”

This bloody wanker.

I want to poke him in the eyes.

Instead, I settle with throwing a jab at him. “Maybe he’s still my plan, and now that you ruined it, I have to work twice as hard.”

A flash ignites in his blue eyes. It’s so harsh and fast that I physically stiffen.

“So that’s what the sucking Captain episode was all about? Getting Chris’s attention?”

“Maybe it was.”

“Best of luck attracting fucking losers.”