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“I’m sure that made his day,” I muttered.
“He also told me you started the fire.” Jagger dragged his knuckles down my cheek, and shivers danced up and down my spine.
I slammed my defenses into place, unsure how Jagger felt about me burning down our home. “I had no choice.”
“Peter told me that as well.”
I looked away, relishing in the relief that Peter had told Jagger at least part of the truth. Tears pricked my eyes as I focused on him again. “I thought I killed you. All these years, it’s consumed me.” My voice cracked with the grief that had nearly destroyed me.
“Now you can sleep at night knowing that I’m alive and well.” His words said one thing, but his expression another.
“What else did Peter say?” I took a deep breath and tried to calm my racing pulse.
“Not enough.”
I waited for him to continue. Our conversation was like pulling teeth, slow and painful.
“If you still have questions for him, I have no doubt in my mind that you can coax . . . I mean torture the truth out of him.” My brow quirked at him.
“Who is Crimson? He ran out of time before he could tell me about her,” Jagger said.
I stilled as if deadly spiders surrounded me. “I don’t know her real name. She was the one that forced me to set the fire, but it sounds like Peter told you that. After months and months of grief and depression, I confessed to him what happened. He used it against me.”
“To control and hurt you.”
“Yeah.” My entire being ached from Jagger’s proximity. I wanted to reach out to him, kiss him as though we hadn’t lost four years. The man standing before me might be my stepbrother, but he wasn’t the guy I fell in love with. I desperately needed to know if he still existed somewhere inside of Jagger.
“He said you were his obsession.” Jagger shifted from one foot to the other, growing restless.
I nodded, unsure of how to respond. “What did you say?”
A cruel laugh rumbled through Jagger’s chest. “I told him an obsession got people killed.”
My eyes popped open. “Jagger. Please tell me you didn’t.”
He pressed his body into mine, and I placed a hand over his heart. The beat was steady and calm. Jagger wasn’t tripping that he’d hurt Peter and tore out his fingernails. I wasn’t sure I cared either. Peter deserved what he got after what he’d done to me. Flashes of him chasing me through the woods at night sent my pulse into overdrive. He hid my shoes, but I ran my ass off anyway. I concealed myself behind the trees and brush. Somehow, I’d managed to outsmart him, but my feet were cut and bloody, leaving a trail straight to me. My feet weren’t the worst of it that night. He began his cutting rituals, but none were deep until he carved up my back.
I gritted my teeth, suddenly needing to hear that Jagger had hurt Peter—maimed him beyond recognition or fed his balls to him. The mere thought of that level of payback made my thighs clench with longing for Jagger. I was screwed up in the head if that turned me on.
Jagger leaned in, his nose brushing against my ear.
I grabbed his waist, heat pooling low in my belly as his dick pressed against his slacks and into my waist.
“What do you want me to tell you, my pet?”
Without my permission, a moan slipped from my throat.
“The truth. Tell me the truth.”
He nipped my earlobe. “Here’s the truth, baby. I thought about you every day for four goddamn years as I lived my own hell. You died in that fire and took my heart and humanity with you. What I had to do to survive would make a grown man beg for death.” His hand trailed up my side then cupped my breast through my shirt and teased my nipple. “You haunted my dreams as I did unspeakable things. Horrible things. You can’t handle the fucking truth.”
“Yes, I can. I’ve seen darkness, Jagger. Don’t underestimate me.”
His fingertips danced a trail down my leg, then beneath my skirt.
“Spread your legs,” he demanded.
My breath caught in my throat as he eased me apart and massaged my clit.
