Ray Maddox
Flashback – Two weeks earlier
It started with the hair.
Long as sin, jet-black, sleek and heavy like ink spilled down her back. It moved when she walked, like it had its own attitude. Like it had seen some things.
She wasn't supposed to be here. I knew it the second she stepped into Club Noir, like she'd crash-landed from another world. Boots stomping across the marble floor, eyeliner thick, mouth cherry-glossed and cocky.
My drink stalled halfway to my lips.
She didn't glance around, didn't look for anyone. Just made a beeline for the bar like she owned it, slapped down a card, and said, "Strongest thing you've got that won't kill me."
The bartender blinked.
I grinned.
She caught my stare a few seconds later—bold, slow, deliberate. No shyness. Just... game on.
"You always stalk women with your eyes?" she asked as she slid onto the stool next to me.
I let my gaze drag over her—knees up. Tight black jeans, slashed at the thigh. Tank top that didn't try to hide anything. That hair. Those lips.
"You always walk in like a goddamn warning sign?" I replied.
She smirked. "Is that your idea of flirting?"
"No. This is."
I leaned in, slowly. Close enough to smell smoke and candy on her breath. "You've got trouble written all over you."
She didn't flinch. "You look like you pay girls to say that to you."
I laughed. "Feisty."
"You haven't seen feisty yet," she said, knocking back her shot.
I ordered us another round just to keep her there. She didn't say no. We tossed them back like a dare.
One song later, we were in the shadows of the dance floor, bodies tangled in something that wasn't dancing. Her back hit the wall behind the DJ booth, and I followed—hands on her hips, mouth at her throat.
She didn't stop me. She pulled me closer.
Her lips crashed into mine like a challenge. Tongue, teeth, heat.
I groaned into her mouth as her fingers tangled in my hair. My hands slid under her top, just enough to feel bare skin and the arch of her spine.
"You kiss like you want to win something," she gasped between kisses.
"Maybe I do."
Her hands slipped under my jacket, nails scratching. I bit her lip in return, and she moaned—low, breathy, reckless. That sound could've ruined me.
"You like it rough, don't you, mystery boy?"
I grabbed her wrists, pinned them above her head gently, and leaned in. "You started it."
She tilted her head, teasing. "Then finish it."
My mouth found her collarbone, her jaw, the corner of her smirk.
"Names?" I asked, lips still brushing her skin.
She shook her head, pulling me back in. "No names. Just... this."
We kissed like we hated breathing. Her thigh slid between mine. My hands were everywhere. The music could've stopped and I wouldn't have noticed. The whole club could've burned down around us, and I'd have let it—so long as she kept making that sound in my ear
She slammed me against the wall first.
That part's important.
She kissed me like she was starving—like I was the last cigarette on earth and she'd been trying to quit. Her mouth was wet, desperate, all tongue and no mercy.
I let her take the lead—until I didn't.
I grabbed her hips, pulled her flush against me, and spun us around. My back against the wall now. Her body caged in my hands.
"Fuck," she gasped when my lips dropped to her neck. "You don't even know what you're doing to me."
I grinned against her throat. "Pretty sure I do."
She tasted like expensive perfume and rage. Vanilla cream and violence.
My fingers slid into her hair—god, it was heavy, thick and silky, like silk sheets and secrets. I tugged it gently, made her gasp, and pressed my mouth to hers again, deeper this time. Slow. Torturous.
She made this sound—this tiny whimper—and I swear my knees buckled.
Our hands were everywhere. She clawed at my shirt, her nails raking down my abs. I slid one hand under the hem of her dress, found bare skin, heat, and more trouble than I could handle.
"Tell me to stop," I rasped against her lips.
She bit my jaw instead. Hard.
"Keep going and I'll kill you."
God, she was perfect.
We didn't have sex—not fully. There were too many clothes, too many voices too close. But we nearly did. Against that damn wall, in the shadows, with her riding my thigh and whispering filthy promises into my mouth.
I remember her thighs clenching around me.
I remember the way her lipstick smeared down my neck.
I remember thinking I'd sell my soul for another hour of this.
But then she pulled away. Just like that.
Fixed her dress. Wiped her lips. Looked at me like I was a beautiful mistake.
"Thanks for the distraction," she said, voice detached. "You kiss like a god."
And then she left.
Hair swinging, heels clicking, and me standing there, hard as hell and breathless in the dark.
No name. No number.
Just the taste of her still on my tongue and the burn of her nails on my chest.
If I'd known then who she was—Sky Valen, daughter of my father's worst enemy—I would've still let her ruin me.
Twice.
---
Sky Valen's POV
I don't normally do this.
Scratch that—I never do this.
But last night? Last night was a goddamn fever dream and I woke up still sweating.
He followed me out of the club like sin dressed in black.
I knew what he wanted. I wanted it too.
We didn't talk. Talking would've ruined it. He just looked at me with those eyes—dark, daring, and so fucking cocky—and I knew I was already in too deep.
The rooftop was cold. My skin wasn't.
He pinned me against the brick wall with his body, hot and hard and solid muscle wrapped in an open black shirt and even worse intentions.
"You're trouble," he whispered against my throat, fingers bunching the hem of my dress. "I like trouble."
"You talk too much," I muttered, grabbing the back of his neck and pulling him in like my mouth had unfinished business.
And it did. God, did it.
The kiss was chaos—no rhythm, no logic, just teeth and tongues and groans swallowed into each other. His hands were under my dress before I even realized it, rough palms skating up my thighs like he had every right.
My moan wasn't quiet. He liked that. Smirked against my mouth like he'd won something.
"Sound like that again," he said, voice low and gravelly. "I dare you."
So I did.
Twice.
I dragged my nails down his chest, popped open the next button just to feel his skin. It was warm, unfairly perfect. The kind of body sculpted from too many sins and not enough regrets.
He lifted me like I weighed nothing and sat me on the ledge—dangerous, my favorite word—and pushed my knees apart with his hips. My breath hitched. His smirk deepened.
"What do you want, baby?" he asked.
"I want you to shut the fuck up and use that mouth."
He did.
Holy hell, he did.
His kisses trailed down my neck, across my collarbone, lower—his hands worshipped every inch like he was memorizing my curves to haunt his dreams later. I arched into him like prayer and profanity were the same thing.
I don't remember the stars.
I just remember the way his fingers slid under my thong and I nearly bit his shoulder from how fucking good it felt.
No one had ever touched me like that.
He ruined me with his mouth. Wrecked me with his fingers. Whispered filth in my ear and made me forget my own damn name.
And when I came apart, hands in his hair, teeth clenched around his name—I still didn't know who the hell he was.
I left him there, still panting, still grinning like the devil.
But I knew one thing walking away with shaky knees and lipstick smeared:
I was fucked.
And not in the way I usually like.