Chapter 1: A Chaotic Holiday

" Back there...in the house," she stammered, voice breaking with sobs that cut his heart in two. " When we told her about her husband. I thought she would be relieved. He abused her. He literally brought every war home to her. But she cried, Luthor. She cried for a man who almost gutted her under the protection of his badge. Do you have any idea how I feel right now knowing that my decision to kill him and free her from her misery might have heightened her sufferings?" 

Head buried in her palms, she ruffles her. hair with a quiet rage. He glanced at her with mixed feelings. 

This side of her—broken, messy, crimson red—was foreign to him. She wasn't the same woman who had opened a grenade and thrown it into the room the fallen soldier was. That quiet fury in her eyes, and determined steady hands had given way for something soft, gentle, girly.

She is shaky, trembling and second guessing herself. Beside the monster he thought of her…the monster he craved…was a gentle lamb. 

" I don't know how to tell her the truth. I never wanted another woman to go through what I went through,” she sputters , dabbing her eyes with the back of her uniform. 

Moraine had volunteered to inform Olivia of her husband's death on the war front. She didn't expect that Olivia would be twice as broken as when her abusive husband used his fist on her.

“I thought I was protecting her somehow. Now, it feels like I killed her as well.”

Luthor moved his hand, but it stopped midway, suspended in the air. His finger itches to graze her skin, to twirl her long raven black hair and lift it to his nostrils. He burned within, picking as much of her scent as he could. The scent lingering long enough to make him grunt in frustration.

As time ticked, and the ship finally docked, the gentle gush of wind accelerated his heartbeat, and fanned the flames within him to an incinerating degree.

“ Get a hold of yourself,” he thought, looking out on the beach, but his heartbeat sped a mile in an hour. It followed her steps as she got down, lumbering out to the island. This is the holiday his platoon is getting. Coerced by the captain, he accepted to go the moment he met her bags packed.

Something she had said burnt in his mind. She was leaving. Resigning. 

His chest rose and fell. He cupped his face, and exhaled. 

“ I can't watch her leave,” he thought, picking his luggage to go after her. 

After hours of determined search, he found her by a small fire, away from everyone. 

“ Hey,” she waved a bottle at him. One look at her, and his throat bobbed.

Clad in a bikini, sand clung to her skin, forming patterns on her thighs. His eyes shifted from her full chest, to the sand covered regions. His chest rose. His throat dries up. He heard her speak, but nothing she said registered in his head. A sultry ring remained. Fanning the flames alive again. 

“ Come. Sit.” She smiled animatedly. He could pick the liquor in her breath, but it struck like an intoxicating pull towards her. The beer was beginning to take a full spin on her senses. Her laughter, alcohol induced, pulled the strings of his thrumming heart.

“ You look good,” he blurted, throwing his eyes away from her direction. With five years gap between them, Luthor didn't think he would lose his grip on the wheels so soon. But between them, heat spread like a mating call.

“ I know,” she replied, voice below a whisper. He sits up, fighting off the urge to pin her down and smack her backside. He dips his head, and gets up to leave, but a soft moan escaped her lips.

“ F*ck you, Moraine. You don't get to do this to me!”

She stifles her laugh, and downs the beer at a go. “ I haven't done anything…yet.”

When she rises, his eyes followed, long before she was straddling him by the beach, riding him like a horse charged for war. He held onto her waist, etching every moment into his memory. Her moans rose, unrestrained. Her body bounced against his, mixed in pleasure and pain. The thought of the fading night left his mind, and all he could think of was her…his first experience…his first woman.

Wet for him. Moaning his name. Begging to be fondled. Only by him.

Immersed in the tightness of her body, Luthor felt reality slip away slowly, coming severally under her touch. 

Her touch, wicked and full of sin. Her body, the lines of temptation. Her kisses, a skin full of liquor. And then, there was the way she rode him. Merciless. Hungry. Possessive, like he naturally belonged to her.

Every grunt. Every moan. Every groan. Their heartbeat synced. He cummed severally beneath her, but the more he cummed, the more she charged against him.

Until he passed out.

At the onset of dawn, he got up, his fantasy playing out a figure lying recklessly on the bed in a swimsuit.

He swallowed and closed in, but met the side of the bed cold and empty.

He cups his face, head lowered between his palms. “ F*ck!” He kicked a piece of furniture in the tent, pacing in the tent. Her bags are gone. Her shampoo lingers. Her scent on his body…teasing his thoughts. 

Eyes wandering around the tent for a trace of her, her handwriting flashed in his eyes. Hurriedly scribbled on a piece of paper she had torn out of her diary. Her words, running like a break in thought.

“ Hope you slept well…and about last night…it was a mistake. It shouldn't have ever happened. I'm gravelly sorry.”

“ A mistake?!” He quizzed, and laughed hysterically. “ How dare her call my first time experience a mistake?” He thought and folded the paper neatly into his pockets. 

“ Moraine, I will make sure you regret your words!” He mumbled with a fiery rage flashing in his eyes. He takes out his phone and places a call to a number saved as “Dad”.

“ Have you learned your lesson?” A hoarse voice came from the other end. He rolled his eyes, and cleared his throat. “ Yes, father.”

“ Luthor, you are my only heir. I expect nothing less but perfection from you. The Kingston group of companies will depend on you in the future, so you can't blame me for being strick.”

He nods obediently. “ I understand. I got discharged. Called to let you know. I might have to go to mom's…”

“ No! You come straight home to me.”

Once the call ended, a dirty grin formed on his lips. He glanced at the bed, and then at the note in his hand.

His mind replayed every scene, and ended at the embarrassment of being labeled a mistake and abandoned after his first night. Feeling used and ditched, he squeeze the notes. “ Moraine, I'm coming for you.”