His Private Hell - Chapter 52: Chapter 52

Touched By Fire
She never should’ve gone to his penthouse again.
Not after what happened in her apartment.
Not after the taste of him lingered for days, like smoke trapped in her lungs. But Eella was never good at doing the safe thing. And Garrison Wolfe? He was her ruin wrapped in silk and sin.
He opened the door like he’d been waiting for her.
Like he knew.
The air between them shifted the second she stepped inside—thick with tension, dark with something unspoken. He was barefoot, hair mussed, wearing a simple black t-shirt that clung to his body like a second skin. But his eyes—those glacial, fire-lit eyes—were the same.
Hungry. Haunted.
And hers.
He didn’t speak.
Didn’t ask why she came.
He just stared, jaw ticking, chest rising with slow, controlled breaths.
She took a step toward him. He didn’t move.
Another step. His fingers twitched at his sides.
“You’re going to break me,” she whispered, almost like a prayer.
His voice came low. “You came here to be broken.”
And then he was on her.
Mouth crashing into hers, hands in her hair, pulling until her neck arched and she gasped. He kissed her like her mouth was the only thing keeping him alive. Then he lifted her effortlessly, pressing her against the wall, grinding against her like he was starving and she was made of heat and need.
The cold marble kissed her thighs. His hand slid between them, fingers finding her already soaked.
“Every time,” he growled into her mouth. “Every time I think I’ve had enough of you—you show up again. Wet. Wanting. Playing innocent like you don’t know what you’re doing to me.”
“I don’t,” she panted.
He thrust two fingers inside her. “Liar.”
She shattered, crying out as his fingers curled, hit that place inside her he seemed to own. He didn’t stop. Not when her legs trembled. Not when she begged. Not when she screamed his name and clutched his hair like she’d drown without him.
When he finally let her down, her knees buckled.
But he caught her. Always.
“Bedroom,” he rasped.
“I can’t move.”
“I’ll carry you.”
And he did. All the way to the room with black sheets and no windows, where the city didn’t exist and the only light came from the fire they kept feeding.
He laid her down like something precious. Kissed every inch of her as he undressed her. Her chest. Her belly. The curve of her hips. Then he knelt between her legs and worshipped her with his mouth like a sinner begging for salvation.
Eella cried out, clutching the sheets, legs trembling as he devoured her, relentless and ruthless. He didn’t let her hide from it. Not the pain. Not the pleasure. Not the truth that she needed him in the most dangerous way.
When he finally came up for air, his mouth was wet with her, his eyes molten.
He slid inside her slowly. Deeply.
Until she forgot her name.
Until all she knew was his.
Their bodies moved in rhythm, dark and desperate, skin to skin, breath to breath. He whispered things into her ear—things no man had ever dared say to her. Promises. Threats. Obsessions wrapped in velvet and flame.
“You feel like home,” he said once.
“You taste like heaven and sin.”
And when she came again, pulling him with her over that sharp, breathless edge, she swore the room fractured around them.
After, he held her like she might disappear.
But she wasn’t going anywhere.
She couldn’t.
Not now.
Not after everything.
•
The morning was quieter.
Softer.
He made her coffee. Toasted bread. Left butter melting on porcelain.
They didn’t speak of the night.
Didn’t speak of anything at all.
Until she reached for his hand across the table and he let her take it.
“Who was Darcie?” she asked.
Silence dropped like a guillotine.
He didn’t flinch. Didn’t blink.
But something in him went still.
“I told you not to ask about the thirty-third floor,” he said quietly.
“I’m asking now.”
His jaw worked. “She was… a mistake.”
“Did you love her?”
“No.”
“Then why is there a room locked for her?”
He looked at her then. Hard. Unblinking. “Because guilt doesn’t need love to thrive.”
Eella’s stomach twisted.
“What happened to her?”
He looked away. “She didn’t listen.”
“To what?”
“To me. To the rules. To what this was.”
Eella’s blood ran cold. “Did you hurt her?”
“I told her to leave,” he said. “She didn’t. She wanted to see all of me. Not just the man I was at Ally’s. But the rest. The dark. The broken.”
He paused.
“She found it.”
“And?”
“She didn’t survive it.”
The words hung between them, ugly and raw.
Eella’s pulse raced.
“She’s dead?”
“No,” he said. “She’s somewhere no one can reach her. Not even me. Because once you step into someone else’s hell, Eella, you don’t always make it back.”
•
The rest of the day passed in a fog.
Eella left his place. But not his presence.
She could still feel him under her skin. Still taste him in the back of her throat. Still hear the ghost of Darcie’s name haunting the silence.
Her phone rang four times. She ignored them all.
She couldn’t face Ollie. Or Astrid. Or even Ronnie.
Because whatever was happening between her and Garrison—it was more than lust now.
It was a noose.
And it was tightening.
•
That night, she sat on her apartment floor with a glass of red wine and stared at the corner she used to cry in.
The corner she used to dream in.
She wasn’t that girl anymore.
Not after the thirty-third floor. Not after his confessions. Not after the way he marked her like she was the only thing he’d ever wanted and hated wanting.
Her phone buzzed.
GARRISON: Don’t drink alone.
She stared at the screen.
EELLA: Why not?
GARRISON: Because I want to be the one who ruins you tonight.
Her thighs clenched.
EELLA: Already did.
He didn’t respond.
But minutes later, someone knocked on her door.
She opened it.
He stood there, rain-slicked, windblown, shirt clinging to his skin.
She didn’t ask how he got there so fast.
He didn’t ask if she’d let him in.
She did.
And this time, it wasn’t desperation between them.
It was something darker.
Something tender and terrifying.
He kissed her slower. Touched her deeper. Said her name like a hymn.
And when he slid inside her this time, it wasn’t just pleasure she felt—it was devotion.
It was hell wrapped in heat and love in the shape of punishment.
•
Later, as they lay tangled in her sheets, his hand tracing patterns on her spine, she whispered, “Am I going to survive you?”
He didn’t lie.
He never did.
“No,” he said. “But I’ll burn with you.”