With a feral gleam in his eyes, he hovered over her and stroked his long, thick shaft. A mewl of impatience slipped from her lips.
“Is this what you want, Raine?” With his free hand, he dragged his finger through the folds of her moistening slit and teased her clit. “What you need?”
“Yes. Please, Liam.”
Instead of giving her more, he lifted his finger away. His expression blanked.
“Sir. Sorry. Yes, please, Sir.”
He didn’t give her what she wanted. “Do you like it when I share myself with you? Does it make you feel close to me?”
She nodded. “It does.”
“Treasured?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“You like watching me stroke myself, don’t you, Raine? Does it make your cunt juicy with desire? Do you want my dominance? Ache for me to fuck you?”
She nodded feverishly. “Always.”
“Ah, love,” he murmured. “How do you want me? In your ass? Down your throat? Filling that tight pussy until you’re mindless with wanting to spill over me as you come?”
He circled her straining clit. She moaned in utter supplication, her stare riveted to his every move, silently begging for more.
“Any of it. All of it,” she cried.
“I can tell you want me.” His silky rasp reverberated in her ear. “I smell your arousal.”
“Liam…” she cried breathlessly.
Then his voice hardened to steel. “But I don’t think you understand, Raine. You will tell me what hurts you, keeps you awake, frightens or upsets you, makes you laugh and cheer and every fucking thing in between because you are mine. Until now, you’ve given me nothing except what I yank out of you under duress. Even then, you dance pretty around the periphery, clinging to me with your soft body and batting your lashes to distract me from your problems. I’ve given you a lot of slack in your rope. All you’ve managed to do is hang yourself.”
His words sliced her to the bone with guilt. From the time he’d approached her about becoming the best submissive she could be until this moment, he’d tried everything to reach her. Still, she remained half-frozen—in love with him but torn. Yearning to surrender everything but terrified.
“I know I need to do better.”
“You need to decide what you want.”
“You, Liam. Always you. Your touch. Your approval. Your understanding.”
“Then you have to do your part. I won’t tolerate just some of your effort or half of your soul anymore.”
He meant it. Raine saw the gravity on his stern face, in the hard glint of his eyes. If she wanted to keep him, she had to find the courage to surrender. She had to figure out how to give him the power to hurt her and trust that he wouldn’t.
“I know.” Raine teared up. “You’re so capable of making a woman feel special and showering her with devotion.” She didn’t see what she could possibly give him in return, and didn’t that sound pathetic? “I feel like I’m bringing you nothing but problems. Wouldn’t you rather just have my body?”
“I already have your body, sub, splayed out and wet just the way I want it.” Again he teased her cunt, sliding his thumb upward to rub her clit while inserting first one, then two fingers through her cream and deep inside her. “Making you beg and scream has been a heady pleasure from the start.”
Raine cried out and arched up for more, trying to drown the dread snaking through her with the euphoria of his touch.
He bent to her ear, his voice brutally gentle. “We don’t have a problem communicating when I’m fucking you into oblivion.” Then he withdrew his fingers, leaving her cold. “It’s here.” Liam tapped her forehead, right between the eyes. “This is where I lose you, where all our troubles lie.”
“You’re right. I know. I said I’d try harder.”
“But what you meant is that you’ll find more creative ways to hide from me. Close your mouth. Don’t deny it. If you lie, I’ll truly punish you and I’ll make sure you don’t like it.”
Foreboding mixed with her arousal to create something so confusing, Raine had no idea what to say. “I understand, Sir.”
“Then prove to me that I’m important enough for you to knock down your walls and learn to trust. Show me I’m not wasting my breath.”
“I’ll do my best. But it’s not that simple. You don’t understand.”
His brows slashed down in a thunderous frown. “Really? Your father hurt you and Hammer pretended he didn’t want you for years, so now you think you’re not good enough for any man, and if I see the real you, I’ll run screaming in the other direction like some bloody nancy? Is that what you think I don’t understand?”
God, it was as if he’d shoved her in front of a mirror, then sliced her to the bone so he could force her to watch herself bleed. Though she’d done her best to hide, he still saw right through her. It felt like being naked in the middle of a crowd. Panic threatened. She tugged at her bonds, struggling, though she knew it was pointless.