I could feel my forehead furrowing with a deeper crease at his response.
He raised my hand higher, twisting it left and right as the small puddles of blood dripped along the creases, gently raining down onto the leather seat between us.
“You’ve been doing this a long time.”
“With a father like mine, wouldn’t you?” I rasped, tugging at his grip.
“You think your father’s a menace, what do you think mine is?” he rumbled, his gaze ensnaring me.
The question had me wincing, because, in this, we were equals.
Both our fathers were monsters.
“We all have an escape,” I defended myself.
“Cutting isn’t an escape.” He squinted at me. “I see you slicing your palms, see the aftermath of it, I’ll tie you to the fucking bed and—”
Irritation flashed through me. “And, what?” I leaned forward, pushing into his space, and with my other hand, I prodded him. “What will you do?”
“Spank you then make you come so fucking hard you won’t remember why you were cutting yourself in the first place.”
His statement had me rearing back, so hard and so fast that my spine collided with the door, but whether or not it was fate, my abrupt gesture was timed with the car’s deceleration.
He moved forward, deeper into my space, and rasped, “You Russians might not take care of what’s yours, but we Irish? Do.” His gaze drifted behind me, to the stables’ parking lot, and it gave me a lick of space to accept that his words hadn’t inspired fear in me, justneed. “Your driver isn’t back yet. Go into the yard, and we’ll wait out here until he comes back.”
“I’ll be okay—”
Anger flashed in his eyes. “Which part did you not understand? You’re mine, Camille. By your own choice.” He reached up and pinched my chin between his forefinger and thumb. “Let’s hope, for both our sakes, you don’t regret flying into my web.”
“Your web can’t be any worse than Abramovicz’s,” I whispered.
He shrugged. “I’ve had no complaints.”
I gritted my teeth at the egotistical remark, but didn’t say anything other than, “I’ll be here tomorrow.”
“Good. Be here at twelve. Make sure it’s the same guard. And don’t bring your cellphone with you.”
“Why not?” I queried with a frown, especially as we’d already exchanged numbers.
“Because your old man’s probably got a tracker in it. He did with Inessa. Caused a real shitstorm.”
I winced. “I can see him doing that. We’ll always be his property—in his mind, at least.”
Eyes darkening, he tilted his chin down. “We’ll see about that.”
To that, I didn’t utter a word, just slipped out of the car and headed toward the stables.
Though I really wanted to go back to Terry, to find comfort in my friend, I didn’t bother because I knew the guard would be returning shortly, and I wanted to see if Brennan would stay.
The sound of a door opening and closing had me turning around during my short walk, and I saw Brennan quickly ducking out of the backseat so he could dip into the front with his man. Only, our eyes clashed and held over the empty space, long enough for it to be dangerous, long enough for me to feel things I hadn’t anticipated feeling.
I wasn’t scared.
Whenever Nyx had commanded me to his side, there’d always been a rush of fear that slithered down my spine.
We all knew Nyx was borderline insane. You never said no to him. Well, outside of sexual encounters—ironically enough. Nyx would slit his wrists before he forced a woman to have sex with him.
But though I knew Brennan was just as dangerous, and from his rep—just as deadly—I wasn’t frightened.