“See, I’m a jealous bastard, Cherry Pie,” he says, his voice rising a bit as thunder rumbles overhead and the rain picks up. “I don’t like people touching my things. And I’ve decided that you’re my plaything. I’m not your boyfriend. I don’t love you, or care about you, or want to fuck you. I want to own you. Do you understand?”
“No,” I say simply. Because I don’t.
“I own you.” He grabs me around the waist and lifts me through the beams onto his side of the supports. I fight to stay on the safe side, but it only pushes him backwards, tipping toward the water, and he’s still in control of my weight. For a second, I feel the terrifying, dizzying sensation of him reaching the balance point. I suck in a breath, ready to plunge over the side. In some gravity defying move, he tips back in time to set me on the ledge beside him, and I remember the first time we met, when he jumped in front of that train so late it seemed impossible that he wasn’t killed. He takes risks like that because he doesn’t care, because it doesn’t matter to him if he lives or dies. I saw it that night, and I see it again now. He could have died that night, or fallen just now, and it would make no difference to him.
That’s why he always wins. Because life matters to me. I matter to me.
“What the fuck,” I say, grabbing onto the supports, my heart slamming in my chest. “You could have just killed us.”
He smiles, that dead-eyed little smirk. “Now you’re starting to understand,” he says. “Your life, your body, your soul. They are mine. If I want to kill you, I’ll kill you. If I want to fuck you, I’ll fuck you. If I want you to kneel, you’ll kneel. If I want to show the world that you like sucking cock in the back of a Corolla, I’ll show them. It’s all mine. Your whole life is mine, Harper Apple.”
“I don’t remember agreeing to this.”
“Tell me who’s going to stop me,” he taunts. “You? Your mother? The police? Who, Harper?”
My grip tightens as I seethe. He’s right. No one in this town can or will stop him. He owns the town I live in, and until I get out of this town, he might as well own me already. “I hate you,” I say quietly.
“I knew you were smart,” he says. “You’d have to be real fucking stupid to love a man like me, Cherry Pie.”
“You’re not a man,” I say, grateful for the rain running down my cheeks like tears, hiding the real thing, the impotent rage leaking from my eyes like acid. “You’re a monster.”
“And you, my pretty plaything, are mine,” he says. “You saw what happens when someone touches my toys. You like pushing buttons, and I want you to know exactly where mine are so you can do it any time you want to see me lose my shit over you again. If you feel like you aren’t important to me, remember that.”
He plucks one of my hands from the support beams and steps around me, forcing me to turn. Again, I feel his balance tip, and I’m sure he’s going to plunge into the water below. Instead, he presses me back against the bridge, my face against his chest now. I grip the supports behind me, feeling completely vulnerable with the front of my body left open to him. He stands with one foot on either side of mine, not holding onto anything. He tips my chin up and gently pushes my wet hair back from my cheeks.
“Now you know all my secrets,” he says, leaning down to brush his lips over mine. “You know exactly how to make me jealous. You know how crazy you make me, my little black cherry darling.” He kisses me, his lips cold and wet from the rain. I don’t kiss him back, but I don’t stop him, either. Something in me feels frozen, as hopeless as I felt at Faulkner, before I started fighting and gambling, before I had any way out of this town.
I don’t know what being Royal Dolce’s plaything means, but I know I’m going to find out, and I know I’m not going to like it.
He pulls back, cupping my face between his hands. “What are your secrets?” he whispers against my lips. “Had you already figured me out, Harper Apple? Is that why you defied me today? Did it turn you on to watch me beat the shit out of that asshole? Does it make you hot to know that I’ll go to those lengths to destroy the competition when the prize is you?”
“You’re disgusting,” I snarl. “It doesn’t make me hot, it makes me furious. I fucking hate you, Royal Dolce. The only thing that turns me on right now is the thought of you falling off this bridge.”
He kisses me again. This time, I struggle against him as well as I can without releasing my grip on the bridge. When my body bucks against him, he reaches up and wraps one huge hand gently around my throat. My neck is still bruised from when he choked me out in the hall after I slapped him, but this isn’t an act of violence. His touch is almost tender, as if to reassure me that he doesn’t want damage done to anything he owns.
It’s also his only anchor to the bridge. His weight rests on the balls of his feet, since his heels are hanging over the edge. Below, the brown water flows, the surface speckled with raindrops. Royal angles his face to deepen the kiss, water dripping from his face onto my skin, his mouth commanding mine to open. When I don’t obey, he forces his tongue between my teeth, pushing me back against the bridge harder, his body rocking forward to meet mine.
It’s not a passionate kiss, though. It’s an examination, like a man who just bought real estate and is exploring his new place to make sure it meets his standards. His tongue moves against mine, slow and arrogant, before skimming over my teeth and teasing the roof of my mouth. He’s almost daring me to bite him.
I don’t. I focus on my hands holding onto the bridge. Can I let go long enough to push him backwards into the water? What are my chances of escape if I push him? If I don’t?
Seemingly satisfied by my lack of defiance, Royal draws back slowly, a smile tugging at his wet lips as he slides them back and forth over mine. He strokes my throat with his thumb, his hand still around my neck. “I could kill you right now, sweetheart,” he says, that word sounding like a threat every time he uses it. “Your life belongs to me now. I can decide to end it at any time. You need to remember that when you’re with me. Remember that every time I wrap my hand around your neck, I could choose to kill you, or kiss you. And what I do is up to me, not you. I decide for you, answer for you. Do you understand that?”
I glare up at him. “Do you understand that you’re the one standing on a ledge, and the only thing stopping you from plunging into the river is your hold on me?”
I expect him to correct that, to grab the rails behind me, maybe slam my head into it for threatening him, but he only cocks a brow. “You gonna push me?”
I release the railing and rest both hands on his chest. In one split second, surprise flashes over his cruelly beautiful face. Then he seizes my head in both hands and slams his mouth down on mine. The kiss startles me so much I grab the railing again, struggling for a second before he overpowers me. He pushes me back against the supports, almost bending me backwards. This time, there’s no clinical detachment in his kiss. It’s harsh and hungry, the stroke of his tongue rough and demanding against mine.
My mouth responds, my tongue battling his, fighting back against the possession in his kiss. It isn’t possessive like a man who thinks he owns me, it’s possessive like a demon, like he wants to crawl inside my body and possess my very soul. His chest crushes mine with each quick, sharp breath he takes, and his hands cradle my head with unyielding command. And though this wasn’t something I sought or even welcomed, the alpha maleness of the kiss makes my knees go weak and my mouth respond on its own. If I don’t, he’ll invade me, take me over. My only choice is to fight back, to yield to the demand to return the kiss.
We kiss, and kiss, and kiss, until my cheeks hurt and my lips feel bruised, until I can taste my blood and his, both mingling on my tongue as he slides his against mine, as if trying to lick every drop of it from my mouth before I can swallow him down into my belly, as if he’s afraid I’ll take a piece of his soul with his blood. I grip the railing with one hand, and I fist his shirt with the other, and when that’s not enough, I slide a hand around the back of his neck, pulling him down, arching my body into his. I dig my nails in, feeling them bite into his skin, relishing the growl I feel build in his chest when I hurt him.
The kiss is everything—a battle of wills, a passionate embrace, a fight for control. And more than that, it’s an outlet for our rage that smashes together and forms an inferno between us, as if each of us wants to burn the other to the ground but there’s nothing left to burn, because our own wildfire has already consumed any ground there is to be gained.
When he pulls back, his eyes are hazy and wild, blazing with lust. It makes me shiver with heat. Without hesitation, I open my legs when he shifts his position, pushing a thigh between mine and gripping the supports behind me for leverage. He rocks against me, his breathing ragged and harsh, his erection biting into my abdomen, the heat of it searing into me despite the cold, wet clothes between us.
“Harper,” he says, his voice twisted in something almost inhuman. “Do you need me to fuck you?”