“I don’t think it counts when you fucking drag me,” I snap, rubbing my arm where he grabbed me. “You didn’t have to do that. I would have come back eventually.”
He just stares at me, breathing hard, his chiseled jaw clenched tight. He may not say much, but there’s plenty going on in there. Maybe it’s the alcohol making me brave, but suddenly I want to poke him until he explodes, until he shows his hand, lets me know what he’s really thinking.
“What’s your problem, anyway?” I ask.
“You have no sexual feelings, but you can rub your ass all over some stranger’s dick in a club?” he demands.
“So what?” I ask, raising my chin and glaring back at him. “It has nothing to do with you.”
“Except it does,” he says, his voice a dangerous growl. Suddenly, I realize how stupid it was for me to tempt fate, to push his limits when we’re in another country where I have no real protection. “The deal was that I would let you do your thing in private, but you would respect me as your husband in public. I take my word seriously. If you want to survive this marriage, you’d better learn to do the same.”
“That—that was for the families,” I say, swallowing the tremor in my voice.
“Bullshit,” King growls. “That was pretty fucking public, what you just did.”
“No one at home will ever know.”
“I’llknow,” he says flatly.
“What, I can never go out dancing again?” I ask, feeling an ache behind my eyes. I fucked it all up already. I should have been more cautious, not gone all out. I should have reined it in and taken it slow, working up to this. But of course I didn’t do that. For me, it’s balls-to-the-wall or nothing.
“You can dance any time you want,” King says. “If you need to grind your ass on some guy’s dick…” He breaks off and shakes his head, then lowers his voice. “I’m right fucking here, Eliza.”
A snort escapes me before I can stop it. “What? I’m supposed to grind on you?”
We stare at each other for a long moment, neither of us speaking.
“Oh, you poor thing,” I say at last. “That’s what you meant, isn’t it?”
“No,” he says, scowling and turning away. Out of his usual suit and tie, he doesn’t look so stiff. Now that I’ve had a week with him, I know he’s not as dickish as he came off at first, but I still don’t know him well enough to predict his next move, and that scares me.
“It is,” I say, an incredulous laugh bubbling out as I bounce onto the bed on my ass. “You totally want me to rub up on you.”
“Why would I want to dance with a frigid brat like you?”
“I’m not frigid.”
King scoffs. “You literally told me your sexuality was frozen.”
I stare at him a minute. But there’s no way I’m going there with him, letting him know anything real about me. I’d rather just get it over with. He’s going to fuck me eventually, anyway. I might as well learn to grin and bear it. And I’d rather him hurt me than look at me the way he did on our wedding night, like I’m some fragile, broken thing.
Broken? Yeah, I’ll admit it. Fragile? Like a fucking grenade is fragile.
I’ll take his wrath over his pity, and I know exactly how to get it.
“Yeah, about that… I may have exaggerated,” I say lightly.
“You what?” he asks, his voice going low and deadly.
I shouldn’t have said it, oh god, his eyes are glittering with a malice that says I’m treading in very, very dangerous territory. But once you say something like that, you can’t just take it back. I don’t want to, either. It’s a relief to know this is finally happening. I’ve spent the whole week tiptoeing around him, hardly daring to breathe lest it draw his attention. I lie in bed each night trembling and petrified, sure each one will be the night he’ll be done waiting.
“Yeah, I lied,” I admit. “I don’t have a problem with sex. I have a problem with you.”
King just stares at me, his eyes incredulous and turbulent as a storm. “Youlied?” he asks at last.
“Yep,” I say. “I’m good at that. But it says something about you, too, you know.”
“What?” he asks, not moving a muscle, just staring at me. But I can see the fury inside him, can see the way he’s almost shaking with it. I know I should leave him alone, but the reckless animal inside me wants to keep poking the beast. Like I said, I’ve never been one to stop at halfway. I push limits. I want to see how far I can go, what I can get away with, what he’ll do when he finally snaps. Maybe that’s partly why I keep going out every night, waiting for him to put his foot down the way no one ever has. To demand answers. When I met him, I thought maybe he’d be a formidable opponent or even a match for me. But he’s too scared of my father, like everyone else in my life.