Finally, our eyes meet again. My cheeks burn hotter, but I don’t drop my gaze. I want to see his expression, want to read what’s behind those dark eyes. But I can’t. I don’t know him well enough to know what he wants, what he intends. I thought he was as into it as I was before, but when I came, when I lost control, he didn’t. He was as cold an unfeeling as a monster, using my pleasure to his advantage the whole time. There is no passion in this man, only calculation.
That must be how he got me in the first place, how he negotiated for my hand and my body, convincing my father to give me up for his use.
“Turn around,” he says at last.
I falter. My bravado is long gone, and my knees start shaking. Oh god. This is really happening. He’s going to take me like the brute he is, from behind so he doesn’t have to see my face.
I shake my head, and his jaw tightens, anger flashing in his eyes. He wants my obedience, but he doesn’t require it. If I say no, he’ll take what he wants anyway. Still, it’s better to go down fighting than to let him think I agree to this, to any of this. I shake my head again.
King repeats himself slowly, and I grip the sill as he steps forward. “You will do as I ask, or there will be consequences.”
“My dad will kill you if you hurt me,” I whisper.
“We both know that’s not true,” King says with that little smirk that makes me want to slap his face.
I meet his eyes, and a tremor of pure terror goes through me. I’m around killers daily, but this man is more terrifying than any mafia boss. He has permission to whatever he pleases with me, to wreck me in unimaginable ways. He can use me until I’m as dispirited as the other mafia wives, until I don’t even want to fight because I know it’s useless. Until I pray he’ll fuck his mistress, so he won’t want to touch me when he gets home. Until I forget freedom because it’s too painful to dream of something that will never be.
“What are you going to do?” I ask. “Do I have a choice?”
King slides a hand behind my head, gripping my hair gently. “You always have a choice, Eliza,” he says. “Obey me, or accept the consequences.”
I try to pull back, but his grip on my hair tightens until I wince, until I can’t move my head. The sting brings tears to my eyes. I gather all my strength and spit in his face.
He spins me around so fast my hands fly out to brace against the window. I cry out, but he doesn’t touch me beyond his grip on my thick bundle of hair. I can hear him breathing behind me, can feel him moving slightly, but I can’t see his face. I’m glad he can’t see mine. Tears of fear and pain trickle down my cheeks, though I breathe through my mouth so he won’t hear. Steam forms on the cold glass around my fingers as I stand there, tense with terror as he readies himself.
“Let those pretty tears fall for me,” he says. “I like knowing you give me the real ones, not faking it like you did on our wedding night.”
He hooks his fingers into the back of my underwear, letting the tip of his fingers trace the line of my crack softly as he draws my underwear down over my thighs. A whimper escapes me, but I bite my lip to hold back the hiccup of terror. My whole body is shaking when he straightens, leaving my underwear around my ankles. He stands there for a long minute, not moving, just looking. My nipples harden and another sweep of goosebumps shivers across my skin while he looks.
“Why don’t you want me to look at you?” he asks, his voice husky. “You’re… Flawless.”
How can I even begin to tell him all the fucked up reasons I don’t want him looking at me? How can I tell him that I don’t want it because he doesn’t deserve to see me, but that when he looks at me, completely bared to him against my will, heat pulses between my thighs?
He steps forward, the soft fabric of his sweats barely grazing my skin. He slides an arm around me and tucks his fingers between my thighs, cupping my mound in his palm. “You were telling the truth about one thing that night,” he says. “You’re not ready. When the time comes, I’m going to bury myself so deep in this tight little cunt that you never forget my claim. All you’ll remember is that you belong to me, and you’ll like it that way.”
I try to slow my breathing, feeling the wetness pooling between my thighs at his touch, hoping he can’t feel it yet.
“For tonight,” he murmurs into my ear, his voice a sexy rumble against my back. “You’ll sleep like this. I want every part of your beautiful body bare for me to see when I wake. If you’re good, you can have your underwear back in the morning.”
“What?” I breathe.
He pulls me to the bed and tosses back the blankets before picking me up and laying me down on the sheet. I think he’ll force me to do something obscene for him, but he only lies down next to me, pulling me into his arms. I tense at his touch, but he rolls me away from him, fitting his body around mine like the bigger spoon, and slides his hand back between my legs. Then he reaches for the remote and switches off the light.
Like I can sleep right now. I lie awake, trying not to squirm as heat pulses between my thighs, where his hand remains. I’m completely naked, but he’s still wearing sweats and a t-shirt. That comforts me a bit, even as it makes me feel more vulnerable. He’s making it clear he’s the one in control, that I’m at his mercy. But he doesn’t take anything else. He doesn’t give it, either. His hand covers my mound in a relaxed, possessive way, like he’s just putting a hand on my knee. Like he knows it belongs to him, and he’s not worried about how I feel about that.
I want to go to sleep like I don’t even feel it, like it’s an offhand gesture to me, too. But I feel wetness increasing in my core with each minute as the heat of his hand, the gentle pressure of his fingers, builds my arousal. It’s all I can do not to squirm against him, beg him for another orgasm. By the time I realize he’s fallen asleep, I’m so worked up and frustrated I could scream. I wonder what he’d do if I started riding his hand. A strange mixture of arousal and fear mingles inside me, and I realize one is fueling the other.
This is not good. I’m so fucked up in the head.
I love risk. I love danger. And this man is all of that.
He terrifies me.
And I think I like it.
eight
Eliza