Levinwas right, I have a moment to realize before Alexandre’s guests close in around me, and the Frenchwoman standing next to Alexandre darts into the fray. I think she’s the one who disarms me, but I can’t be sure. I try to throw a punch, to wrestle free of the four men restraining me as the gun is lost. Still, I’m in too close of quarters to use my boxing skills, and the Frenchwoman is already backing up, my pistol dangling from her finger as she smirks at me.
“Liam!” Ana cries out, leaping up. Alexandre looks at her, his expression suddenly black with anger, and I see her flinch backward.
There it is. The fear that I’d thought I would see, but too late. She gasps as he swings at me, his fist connecting with my chin, and she cries out my name again as my head lolls to one side, the punch splitting my lip.
“How do you know this man?” Alexandre demands, rounding on her as his guests hold me with my arms pinned behind my back. “Is he your lover?”
“What?” Ana gasps. “No, I—I barely know him, I just met him in Russia! He knows my best friend’s husband. I swear I’ve never—”
“I don’t believe you,” Alexandre snarls. “Lying littlechienne. Bitch! Heisyour lover, or else why would he come here—”
“I don’t know,” Ana whispers miserably. “But I swear—”
“Why should I believe you?” he sneers, his handsome face twisting. “You’ve lied to me before.”
“Alexandre.” The Frenchwoman holding my gun comes to stand at his elbow. “I have an idea.”
She leans up on her tiptoes, then, her free hand on his shoulder as she whispers something in his ear, and I see Ana flinch, paling even more. It’s clear she knows this woman too, enough to dislike her.
Alexandre’s mouth twists. “I don’t like it.” He shakes his head. “No one touches her but me.”
The woman shrugs. “You might not like it, but you know I’m right. She won’t respondifshe loves you. His touch will mean nothing to her.”
What the fuck is she talking about?I stare at her, but Alexandre is already nodding. The woman moves around the table, grabbing Ana harshly by her upper arms.
“Get your hands off of her!” I shout, but Alexandre is nodding to the men holding me.
“If you’re going to disrupt my dinner party,” he says coldly, “and make me question the loyalty of mypetit poupée, then you might as well entertain my guests while I put her to the test. Take him over to the table where Yvette has Ana,” he instructs.
I don’t know what the fuck is happening, but I’m not given much choice. The four men holding me manage to manhandle me towards where the Frenchwoman—Yvette—is holding Ana so tightly that her nails are biting into her upper arm. As I stand there watching in horror, she grabs Ana’s skirt in her fist, yanking it up as she turns Ana sharply and backs her against the table.
“What the fuck is going on?” I shout, twisting to glare at Alexandre, but he just crosses his arms over his chest, shrugging.
“You’re going to fuck her while we watch,” he says, as casually as if he were telling me to take a seat at the table.
“What?” I stare at him.He’s insane.“No, I’m fucking not—”
“You will,” Alexandre says coolly, “or Yvette will shoot her.” He nods as Yvette raises the gun, cocking it and pressing the barrel to Ana’s temple as she turns bone-white, starting to shake.
“Liam—” she whispers my name, her eyes starting to well with tears as they flick towards Alexandre. “Alexandre, please, I swear, I’ve never—we’ve never—he’s not—”
Alexandre shrugs. “Prove it,” he says coolly. “Yvette is right. If you love me, and he’s nothing to you, then he’ll be nothing but a cock in a hole. You won’t feel pleasure, and you won’t come. But if you do—” his eyes narrow, blackening with rising anger again. “Then you’re a lying bitch, and Yvette will deal with you both accordingly.”
He looks at me. “You came here for her, so hurry up. Now’s your chance. Don’t make us wait.”
The four men shove me forward, letting go of my arms as they push me in front of Ana, who is visibly shaking now. I frantically try to think of some way out of it as I look into her tearful pale blue eyes, of some way to get the gun back, but I can’t. Yvette’s finger is on the trigger, and if I try anything, she’ll shoot Ana before I can stop her.
I’d come here to save Ana, but somehow I’ve made everything so much fucking worse.
“Hurry. Up.” Alexandre growls it from behind me through clenched teeth, and I let out a frustrated breath.
“You’re a fucking man,” I growl right back, clenching my own jaw. “I have to be hard to fuck her, you fucking—”
“You wanted her. I’m running out of patience to find out the truth.”
Fuck.Of all the times for my cock not to respond—this would be it. I want Ana more than I want to breathe, but in front of strangers and the man who owns her, with a gun to her head, isn’t how I’d envisioned it. It isn’t a good situation for getting a hard-on, and it’s the worst possible one for the two of us that I can imagine.
I have to fuck Ana to get us out of this. That much is clear. But by doing that—by allowing Alexandre to force me to fuck her, I’m essentially killing any chance of us ever being together.