My insides shrink from sharing the truth, from the emotions it would reveal. His hand is firm against my backside, and I jump. “Elijah, I left you because you locked me in.”
He leans over me, his lips a breath away from my ear. “Explain.”
That wasn’t what I meant to say. I left because my sister needed me. I left because of family. Those would have been acceptable reasons. They weren’t the real reason I walked away. It was because he locked me in. The same way Adam had. Both men thought of me as some kind of pet. Someone to keep and play with and then put away.
“You didn’t treat me like an equal. Like a partner.” You didn’t love me. I manage to hold in those final, damning words, but they hang in the air anyway like dew in a dark morning.
“A partner. Someone to face down the Ian Taggarts and the Adam Blacks of the world, is that what you mean? Someone to hold a gun and fight battles?”
“No.”
He bites down on my lower lobe. “Someone to struggle when I tie her up?”
A flush creeps up my cheeks. It’s perverse, this game. It’s wrong. “No.”
Cool air wafts over me as he pulls back. I hear the whistle of a belt, the rustle of clothing. Something hot prods my opening, and I know he’s about to have sex with me. He holds himself back, there at the entrance, making me clench around nothing.
His voice comes strained. “Elijah, I won’t leave again.”
My hands fist against my lower back, and I wriggle my ass, shameless and afraid. “I can’t say it, Elijah. I can’t. I can’t.”
A growl of frustration is the answer. He thrusts inside me in one smooth motion, and I cry out. He fucks me hard, almost too hard, and I squirm to get away. Of course I’m tied down and surrounded by him, thoroughly contained.
“So fucking pretty in gold and diamonds,” he grunts, matching each word to a thrust. “So fucking pretty in a room full of men and women who want to fuck you.”
“They didn’t—”
He changes the angle of his thrusts, finding a new place inside me, and my words become strangled. “They did. All of them wanted you. Only I have you. Say it.”
I shake my head as tears stream down my cheeks.
“Say it. Elijah, I won’t leave again.”
But I don’t say it.
When he comes with a roar, hands gripping my hips, that roar pervades every inch of the SUV. Hotness pulses into my sheath, and the knowledge that he’s coming inside me, unprotected, makes me squeeze down hard. I come in sharp, hard bursts, already grieving the coldness I’ll find when it’s over, the pain that comes without a promise.
The aftershocks still run through me when he unties my hands. I turn over and push myself onto the seat, feeling topsy-turvy. I rub my wrists. The diamonds left little indents in my skin, like a constellation for me to map.
He’s quiet as he cleans himself and rights his suit. He rummages through a cabinet and finds a crystal glass and a bottle of amber liquid. He pours a glass and takes a swallow.
He doesn’t offer me any. He just studies me through slitted green eyes.
“So,” he says on another swig. “You do plan to leave.”
It’s strange to have a conversation after he was inside me. Strange to see him so far away. The distance across the SUV could be from here to the moon. That’s how far away he feels right now. “My only plan right now is to pay off my sister’s debts and help her fight the addiction.”
CHAPTER SIX
London
My sister’s in the next car, probably getting great sex.
Meanwhile I’m stuck with a babysitter who has a stone-cold expression.
Liam North sits across from me in the back of the SUV, occasionally scanning the outside scenery as if we’re going through a war zone instead of the beautiful Italian countryside.
The only upside to this situation is that he definitely qualifies as eye candy. A hard body, broad shoulders, and those gorgeous green eyes. Yeah, he’s no hardship to look at.
Unfortunately, my mind is stuck remembering dark gray eyes, almost like silver in the shadows. I’m stuck remembering the feel of strong hands holding me while we danced. Adam Black. What a bastard. I should hate him. I do hate him.
“Are you sure my sister’s safe with your brother?” I ask.
Green eyes study me. He says nothing.
“It’s just that he seemed kinda pissed off. He won’t hurt her, will he?”
“No.”
“Are you sure about that?”
Nothing.
Addiction is not a desire or a pull. It’s a third person sitting in the cab of the SUV. It’s a physical presence, a shudder, a cold breeze where there shouldn’t be.
I turn a ring around my pinky finger, around and around. “The thing is, from what I understand, you haven’t known him that long. You only recently reconnected. So he might be the kind of guy to take his anger out on a woman.”
“He’s not.”
“Violence runs in families. Does yours have a history of that?”
He gives a short laugh. “You could say that.”
The dark shadow of addiction gives me a little wave, and I resolutely ignore it. “I know I’m being insistent, but it’s my sister we’re talking about here. I love her. She takes care of me. I wish I could take care of her, too.”
It’s hard to tell in the shadows but it’s possible his green eyes soften. “We’ll reach our destination in an hour and a half. You can ascertain her safety then.”
“Ascertain,” I say, drawing out the word. “Ascertain. It sounds so formal.”
“Determine. Verify.”
“Still formal. Are you always this uptight, or is it because you’re on a kidnapping mission?”
“We weren’t kidnapping you. We rescued you.”
“Oh, and I suppose if we had wanted to wander back into the party, have another glass of champagne, dance a little, that would have been just fine with Elijah.”
Nothing.
“For what it’s worth, I think you’re always this uptight.”
“We’re operating in a gray area,” he admits. “Private security frequently operates in a gray area. Stalkers we subdue to protect the client. A thief we escort into the police station.”
“Not this gray, though. This is like dark, dark gray.” Like Adam’s eyes. Like the hulking mass of shadows that represents every dark impulse that threatens to destroy me.
“Yes, but in the same way that you want to protect your sister, I want to protect my brother. Even if the danger is coming from himself and his infatuation with—”
I huff a laugh. “Infatuation? Is that what they’re calling it these days?”
“What would you call it?”
“Lust. He wants to fuck her.” I use the word deliberately, but of course an ex-military man doesn’t even flinch at the word. “And once he’s had his fill, he’ll leave.”
“Maybe.”
“Definitely.”
“What about you? Do you have an infatuation?”
“I’m in love.”
It’s startling to hear those words from a man so thoroughly masculine and hard lined. I would have expected him to spit nails and break a crowbar in half before ever admitting them. “Let me guess. Your high school sweetheart. You have two point five kids and a minivan.”