Savage Hearts (27 page)

And when she opened her eyes, this gorgeous man who she could never allow herself to fall for was looking at her like what she was feeling was the most important thing in the world to him.

It was too hard.

“Stop being so fucking sweet!” she shouted.

Soren’s eyes flashed. His hands circled her wrists, his body turned, pivoted, and he pinned her against the wall, her hands above her head, her legs pushed apart by one of his.

“Ok,” he said.

That
voice
.

Cate tried to catch her breath. This. This she understood. This was better than falling, than worrying, than feeling lost. This was losing herself
in
something.

She would follow him anywhere.

“Do it,” she whispered.

Cate gasped as Soren ripped her dress apart in one vicious movement, leaving it in long elegant tatters falling from her waist. His grip tightened on her wrists as he looked at her breasts, watching the pink nipples tighten under his eyes. She couldn’t hide how aroused she was if she tried.

If she wanted to.

Soren grabbed her face and tilted it up so he could cover her with a rough, ravishing kiss, his body pressing into hers in a way that made her moan into his mouth while he savaged hers. When he pulled away, it was clear it was because he wanted to see her. Wanted to watch her.

He grabbed one breast, then the other. Not gently. He squeezed, and pulled, and pinched, and he did it all while looking her in the eye while she felt herself pushed closer and closer to the edge.

Jesus, he never looked away.

He pinched her again and Cate squealed, surprised as much as anything. She’d never felt like she could come from just having h kjusfoner nipples pinched, but this man…

“I’m close,” she said. “Oh God, I’m—”

And
he ripped his hand away
,
his eyes hard and determined
. She whimpered, almost begging, as he dragged his hand down her bare stomach until he got to the ruined remnants of her dress.

Soren snarled in surprise and looked down. And then he tore the dress away completely.

Cate writhed against the wall. He wasn’t even touching her, just looking at her, naked, and she—

He picked her up. Not over the shoulder as he had done before; he just wrapped an arm around her waist and lifted, pinning her to his hip. She tried to turn, twist, be less awkward; he ignored her.

He wasn’t going far anyway.

The kitchen. He stalked over the brushed steel kitchen island and set her down on her heels, spinning her around until she faced the island. One hand on her hip, the other on her neck, he bent her down until her breasts pressed into the cold, cold surface, her cheek flat on the steel, her mouth open as he spread her farther apart and ripped at his jeans.

She didn’t move while she waited. It felt like an eternity, her own wetness dripping down her leg, Soren’s hand heavy on the back of her neck.

He slapped her once on the ass, hard, spread her with his thumb, and then he drove into her.

Cate cried out.

“You don’t come until I say,” he growled in her ear. “You’re mine. You come when
I
say, you understand?”

Oh God, she didn’t know if she could do it.

He filled her with long, hard strokes, leaning back while he kept her down with his hand on her neck, taking what he wanted. Just the idea was enough to bring Cate close to the edge, and now, now it was happening, he was fucking her like he owned her all over again, and she wasn’t going to make it.

She wasn’t.

She’d never held on so tightly to an impending orgasm in her entire life.

And then, when Soren pulled out only long enough to turn her around, pick her up, and lay her down on the table, her legs up in the air, her ass in his hands, she let it go.

He plunged into her just once, the head of his massive cock striking her G-spot at the perfect angle, and Cate couldn’t stop it.

She came.

She came screaming, her arms flailing hopelessly for something to grab on to on that stupid table, her back arching,
her
hips pumping.

And Soren just smiled. He stopped moving, and he smiled, and when Cate got a look at him, she shivered.

This was exactly what she’d needed. She felt like she was in the middle of a storm, this confusing, emotionally violent storm, and the look Soren was giving her, that animal, dominating, topspace look, told her she’d just entered the center of it. She felt calm. She felt right.

Soren pulled out of her, his eyes shining. He set her down in front of him, his huge erection still unsatisfied.

“Upstairs,” he said, his voice low. “Now.”

Silently Cate obeyed.

She walked naked through his house, up the stairs, to his bedroom. There she followed Soren to the bed, watched him sit. Watched him wait.

“Over my knees,” he said. “Ass in the air.”

It was the voice. She didn’t hesitate, not even when it was awkward, when she almost lost her balance. He grabbed her, readjusted her as he saw fit, like she was weightless.

He held her down, his forearm across her back, her ass high,
her
feet off the ground.

And then he struck her.

Cate didn’t really know what to compare it to. There wasn’t anything, in the end, no reference point for the sting that spread across her flesh and turned to pleasure. She didn’t know how to understand it, and each blow drained away more and more of what was left of her mental capacity, until all she was left with was this dizzying, delirious symphony of pain that turned into pleasure and back again.

She was past being upset or afraid, past feeling like a victim or broken or anything at all. There was nothing in the universe beyond what Soren was doing to her, and she let herself float blissfully, freely away.

And when she was free, he rolled her over onto the bed, spread her legs, and entered her without preamble, fucking her with desperation, with need, with determination. He moved inside her like it was the last thing he would ever do, mercilessly, biting her when she scratched down his back, leaving his mark.

When he shouted for her to come, she did, until she had nothing left.

Soren knew something was wrong before he was even awake. It was the wrongness that jolted him awake, the knowledge that something was not, definitely not, as it should be.

Cate was gone.

He didn’t even need to look to know she wasn’t anywhere in the house. He could feel it. Still, he did a search j n win>-1">
ust to make sure. He found Desi in the living room, happily gnawing on a rawhide bone, which meant that Cate had let the dog in and probably played with him for a while before leaving so abruptly.

Yeah, that made sense.

Of course it did, kind of. In that crazy, damaged way, it wasn’t totally out of line. The previous night had been what Cate liked to call “beyond,” and it had been about more than the sex, even if neither of them had said it. She would have turned tail and run away if he’d made her say it, though she would have said it.

They’d gotten close, last night. Closer than Soren had been to anyone in a long time. And now he had to be very, very careful.

Cate’s skittishness both saddened him and calmed him, in a twisted way.
If she was that far away from falling for him, so much the better.
But she needed to know that she could let him in—let people in—let him see her, all of her, faults and weirdness and everything, and it would be ok. She’d started to do that, last night. He wanted her to finish.

And he knew just how to do that.

He got out his phone. No new calls. Imagine that.

He texted her.

“Give me your address.”

And then he waited.

Ten minutes and nothing.
He knew her, though. She was never without her phone. She never missed anything. She’d seen it.

“That was an order.”

Still nothing. Soren sighed, made
himself
some cereal. She was freaked out, having shown him that much of
herself
, having opened up even a little bit. He couldn’t let it go or she might retreat even more, decide she couldn’t bear it when she was right on the edge of something. All he wanted to do was show her that there was nothing to be afraid of, that the parts of herself she kept hidden were fucking beautiful, that she was not even close to broken. And
then
if she wanted to tell him to fuck off, well, he’d have to take it.

He waited a little longer. And then:

“Cate. Trust me.”

So when his phone rang, he wasn’t surprised. He was, how s. H>

“Where are you?” Soren said.

“What?” Declan’s voice came through. “I’m at home. Don’t worry about that, though. Worry about what that asshole lawyer
Cheedham
is saying about you.”

“What are you talking about, Dec?”

“Have you been online? Molly says it’ll be in the papers tomorrow, on the networks tonight.”

“Dude, I don’t have time for this,” Soren said. “Just tell me already so I can deal with it.”

There was a pause. If even Declan didn’t want to give it to him straight, that was not a good sign.

“The newest piece of bullshit is that you plied your women with drugs,” Declan said. “That consent wasn’t…”

“I fucking know what it means,” Soren said softly.

He should have known this was coming. He did know. He knew, deep down, that Sonya would screw him, that she’d sell whatever story brought her the most money, no matter how untrue it was. No matter how much it hurt him or anyone else. No matter how much she knew he wasn’t willing to tell the truth to defend himself.

“You’ve
gotta
deal with this, bro,” Declan said.

Soren looked down at his phone. There was a text notification in the corner—Cate.

“Later,” Soren said. “I have something more important going on.”

“You
what
?” Declan said just as Soren hung up.

The text was what he’d known it would be.

An address.

~ * ~ * ~

Cate sent the text, and then waited for the freak-out to arrive shortly thereafter.

Right on time.

She’d woken up anxious, like her mind had just been waiting for its chance to yell at her while her body got what it wanted. Her eyes flew open, saw Soren’s naked body next to hers, remembered everything about the previous night, and thought,
Oh holy shit, this is real.