Seize me From Darkness (Pierced Hearts Book 4) (13 page)

Her gasp and screech were low volume. She froze. “Go
away
, Pieter.”

I reached past her and turned the metal dial. The water slowed and stopped. The last clear stream trickled and died.
I was so close I could see the fine hairs on her arm. The little silver angel, on the bracelet she never seemed to remove, swung in an arc from her wrist.

“Your hair
’s stuck across where I need to see. This won’t take long.”

“Fuck. Off.” The trembling started and damn if that didn’t make my hard-on harder.

“No. Ten seconds. Tops.”

Getting there. Doing this.
I counted downward from one hundred to stay focused. Naked woman, yes. Not mine. No.

I smoothed m
y fingers under her hair, shifting it aside, and just as I cleared the spot where the line of red swelled up, pursing her skin into an angry ridge, she tried to bolt.

I slammed my palm onto her, flattening her to the wall.

“Stay, girl. Fucking stay there!” My voice had roared into boss mode.

“
Sorry.”

God.
That hitch in her voice. That spoke to my balls.

I pressed
on her harder and squatted. With my free hand, I gently cleared away the last strands of her hair. My cock was making me uncomfortable with its need to get into her, between these legs. Even while I concentrated on her back, I was feeling myself sinking into her wet pussy.

There were memories that you remembered and
memories that held you hostage and threw you back into the moment, headfirst, cock first, scent, feel, and the slip of her cum on your fingers as you thrust them inside her.

I cleared my throat.

The welt was a little red and puffy but nothing atrocious.

“This need
s keeping an eye on.”

Then I looked lower, saw the
lips of her cunt. I’d been in there. I’d beat this ass, made these bruises. “You’re going to let me check you every day, from now on.”

Her swallow was audible.
Her reply was as quiet as a drift of breeze. “I don’t think –”

“Understand me?”

She didn’t answer.

Water dribbled down the outside of her thighs. I’d strapped apart these legs. Been in this pussy. Made her scream. My mind was blown. I knew I’d never stop, not now. Need arrived, blasting in, blowing apart rational, civilized me.

Keeping that one hand on her back, holding her in place, I let my fingers glide down until they reached the top of a bruise a few inches below where her butt swelled outward. I wasn’t using much force and she was staying still. Did she like it or did I scare the hell out of her?

Whatever.

Such temptation was never meant for any man to resist.

“Understand?”

“Yes.” Feather quiet.

I looked up the length of her back. Her forehead was
resting on the wall.

Then I leaned in
, wrapped my hand around her thigh, and I bit right over that bruise.

Her gasp turned into a high-pitched “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” before I let go.

While keeping careful contact with her skin with my hand, I climbed to my feet, marveling at the slopes of her warm body. Her submissiveness was intoxicating. She shuddered under my fingers and I detected the smallest nudge outward of her very female bottom. That signal, I could pick up from a hundred yards away.

I was sure
lack of protest didn’t hide unwillingness.

From no to yes in under thirty seconds.

“What are you keeping from me? Hmm?” I played with a wisp of hair at the side of her neck and began winding those few strands on one finger, around and around.

“Nothing. I want you to go away.”
As before, her words were so quiet, it seemed she barely wanted them heard.

“Do you?” My h
old grew firmer as I gathered more hair. I tightened my grip until she had to bend back her neck. “I see a beautiful pair of eyes.”

Jazmine blinked at me an
d,
fok
, she whimpered and parted her lips, sucked in a long breath – like she was about to run out of oxygen. Her eyelids lowered. Red rag to a bull.

If she wasn’t turned on, I was a purple alien from Mars.
I desperately wanted to push this. To see the truth beneath her wildly different body language.

I might not have played the dominant card with
Elenor but with this one it came with the package. I tugged once on her hair. “You’re going to turn around when I tell you to and stand there. Now.”

I let go. My heart pounded away as
if it too waited anxiously to see where this would go. If she ducked under my arm and ran...

“...
turn around when I tell you to and stand there. Now.”

That command had me paralyzed. I was torn
. I needed to get away from Pieter and I
craved
staying. I wanted him to make me do...things.

It was the stupidest desire ever.

Where he’d planted his palm on my back and where he’d bitten seemed hot as brands, reminding me of how easily he could handle me.

That was such a turn-
on, but wasn’t
me
. I was smart, independent. If a previous boyfriend had tried this, I’d have laughed, I’d have kicked their balls up into their teeth. Not that they would’ve dared try. Pieter...was different.

When he’d let my hair go, I’d bowed my head again.
Now I was stuck here in limbo, knowing he wanted me to turn and face him and knowing if I did, it would be a huge mistake. Every other time, I’d been tied up. I had excuses. It had been forced.

I couldn’t
just obey him. Male dominance was ridiculous.

“If you don’t move by the count of three, I’m going to turn you over my knee on that bed and spank you.
”

“Pieter...” I stalled, feeling like I was being strangled
.

The worst part – I knew he’d do this and like it. That was
so hot.

“Three.”

I raised my head, teeth clamped on my bottom lip. Even thinking about deciding what to do was scrambling my brain.

Fuck.

And he’d be seeing my indecision. Probably thought it amusing.

“Two.”

Crap.
Spanked? He could do that if he wanted to even if I fought. I swung and found myself confronted by this huge man, who occupied more space then he should be allowed to. Air, I needed air.

My throat worked.
I needed to tell him I wanted him out of my face. “I...”

“What?”

He whacked his hands onto the wall either side of my head then looked down at me. “Hmm?”

For a few seconds, his gaze moved
lower, to my breasts. With his body so up close, my brain wasn’t functioning. I was supposed to answer –

“Forgotten
what you were going to say?” His mouth curved up, barely.

It was fearsome what I saw promised in that tiny gesture.
Was that supposed to be a smile or was he about to pounce?

I
blinked, not sure if I was breathing. I was the utter focus of his attention.

What he’d done in the
other room was him. He liked hurting me, liked fucking me and tying me up. That knowledge riveted me to this wall. There was
fear
and there was fear.

He could hurt me, badly, if he wanted to. I didn’
t think he would, but he could.

A little bit of fear was a
whole lot of thrill.

A
s he shifted infinitesimally nearer, I squirmed up the wall, trying to merge with the white tiles. A quarter inch, an inch? His body heat and his scent was a living force. This was the man who’d napalmed my ass. Any closer and I’d be lost.

“You didn’
t run.”

I glanced to the side
. “I um...”
Run?
Good idea.

W
ith his whole hand, he gripped my jaw, as if he wanted to be sure I stayed put, then he dragged me back to the middle. Past a few dangling locks of hair lurked his clear brown eyes.

“Hello, there.”
That bear-growly voice of his should be illegal. “Place your
fucking
palms on the wall and keep them there until I say not to. Do you need more incentive?”

I’d flinched at the
fucking
.
Wimp.

He pinched one of my nipples between finger and thumb and squeezed.

Gasping, and in increasing pain, I slumped as far as I could go with my nipple his hostage. That I’d become even wetter horrified me.

The pain
dazzled. Like the cut of a scythe, it separated me from everything else that had happened before, from all the terrible things that might happen. All that mattered was him, concentrated. Distilled male.

Still
unsure why, and what the hell I was doing, I crept my hands onto the wall. I felt the dips between the smooth square tiles. Water dribbled down my skin. His hand stayed on my jaw as did his crushing hold on my breast. And I loved it.

All those games we’d played meant nothing when he was like this. I saw him for what he truly was. I was dealing with the devil.

“Correct response. But slow. You will be punished for that.”

D
esire rippled into me, and I shivered for a full second. Visibly shivered. His threat had done that. Since when had I been into pain?

“You like that?” His eyebrow arched. “
You like the threat of pain?”

“No.”
My denial was automatic, but I couldn’t stop the tiny swallow that followed. He’d figured me out before I did.

His thumb swept across to my mouth then he curled out my lip as if
checking the teeth of a bought creature.

Awareness
blossomed in his eyes, a smug satisfaction that half made me want to wipe it away. But the other half of me wanted to do anything he asked.

“Liar,
” he murmured, stretching out my nipple, eliciting another gasp. “Pretty liars get hurt anyway. Say thank you.”

M
y eyes widened. Then he shifted his hand, hooked two fingers into my mouth, and leaned that elbow on the wall behind my head. “Say thank you.”

I wriggled in his grip.

“Say thank you.”

“No, no –”

His fingers hooked deeper in, brushing my tongue. I was crushed, desire annihilating thought. My
thank you
tumbled out. Tears leaked and dribbled down my cheeks. This was insane.

He pulled his hand
from my mouth and held my throat to the wall while he shoved his other hand between my legs, fingers curving along in my moisture and making me part my legs. Then he lifted me an inch or so. My back slid on tile, rekindling pain. I was pinned there, throat and pussy. A needy moan escaped my lips.

I wanted
this, I did, but I was afraid. Who would stop him, this monster of a man, if he went too far? He could burn me down to the ground if he so chose. Want and sensible were at war.

“We can’t have sex.
” I managed to gasp out, my throat moving against his hand. We couldn’t because of Gregor. What a time to remember where we were. I did what was becoming a habit, I blanked it out.

“I
can think of a hundred thousand other things I could do with you. All of them dirty. I own you, Miss Jazmine. Starting with this.”

Own.
The word stunned me. His predatory smile widened.

Then he kissed me.

I’d never been kissed before while someone held me down. This,
this
was what I’d been missing. Overwhelming mind-shaking passion. A desire so strong that it made someone want to hold you still while they used your mouth, abused your mouth, and ravaged you with teeth, tongue, and fingers.