Torn from You (11 page)

I fought the desire, and I failed. He hadn’t
moved toward me, and I was uncertain why, considering Logan was
always the dominant one. I knew he’d never love me or care about me
like I’d once thought he had, but I wanted comfort. I craved it,
and if he gave it to me physically than I’d take it.

I trailed kisses up his chest to his neck,
and his fingers curled in my hair. He closed his eyes and groaned.
Slow and hesitant, I moved up and onto his body, instantly feeling
the heat of his skin sink into me. I’d only done this once and had
hoped he’d take the lead.

“Eme.” He tone was gentle, and a heated rush
of goose bumps sprinkled across my skin. “Jesus, what you do to
me.”

My mind was all fucked up as it fought
against the comfort I needed. I’d been beaten, threatened and
starved, witnessed horrific abuse and I lived each moment in
terror. I yearned for some kind of comfort—even if it was from the
monster who had lied to me about everything. I had tried so hard to
stop feeling anything for this man who shattered my heart and now
... now I wanted him to make love to me. It was sick. I was
sick.

I lowered my lips to his, and at first he
didn’t reciprocate as I kissed him, slipping my tongue inside his
mouth, and then ... then he broke, and his hands grabbed me on
either side of my head, and he kissed me back.

Logan.
He was my Logan.

I moaned as he rolled me over without our
lips disconnecting. I wrapped my legs around his waist, and he was
on his knees between mine.

“Oh God,” I whispered breathlessly.

He pulled back, and I grabbed for him, but
he’d become the one in control again, and he kissed his way down my
body until he was hovering over my pussy. I pulsated. I panted. I
needed him, and yet he stopped. He wasn’t moving.

“Please, Logan.”

“Tell me. Tell me what you want.”

“You.”

“You have me. What else?”

His mouth was inches away from me, and if I
arched upward I could ...

“Tell me,” he ordered.

“Kiss me.”

“Where?”

Oh God. Why was he making me do this? I was
so frustrated that I threw my arms back and gripped the headboard.
“My pussy. I want you to taste me, Logan.”

He didn’t hesitate any longer, and within
minutes I was writhing and screaming with uncontainable desire. He
did that to me. Everything in him right now was the man I knew and
loved. There was no fighting that fact.

Logan drove me to begging, and then I
crested and came hard, screaming his name. He slid up my body and
kissed me again with fierce possession.

We lay silent, him spooning me, and his
fingers drawing slow circles over my abdomen. It was sweet, and I
loved the feel of his hardened fingertips which I suspected came
from playing the guitar. I never thought for a second that I’d fall
into this man’s arms again, and I knew when the sun’s rays shone in
the morning I’d hate myself, but for right now I was going to take
what he’d given me—comfort.

After a while, when I couldn’t fall back
asleep, I asked, “What about your band? You ... I thought you were
going on tour.” It was a long shot that he’d tell me anything, but
I hoped we could talk like we used to. Maybe I could learn why he
was doing this. What had changed so drastically?

He kept drawing on me while he spoke. “We’ll
get there.”

“When you leave here?”

“Yeah, Emily.”

Okay, so that meant he didn’t plan on
staying forever. Or keeping me? Oh God, would he leave me here? Was
he going to sell me? My throat tightened as I said, “When?”

“We can’t be having this conversation.”

I had to talk to try to stop the panic from
taking control. I had to pretend, at least in the dark, that we
were somewhere else. That if he left, he’d take me with him. “How
did the band get together?”

Logan chuckled, and the sound made me jump
then stiffen, uncertain why he’d laugh. My panicked mind thought
maybe I’d pushed him with the questions and he was laughing because
now he was going to punish me. God, that sounded ridiculous. Logan
wouldn’t laugh if he was going to hurt me, he’d be angry.

I was losing it. I was fighting the fear of
him leaving me here or selling me and everything he did I was
second guessing, trying to decipher what it meant. But I couldn’t,
could I? Because I didn’t know who Logan was.

“From the moment I met you, you wouldn’t
give up. Why was I expecting any different even here?”

I took a deep breath when his voice was calm
and playful. We’d met the night of his fight, when I’d asked him to
teach me self-defense, he’d laughed; then after making fun of me he
told me a direct no. But I wasn’t taking no for an answer, and
Logan found that out pretty quick.

“I met Kite when I was sixteen.” My muscles
relaxed as he started talking. “My mother and I had just moved to
Toronto, and Kite and I went to the same school. We became instant
friends.” I felt him shrug. “Think it was his calm, take-no-shit
attitude. First time I saw him was in the lunch room where a couple
of guys purposely bumped him then pushed his tray out of his hands,
spilling his food onto the floor. Kite picked up his tray, threw
his ruined lunch in the garbage then strolled over to the guys who
were now sitting at the table laughing.

Kite never said a word as he grabbed one guy
and had him on the ground crying within seconds. The other guy took
off running. There wasn’t a flicker of fear or unease in Kite.

We started hanging out after that. He’d just
left a band he was playing with. I found out the two guys were his
old bandmates. Kite played drums, and we soon discovered I could
hold a tune.” Logan kissed my neck just below my ear, and I
shivered. “We hung out at the local coffee shop where I started
writing my own music. Georgie bought the place a couple years
later.”

“I didn’t realize you knew her.”

“She introduced me to Crisis and Ream. They
were friends with her brother.”

“Brother? She never told me she had a
brother.”

His finger stopped tracing for a second and
then started again. “Yeah. Georgie’s brother was in the JTF2—Joint
Task Force 2—with Deck. A counter terrorism unit. Deck came back
from their last mission, Georgie’s brother didn’t.”

“Oh. God.” I hadn’t known. Was that why Deck
was so protective of Georgie?

“Go back to sleep, Eme.”

“Logan?”

“Yes, Emily.”

“When can we leave?” I held my breath.
Afraid to ask the question, yet needing to know if he was taking me
with him when he left. I hoped. No, I prayed he’d tell me not to
worry. That he’d never leave me. That he’d never sell me. But the
truth was—I didn’t know.

I felt his muscles stiffen, and he drew in a
deep breath. Our moment was over. It changed within seconds, and I
wanted to cry and hit him then yell and scream. Instead I watched
him as he threw back the covers, got out of bed—still with a raging
hard on—then strode into the bathroom closing the door.

The tears slid down my cheeks and I buried
my face in the pillow as the sobs took hold. Logan was going to
sell me.

The day was lonely after Logan left. He’d
showered, dressed, then walked out without a single word to me. I
waited all day for him to come back, uncertainty playing with my
mind as I paced the length of the room. I ignored the food the girl
brought and saw her frown when she came back to get the tray and
the food remained untouched. In the afternoon the same thing
happened except this time the girl kept her eyes lowered.

By the end of the day, I was exhausted from
worrying if whether or not Logan was trying to find a buyer for me
today. I’d upset him, pushed him with my questions.

When the door finally opened it was dark
outside. I knelt in the corner of the room and held my breath until
I peeked up and saw that it was Logan and not Alfonzo coming to
drag me away. I wanted to throw myself into his arms with relief. I
wanted to cry and I wanted to kiss him and thank him.

God, I was crazy. There was something wrong
with me. I was so screwed up with my feeling toward Logan. One
moment afraid of him, the next wanting him, then terrified he was
going to sell me then having hope he’d get me out of here.

What did comfort me was that, if given the
chance, I’d leave. I’d leave Logan, and I’d get out. I’d never look
back. I may want him sexually or want the comfort of someone I’d
once loved, but that would end the second I escaped.

I even wondered if I would kill Logan to do
it. These thoughts are what happen when left alone for ten hours
with nothing to do. My mind went on an imagination highway
contemplating scenarios that may never be true.

But when I saw Logan walk in tonight the
pain in his expression was worse than yesterday, and I began to
wonder if the fight Raul had talked about was beginning to weigh
heavily on him. Did he think he might lose? I hadn’t considered
Logan losing. I’d been so worried about everything else that I
assumed he’d win, but he might not. What would Raul do if he lost?
I’d be sold, but what would he do to Logan? I suspected Raul didn’t
take failure too well from anyone. Was Logan concerned about what
would happen to him? But if Logan was worried about losing that
meant he wanted to keep me right?

“Come here.”

I got up and walked toward him.

He raised my head with the tip of his finger
under my chin. “You can’t do that again.”

A crackle of fear went through me. I hadn’t
done anything wrong. I’d been good.

His thumb stroked my lower lip back and
forth, and I didn’t even think he realized he was doing it because
... because he used to do that all the time to me. “Last night was
wrong.” His hand dropped, and he strode to the other side of the
room and stared out the window. His hands gripped the iron bars as
he stood silent and still.

I knew what I had to do and there was a
struggle within me whether I was doing it because I was trying to
help myself or because I wanted to comfort him. I quietly
approached him, stopping a few inches behind, and took a deep
breath then reached out and placed my hands on his waist. “Please.”
I didn’t know what I was saying please for; maybe to get him to
talk to me, to turn and look at me, to hold me, God, to tell me
that we were leaving.

“Let go.”

I was going to. I stiffened and was about
to, but he’d said those exact words to me the night I’d met him,
and I didn’t listen then. Yeah, stupid maybe, because this Logan
wasn’t the same one. But maybe he was? He had friends, a band,
there was a chance that the Logan I knew existed. Maybe I just had
to find him and bring him back to me.

I stepped in closer, kissed his shoulder
then trailed kisses down his spine.

“Emily. Don’t.”

But he let me. My hands started at his
shoulders then ran down his arms until they rested on top of his
hands that were gripping the bars so tight that his knuckles were
white. I peeled each finger away from the bars, until he let go,
his arms falling to his sides, my hands holding his.

“Are you scared of me?”

I was thrown off for a second by his
question; it seemed odd to ask me that now. I answered him
honestly. “Yes.”

His head dropped forward with a
half-nod.

“I want to ...” God, I wanted him so much it
hurt. It was ripping me apart having him next to me night after
night. No matter how wrong it may be, I still wanted him. Or maybe
it was I wanted to believe so badly that he was still the man I
loved that I would do anything. Was that weak? Was I falling prey
to what he wanted? Right now I didn’t care. Tonight I wasn’t going
to care about anything except Logan and me.

“Please, Logan.”

He turned. And any reservations I may have
had lingering were swept aside the moment I looked in his eyes and
recognized the warmth within them.

“Please. I need you.”

His hand swept into my hair, fingers curling
around the nape of my neck. “You’ve never needed me, Eme.” He was
wrong, but I didn’t argue because right now I wanted him to kiss
me, so I stood on my tip toes and kissed him first.

The moment the heat of our lips pressed
together I heard him moan. He swooped me up in his arms and carried
me to the bed then placed me on the rumpled sheets. He leaned over
me, both arms on either side of my head.

“You want this?”

I nodded.

“Tell me, Emily.”

“I want this. I want you.”

He stared at me for several seconds, and I
didn’t realize I was holding my breath until he finally spoke
again. “Then tonight, show me. Show me exactly what you want and
take it.”

I nodded again, although I was feeling
uncertain and nervous. My experience was, well, zilch, but Kat and
I had watched pornos numerous times, laughing at the ridiculous
positions and moaning, but still we’d learned a lot.