by Caisey Quinn
“Sure you want to play this game, cowgirl?”
Her eyes met his with a desperate yes in them.
The memories, dark demons with the fury of ten hells, tore at his flesh, teeth gnashing and clawing at his throat. His eyes closed involuntarily. He wanted to get high. Fuck this woman on his lap until she screamed for mercy. Then fuck her some more. Destroy the world around him. Burn it to the goddamn ground.
Until an angel kissed him, lightly on the throat. The demons backed down a fraction of an inch, a feat only narcotics had been able to accomplish in the past. She kissed him again. Her warm, wet mouth somehow soothed his tortured mind until he could give her what she wanted.
“Our mother was an addict.” He sucked in a breath as she dragged her mouth across his chest. “Like me, I guess. But she went at it harder. It was a lifestyle for her, not recreation.”
He kept his eyes closed as she nuzzled against his neck. He focused on the vanilla wildflower scent instead of the rotten egg and ammonia fumes from his childhood.
“Some of the...people she associated with weren’t exactly kid friendly if you know what I mean.”
He felt the flinch of her body against his. He hated inflicting this on her. No matter how good it felt to let some of it go.
“I was lucky. Most of them paid about as much attention to me as they might have an unwanted pet. I was a nuisance that got kicked on occasion and shoved into closets now and then.”
This time it was a sob, she was trying not to let it go, but he felt it. He swallowed hard and opened his eyes. Tears streamed down hers.
“Stella.”
“Keep going. I want to hear it, Van. I need to…know you. I want to understand.”
He nodded. “Val, my sister, wasn’t as lucky. She was beautiful, even as a kid. Sometimes she got locked in the closet with me.” He almost smiled at the memory. “She’d try to comfort me, make it a game. Pretend we were camping or some shit. Pull out a flashlight and make up stories.”
His fists clenched before he realized he still had her hips in his hands. Pain had her blinking rapidly, but she took it without complaint.
“Other times, she didn’t get put in the closet. She got…” Her cries for help swirled in his mind. The image of her body huddled in a corner flashed behind his eyes.
“I tried,” he choked out. “I tried to save her. I was young. And weak. I couldn’t. I fucking couldn’t.”
He tried to stand, to throw her off his lap so he could get out of there, get the fuck away from this place, and get high. He hoped Drake was still somewhere nearby. Then Stella’s mouth descended on his. She kissed him so hard he tasted blood. She was giving him everything she had and he took it, knowing he shouldn’t.
“It wasn’t your fault, Van. You were a kid yourself.” She licked his neck, kissing it tenderly before sucking hard enough to leave a mark.
He shook his head. She didn’t understand. No one really could. Unless they’d lived it. Listened to their sister get violated and beaten nearly to death while they were locked inside a closet and unable to help her. Watched her turn from a comforting angel to a frightened cornered creature incapable of withstanding human touch.
“Our mom overdosed when I was nine. We got taken away. I was put in a boys’ home. There was this Christian do-gooder couple that used to come play music for us. I learned how to play guitar and traveled with them some.”
“And Val?” Stella asked quietly.
“I couldn’t find her. She’d run away from the foster home she’d been put in. I searched. God I searched high and damn low.” He’d found Vanessa instead, a waitress who had worked with her. But that part of the story had pretty much been told already.
Stella ran her face along his. He almost smiled. With both of their emotions raw and so close to the surface, he could practically read her mind. She wanted to hold his face in her hands, but she couldn’t. He still had her tied. Just as his words were binding her, so were her red lace panties.
He remembered thinking that this place was hell when he’d first met her. That she’d been sent here to torture him. But now he knew better.
This was hell and he was the devil. She was the fallen angel he’d eventually destroy. He couldn’t even stop himself.
It was time for this to end. He switched off his emotions and summed up a story he never should’ve begun.
“I found her a few years later. I was too late though. She was dead. She’s the angel in my tattoo. Stand up, cowgirl.”
Her legs trembled atop his. He stood, letting her stumble backward. Her breasts bounced, reminding him what she’d come to him for. Certainly not to hear his fucking sob story.
“If you’re smart, you’ll run while you still can.” His warning was valid. He was losing his grip on humanity. On the line between morally acceptable and hideously reprehensible.
She remained rooted where she stood.
“Can’t say I didn’t warn you. Time to pay the price for that pound of flesh. Bend over the bed, cowgirl.”
She did as he’d said, and the view was enough to ground him momentarily. The heels presented her to him perfectly—her ass peach perfect and on display. Those delicate wrists bound in red sent his heart hammering pure adrenaline through his veins. He exhaled loudly.
“No safe word, remember? I’m invoking that rule now. It’s your fucking problem if you can’t walk out of here upright.”
“Take what you need, Van. I can handle it.”
Fucking hell.
He raked his fingers hard down her arms. “I get tested regularly since I haven’t typically been too discriminatory when it came to blowjobs. And I was tested again when I checked in. I’m clean.”
“Okay,” she whispered. “Me too.”
He chuckled lightly. He wouldn’t have thought for a second that the woman who probably only had the kind of sex that involved multiple contraceptives and the missionary position wasn’t clean.
“I’ll pull out though.”
“I’m on the pill.”
Bonus. “Well, then brace yourself, beautiful.”
Her stance widened slightly and he slid his heavy cock between her ass cheeks.
“What if I fucked you hard in the ass right now? How mad would you be? Scale of one to ten?”
She breathed loudly. “I’m supposed to be the one giving the survey, Mr. Ransom.”
He pressed against that tight opening and it flexed against him. She whimpered, and he moved north to her already wet opening.
“Fortunately for you, I don’t have the patience necessary to prepare you. But soon, cowgirl.”
His full length shoving inside of her pushed a sound from her throat. He needed that sound again and again. So he withdrew and plunged inside her clenching walls as hard as he was physically capable of until she was panting beneath him. She was so damn tight he struggled for breath right along with her.
Feeling himself reach the threshold of his orgasm, he pulled out and took a few deep breaths.
Suddenly she stood and turned to face him. Pissed-off green eyes met his amused ones.
“Help you with something, cowgirl?”
Her eyes narrowed. “Un-fucking-tie me.”
He shook his head. “I’m disappointed, Stella Jo. I thought we agreed. No stopping.”
“Oh, we’re not stopping. But if you’re going to hate-fuck me to death, you will damn well let me watch as you do it.”
He smirked. “As you wish.” He untied her wrists and watched her fight the urge to rub them. “Take the pain, Stella. It’s a feeling. Feel it. It will make the pleasure that much better.”
She propped herself against the foot of the bed and dropped her legs open slowly. “All this big talk of yours. I’m still waiting for the pain.”
Every curse and cry of joy he knew flitted across his mind.
“Get on the bed. All the way,” he growled. “Let’s see how far you can get those perfect fucking legs over your head.”
Van came to in a dark room.
He blinked until his eyes adjusted. He was alone in his bed. Panic seized his chest.
He’d told her. Shown her who he really was and what he was capable of. Pulled back his flesh and exposed the garish, gaping wounds in his soul.
Sitting up, he looked around, listening closely for any sign she might still be with him. There was only silence.
He swallowed the thickening knot forming in his throat. He’d fucked her more ways than should’ve been humanly possible. He was pretty sure he’d blacked out during. Exhausted himself right into a loss of consciousness. She was probably never going to even look at him again other than with disgust.
Stretching sore muscles, he stood and switched on the bedroom lamp.
Bright red lipstick decorated his vanity mirror. He moved closer to read what she’d written.
I walked out of here just fine. Guess you’ll have to try harder next time.
Something foreign swelled in his chest.
Next time couldn’t come soon enough.
Stella sat in a hot bath, the heat simultaneously stinging and soothing her ravished skin. The pain was strangely satisfying. The burning ache she felt between her legs as well as on her wrists, ankles, and back was like nothing she’d ever experienced.
She’d lost her virginity to Nash. It had been quick and mostly painless. Maybe some discomfort, like a gynecological exam, but that’d been about it. She’d stared at herself in a mirror afterward, expecting to feel different. To feel something. Anything.
But nothing had changed. She hadn’t changed. She’d felt defective. It was such a monumental event—so she’d been told.
This experience had been totally different. Her shoulders seemed to remain taut, as if her spine had been tightened and screwed into place. Even her teeth-mark-marred breasts were proudly thrusting themselves forward.
She was changed all right. Finger-shaped bruises dotted her upper arms and lower back. Passion marks colored her neck and inner thighs. Merely glimpsing the bite marks on her hips turned her on so hard a breeze could’ve blown between her legs and sent her into the relentless spiral of a heaving orgasm.
She had been fucked. Possibly for the first time in her life. It felt like being switched on. From autopilot to manual.
She groaned as she stood in the tub and reached for a towel. Van Ransom had marked and claimed her. He owned her—mind, body, and soul.
And even more importantly, at some point while he’d been pounding the hell out of her, tearing orgasm after orgasm from her core, she’d been permanently altered. She’d been what he needed, been strong enough to give him everything. His gratitude had come in the form of whispered confessions and professions as he roared to a release and came inside her.
You’re so fucking perfect, he’d said more times than she could count. Stay with me, baby. Please. I need you. God, you’re so damn perfect.
She wasn’t. She knew that. But maybe she could be perfect for him. Be what he needed, because he was exactly what she needed. His words had given her renewed strength each time, strength to climb atop him and take even more. But they’d taken something too.
The fear. The fear of getting hurt, of failing, of disappointing. It was all…gone.
Which meant she had a horse to see. And sooner than later, she’d have to go home and face the people she’d spent her entire adult life avoiding. She’d gotten her answers from Van, now she needed them from someone else.
Van made his way to the barn. For the past week, they’d stolen every free moment they could. His place, her place, her office, the stables.
The only place he hadn’t had her was his apartment in LA and he was planning to correct that in three weeks when he checked the hell out of this place—an event he was both anticipating and dreading.
He was still picturing the many places in his apartment he could tie her to when he started to walk past her door. She bounded out of it as if she’d been watching for him at the window.
“Come on. I want to show you something.” Her eyes were bright and her entire body seemed to be humming with energy. As if she were made of electricity and someone had thrown the switch. Normally, he’d credit himself for her excitement. But he couldn’t think of anything he’d done lately that would have her so worked up.
“Hm, I think you’ve shown me pretty much everything.”
Rolling her eyes and grabbing his hand and threading her fingers with his, she led him to the barn. Which was how he knew she’d lost it completely. They couldn’t just walk around holding hands. He’d never realized how badly he wanted to hold her hand until it had actually happened. When they reached Shadowdancer’s stall, she let go, leaving his hand empty without her small warm one in it.
She always did pick that damn horse over him.
“You were right. It’s time for me to get back on the horse—literally. We did this for the first time today.”
He had no clue what she meant until she began securing a series of buckles and straps to the black horse. He was happy for her, glad that she was taking his advice. But Christ, he wished it didn’t have to be that particular horse. He wished she could’ve been drawn to the grandmotherly one, the slow-mover they called Mother Maybelle.
But she had a type all right. Difficult, moody assholes that weren’t worthy of her.
Her eyes stayed on Shadowdancer as she mounted him.
“Lucky bastard,” Van mumbled under his breath.
He stared at the horse, unsure where to look for any signs that he was going to get pissed off and throw her. He wished the fucker was human so he could threaten him with a painful death should he do anything to hurt her.
Stella wrapped something in her hand and tapped a handle on the saddle. Her foot gently nudged the horse and they began trotting out of the barn.
Van wanted to follow, wanted to call out, “Okay, I get it. That’s enough,” and demand she get the hell down. But when the horse picked up speed and her hair flew behind her as if it had a life of its own, she grinned at him and he couldn’t move. Or breathe. Or think.
She looked alive. She had that blissed out look in her eyes that she normally only got after sex. Somehow this fucking horse made her just as happy as he did. And all it was doing was running in a circle.
He hadn’t made his mind up about Shadowdancer, but anything that made her this happy he’d just have to deal with.
“Yeehaw, cowgirl,” he called out to her, laughing when she pretended to lasso him and reel him in.
“You have got to be kidding me,” Jesse Ramirez said from behind him.
Van turned and nodded at the man. Guy seemed okay. Minus the fact that he wore jeans that choked the shit out of his nuts. But hey, to each their own, he figured.
“She’s been dying to ride that damn horse,” Van told him as they shook hands. “Guess she finally broke the poor bastard.”
“Looks like it,” Jesse said side-eyeing him slowly before turning his attention to her. “She must’ve been persistent. Shadowdancer hasn’t had a rider in over a year. Not since the incident.”
The hairs on the back of Van’s neck stood at attention. “The incident? What incident?”
Jesse turned to him, his dark eyes taking in more than Van was comfortable with. He knew his concern for her was over the top and it was showing. It was going to show a whole hell of a lot more when he grabbed the guy and shook him until he told him what he was talking about.
When the man finally spoke, it was a lot slower than Van’s patience could handle.
“He was a racer. A good one. Some might say the best. He broke a shit-ton of records. Was all set to win the Triple Crown.”
Van clenched his fists at his sides. So far nothing too upsetting. But it was coming. He could feel it.
“Then some trainer got a little too aggressive. They were doing practice laps. Shadowdancer threw his rider and stepped on her. Trampled her by accident. Broke a rib, rib punctured a lung. She didn’t make it.”
No. It was the only word in Van’s head as
he pictured the black horse, who’d suddenly developed some demonic qualities before his very eyes, trampling Stella to death. He could see her lying there, lifeless and blue. Just like Val had been.
“He would’ve been put down,” Jesse continued, clearly unaware that Van was two seconds from a full-blown panic attack. “But one of the new investors bought him. Can’t say I’m thrilled to see her on him.”
No. Fuck no. He’d wrestle that horse to the damn ground with his bare hands if he had to. Put the fucker down himself if he hurt her.
“Stella,” he yelled out, getting her attention. “Okay, cowgirl, that’s enough for tonight.”
Jesse started towards him. “Mr. Walker, it might not be the best idea to—”
“What?” Stella called out to them from across the pasture.
It was then that Van took off in her direction. The horse stomped. Lifted his back leg and stomped. Surely that was a bad sign.
He was a mere few feet away when the horse huffed out a loud breath and shook its head.
Back up, motherfucker.
The message was so clear, Van practically heard him. He put his hands out to show that he didn’t mean any harm.
“Stella, I’d feel a lot better if you just got down now.”
He didn’t have time to check if she’d heard him. Shadowdancer backed up and stamped his hoof again. And then Van’s nightmare came to life right before his eyes. The giant beast reared back and flung Stella off like a fly.
She hit the ground with a grunt and a thud. Jesse Ramirez ran to her, kneeled down at her side. But Van froze. The scene before him blurred. When he blinked, he was standing on a windy riverbank.
Mr. Ransom, can you follow us to the morgue?
The morgue.
We need you to identify the body.
The body.
Val’s laughter, her smile, her eyes, the tiny hands that had held his, the arms that had hugged him—the only affection he’d known growing up—was reduced to a body. A body in the morgue.
And now, the woman he’d fallen in forbidden love with was lying lifeless on the ground before him.