“He's not my brother,” I shot back at him, and to my surprise, for the first time I really meant it. When I thought of Richard, when I saw his face in my mind, I no longer automatically labeled him family. “He's not my brother,” I said again, still trying the concept out. I tried to think when I had finally let go of the old taboo in my mind and couldn't put my finger on it. Maybe it was because my physical need for Richard was so strong, or maybe the new bond between us had broken the old one. Maybe my emotions of love and lust were stronger than a tie seventeen years in the past. Or maybe it had finally just sunken in. “Richard is not my brother.” I said it a third time, and Charles looked impatient.
“Yes, you've said that,” he pointed out, his voice cold. “But that wasn't the song you were singing a month ago when he first wandered back into your life.”
“I…I know,” I said, scrambling for an explanation. “But I don't feel that way about him anymore. I just…I don't.”
“Well, it was a short step from affection between siblings to screwing, wasn't it?” he sneered. “Have you been fucking him all along? Laughing at me behind my back?”
“No,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady and my chin up. After all, I felt I deserved every bit of what he dished out. “It's been a gradual thing. I swear I never meant to hurt you, Charles. If…if you want to call the wedding off, I'll understand completely.”
“Call it off?” He ran a hand through his hair, mussing the carefully combed strands. “Not bloody likely. There are five hundred guests out there waiting to see us wed, and two of them are U.S. Senators. Not to mention all the clients from my firm and my mother's society friends. No, we're getting married today if it kills us—I'd be ruined socially if we didn't.”
I felt my heart sink. “Then…then you still want me? Even after what I did?”
“I want what I waited for,” he snarled. “What I paid for.” He grabbed my left hand and held it up, gesturing at the huge, antique diamond engagement ring I'd somehow remembered to slip back onto my finger before I left for the church.
“What you paid for?” I stared at him in disbelief. “What do you think this is—some kind of financial merger?”
“Oh, there's going to be a merger, all right.” His laughter was low and ugly. “A merger between you and me tonight. I was all prepared to be careful with you, dearest, to break you in gently on your first time. But since that happy little occasion came and went without my participation, I think we can dispense with the gentleness, don't you? In fact I think a little rough riding might be the order of the day.”
“I don't know what you're talking about,” I said, but I had a cold feeling in the pit of my stomach that I did. Charles was talking about rape, and despite my rough initiation to sex at the hands of Richard's beast the night before, my mind rebelled against it. The thought of Charles touching me, taking me the way Richard had, turned my stomach. In fact, just the feel of his hand encircling my wrist made me feel sick and weak, as though I'd been breathing some kind of poison gas.
“I think you do know.” Charles wore a hard, angry grin. “I think you know exactly what I have planned for you tonight, darling.”
“I can't do this,” I said. “I don't know why I thought I could.” I twisted the diamond ring off my finger and held it out to him. “Here, take it and let me go, Charles. I'll get out of your life, and you'll never have to see me again.”
“Haven't you been listening to me?” His grip on my wrist tightened painfully. “I said we're going through with this wedding, even if it is a sham. I've waited two years to have you, and I won't wait a second more.”
I stared at him in disbelief. “You're crazy,” I said. “You can't make me marry you. And if you think you can get me up to the altar and I'll say 'I do' because I'm too embarrassed to make a scene, you're dead wrong. I don't care if there are five thousand people sitting out and half of them are senators; I'm not marrying you, Charles. Now, let me go!”
“Not until I get what I paid for!” he snarled. And then he pushed me hard against the flowery wallpaper that decorated the antechamber's wall.
The breath rushed out of my lungs, and I was momentarily stunned at his sudden actions. The only time Charles had ever acted remotely like this was when he had grabbed my arm in the police station the night I insisted on taking Richard home with me. I had never dreamed he had such violence in him—or such malice.
The feeling of him fumbling to get under the voluminous white tulle skirt of my dress broke through my disbelief. Apparently, Charles had decided not to wait for the wedding night, since there wasn't going to be one, and he wanted what he considered his due now. I felt bad about cheating on him, bad about jilting him at the altar in front of his family, clients, and friends. But not nearly bad enough to let him rape me.
“Stop it! Stop!” I demanded, pushing at his hands and kicking at his legs. But Charles was like a man possessed. He wanted me, and he was intent on having me. This was so much different than the night before, I thought disjointedly as I struggled with my fiancé turned would-be rapist. So entirely different, and it wasn't just because Charles was behaving more like a beast than Richard ever had.
The night before I had feared Richard in his beast form, but I had wanted him as well. Or rather, my body had wanted his. I had been wet and ready to accept him, my nipples tight peaks of need and my sex flooded with my own desire. I had none of those feelings now. Now I was just frightened and revolted. And weak…so very weak. Just being near him seemed to make me ill.
“Charles, no!” I gasped as he got his hand up my skirt and ripped away the crotch of my sheer white nylons, leaving me defenseless. “Get away—get back!” I threw the heavy diamond ring at him hard since it was the only weapon I had. It hit him on the cheek and left a bloody scratch, but that only seemed to make him angrier.
“Hold still, dearest,” he snapped, working to get my legs apart. “It will all be over in a moment. Just lean back, relax, and enjoy yourself. Or don't—I don't give a damn either way.”
I beat at him weakly, feeling like I was moving under water. I felt sick—literally sick to my stomach. I wondered distantly if throwing up on his head would stop Charles in his mad assault and doubted it. He was enraged—a man who'd been cheated of his rightful property. Because that was all I was to him, I now realized, just property. A pretty piece of arm candy to show off during the wedding of the decade to all his clients and society buddies. I just wished I had seen it sooner. And even more, I wished I had the strength to push him off me. But I felt so weak, so terribly weak…
“Get off her. She's mine!” The sudden roar in the tiny room was so loud I thought it would make my ears bleed. With immense relief, I saw Richard storm through the door, his green eyes glowing possessively. But Charles was so intent on having me that he didn't even look around. He had the fly of the elegant tux trousers open now, and his short stubby cock stuck out, proving that he meant business. Despite my efforts to push him away, he still fumbled between us to make a connection. Only my huge skirt had saved me so far, but I had the feeling he was crazy enough to just rip it off in order to get to the prize.
Richard didn't give him a second warning. Instead, he grabbed Charles by the scruff of the neck, as though my fiancé were a small kitten, and heaved him across the room. I heard a hollow thumping sound as Charles's head hit the wall and he landed in a heap in the corner. He scrambled to his feet indignantly, clutching his head with one hand.
“How…how dare you?” he spluttered, pointing at Richard. “This is my wedding and that's my fiancée.”
“Not anymore.” Richard's voice was a low, menacing growl. “She's my mate now. You ever come near her again, and I'll kill you.” He looked at me. “Are you okay? He didn't hurt you, did he, Rache?”
I swallowed hard. “I…I'm fine. Just a little sick to my stomach.”
“Well, well, and supposedly he only just fucked you last night. Having morning sickness already, dearest?” Charles hissed.
“That's enough.” Richard took a step toward Charles, and at first I thought my fiancé, or should I say ex-fiancé, would stand up to him, which would have been a very stupid move. Instead, he straightened his tie and cleared his throat.
“Well,” he muttered and ran a hand through his hair to try and restore it to its former state of perfection. He reminded me of a cat that has been surprised into being clumsy and is grooming itself to hide its embarrassment.
“I'm leaving, Charles,” I said, smoothing my dress down with shaking hands. “I'm sorry it had to end this way.”
“Go on, then. Go.” He stood up straighter and gave me a superior look, as though dismissing me like a grubby child who's been caught where she doesn't belong. As though he hadn't just been trying to rape me.
“Tell your mother I'm sorry she went to all this trouble for nothing,” I said. I was through apologizing to him, but I did feel bad that his mother had planned, not to mention paid for, the entire wedding for nothing.
“I'll tell her she was right about you all along,” Charles snarled, looking down his aquiline nose at me. “She always said you were trash, now I can see she was right. But first I shall go inform my guests that there will be no wedding today—or any day for that matter. Not with you, Rachel. I hope you realize what you're missing because I'll never take you back.”
“I don't want you to,” I said quietly. “Don't worry, Charles, I'll be perfectly happy if I never see you again.”
He lifted his chin. “We'll see if you're still singing the same tune once you've had five or six months of living in incestuous squalor with that…that—”
Richard's menacing growl cut him off, and Charles shook his head and repeated, “We'll just see.” He stalked past us, giving Richard a very wide berth, and slammed the door of the antechamber behind him.
After a moment of silence, Richard turned to me. “Do you think we should have told him his dick was still hanging out of his fly before we let him go out in front of five hundred people to tell them the wedding is off?”
I burst into a fit of hysterical giggles. “Was it still? I didn't even notice.”
“He's swinging in the breeze,” Richard assured me, beginning to laugh, too. Then he came over and put a soothing hand on my shoulder. “Are you okay?”
At his touch on my skin the horrible weakness seemed to melt away, and the nausea that had been oppressing me passed at once. Wow, touching him was better than taking a Tums and chasing it down with a Red Bull.
I was still laughing at the idea of Charles stepping into the crowded chapel with his dick hanging out—what would the U.S. Senators think of that—and the crazy thought about Richard made me laugh even harder. I don't know when the laughter turned to tears, but suddenly, I was sobbing in his arms.
“Hey, it's all right, baby. It's all right.” He cradled me close, and I fit against him perfectly just the way I always had. “Come on.” Richard swung me up into his arms and kicked open the door.
“Where…where are we going?” I managed to ask, my head still buried in his shoulder.
“Home,” Richard told me. “To finish this once and for all.”
Chapter Twenty-three
Richard had taken a taxi to the church, so we went home in my car with him driving. I rolled down my window and let my hair blow in the breeze, taking gulps of fresh air to clear my head and dry the tears that streaked my cheeks.
We pulled up in front of the house, and I tried to get out of the car, only to find myself still dizzy and a little weak—probably more from the emotional scene I'd just been in than the lingering aftereffects of touching Charles. Richard saw how I was feeling and put a hand on my arm to stop me.
“Hold on,” he said. He came around to my side of the car and swung me up into his arms. Then, without a trace of irony, he carried me over the threshold and shut the door.
Once in the bedroom he helped me strip out of the confining, white tulle wedding dress and the ruined remains of my nylons and panties. It occurred to me that we were right back where we'd been a few hours before, but I was too worn out to care. I glanced in the mirror as Richard got me undressed and saw that I looked like a raccoon. All of Charles's mother's perfectly applied make-up seemed to have pooled around my eyes very unattractively.
“I'm a mess,” I said, pointing at my face. “I need to wash all this goop off me. Come to think of it, I want to wash Charles off me, too.”
“Not a problem.” Richard disappeared into the bathroom, and soon I heard running water and a cloud of steam began to float out the door. He came back in a minute, and this time he was naked. He scooped me up in his arms again and carried me into the bathroom.
Ignoring my weak protests, he stepped into the shower, still holding me, and got us both wet in the steaming spray. The hot water on my skin seemed to revive me, and I got him to let me down, insisting I could stand on my own. Richard held on to me, just in case, his large, strong hands planted firmly on my hips while I lathered my face with a washcloth and scrubbed off the make-up.
I wanted to wash my body, too, but Richard took the washcloth out of my hand.
“Let me,” he murmured, and for some reason, I did.
He added a big dollop of my favorite peach body wash to the cloth and began to wash me with long, slow strokes, looking in my eyes the entire time. I shivered at his intense gaze and the warm, sensual way he washed my body. Now that the water had revived me and we were in close proximity again, I could feel my body wanting his once more, and it was obvious he wanted me, too. I tried not to notice the water droplets beading on the muscular planes of his broad chest, running down his rippling abdominals and pointing the way to his erect shaft. I tried not to see it, but it wasn't easy when my eyes kept wanting to return to it again and again. My mind kept showing me quick glimpses of the night before in the cage and that morning when he had healed me with his tongue. It was an X-rated slide show that wouldn't stop. But as much as my body wanted him, my brain still wasn't sure. I knew I had better tell my body that in a hurry because in a minute it would be too late.
Richard had dropped the washcloth and started soaping me all over with his bare hands. He turned me so that my back was to his front and I leaned against his broad chest. I felt his hard cock digging into the back of my thigh and gasped as he cupped my full breasts in his hands and then plucked gently at my tight nipples, shooting sparks of desire down to my wet sex. Then his hands traveled lower, tracing a path down my lower belly to cup my mound.
“Spread your legs, Rachel,” he murmured in my ear.
“Richard,” I tried to protest, but his name caught in my throat. Instead I found my legs parting. I moaned as one slick, soapy finger slipped between my swollen pussy lips, washing me gently, tracing my aching clit as he dipped into my liquid depths.
“Just relax, baby, and let me wash you,” he whispered. “I love how wet you are—how wet you get when I touch you. Can you feel how much we need each other? Can you feel how ready you are to take me?” He sank two long fingers deep into my cunt and fucked me with a slow, hypnotic rhythm I felt helpless to stop. They felt so good—so right in me. But not nearly as right as his cock would have felt. I needed it in me, filling me. Needed to feel his knot swelling inside me once more to join us completely. But, no—I pushed the thought away.
“Richard,” I gasped, even as I spread my legs wider for him. “Richard, please…”
“There, now I think you're clean,” he murmured in my ear after what seemed like an eternity of his thick fingers stroking inside me. “Let's rinse you off.”
I bit back a gasp as he spread me open, parting my cunt lips and baring me to the hot, pounding spray of the shower. My tender clit throbbed at the rhythmic stimulation, and my legs were getting so weak with pleasure that I was afraid they wouldn't hold me up.
“You have such a sweet, soft little pussy, Rachel,” he growled softly in my ear as he touched me. “I know I just tasted you this morning, but I want to do it again. I want to tast
e your sweet juices mixed with the water and feel you grab my shoulders while I put my tongue deep inside you.”
His words made me moan with desire, and I knew I had to stop him before we went too far. If I let him taste me again then I would certainly let him fuck me—breed me—again, too. Because if he made me come and those waves of needing and lust came back, if my body demanded a second breeding, I wouldn't be able to deny him this time.
“Richard, stop,” I said as he turned me to face him. “Stop this now. We…we need to talk.”
“What's there to talk about?” he growled softly. “Our bodies need each other, Rachel. By denying me you're only denying yourself.”
“I…I realize that,” I said, still trying to make my brain work when it wanted to just shut down and let my body take over. “But, Richard, just because I'm not with Charles anymore doesn't mean I want to be with you. Maybe…maybe I need a little time to recover. Did you ever think of that? And I still have…issues with you. Deep ones that I don't know if I can ever resolve.”
“All right.” He sighed and turned off the water. “But can we at least try to resolve them? Will you at least talk to me instead of running away this time, Rachel?”
“Yes.” I nodded, knowing that I owed him that much at least. “Yes, Richard, I will. But not here—I'm freezing!”
He frowned. “You're shivering. Here.” He grabbed some towels hanging on the rack by the shower, took one for himself, and handed one to me.
I rubbed myself all over and wrapped the towel securely around me, knotting it under my arm. Then I squeezed the water out of my damp hair and stepped out of the tub. Richard looked like he wanted to help me, but I felt stronger now and more in control of myself. I knew that if I let him touch me again, the balance of power might shift. So I kept my distance as we went back into the bedroom and sat on opposite sides of the bed.
“Now.” Richard had draped his towel around his lean hips, and he sat easily at the foot of the mattress, staring at me.
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