He reaches down and pulls at my bottom lip, and I open my mouth. He comes hard on a hiss, the tip of his cock bursts like a volcano, cum spraying my boobs, my face, hitting my tongue. I would close my eyes and savor the salty taste of him, if I could bear taking my eyes away from what’s towering over me, exuding supremacy, screaming sex.
His back arches, his hips push forward, the thrusts of his hand starting to slow, and then he falls forward onto a fist, struggling to hold himself up. “My God,” he whispers, dipping to kiss the corner of my mouth, not bothered by his seed spread all over my lips. “I’m broken.” He collapses and blankets me with his body, completely crowding me.
I have to agree.
I’m broken too.
But this kind of new broken hurts so good.
15
JAMES
There’s a fine line between want and need. Sometimes you can want something so much, you convince yourself you actually need it. Or, worse than that, think you’re entitled to it. It makes the withdrawal symptoms more prevalent. I no longer allow myself to want something. I refuse to fall into the realms of need.
I’m used to the misery.
The darkness.
The never-ending cycle of hate. Hate for the world. Hate for my family’s deaths. Hate for every person on this planet living.
Hate for myself for surviving.
Hate is easier to feel than love. It’s a consistent, reliable form of self-torture I’m in full control of. Other emotions are not. With that tainted, unnamed emotion, someone else is in control. Someone else delivers the torture.
I’m only capable of hate.
But as I stare at the woman beside me, her skin still damp, her screams of ecstasy still ringing in my ears, I feel no hate. I feel only purpose. I see a lost soul who’s fighting to navigate this world. I see desperation to escape. I see an equal, diabolical, deep-seated need for vengeance. And her scar? I reach forward and stroke down the length of her arm, from her shoulder to her wrist.
I see red. A mist of fury descends. It’s unstoppable.
I get up off the bed and stalk out, needing to walk it off before I wake her up and give her truths that unveil my darkness. No. Not happening.
I land at my desk and pull up the screens, loading the stock market and scanning the numbers. All numbers I like. There’s nothing to take my mind off things here. So I pull up my inbox and reply to every email. And once I’ve done that, I call Otto to check on the burner phone he’s been tracking for two years. Nothing.
Then it’s just me, my thoughts, and the darkness again. I close my eyes, and the first thing I see is our house. My family home in England. My father at the head of the table smiling as the maid serves dinner to his wife, son, and daughter. As the butler pours wine and water. As his best man, Otto, gives him a nod that all is well. In that moment, it was all well. The men were guarding the gate, ensuring we were safe. My father, the prolific Spencer James, lording it up on his country estate after finalizing a deal with the Serbians to supply London’s richest with the finest cocaine.
I was twenty-two years old. A master shooter. A fine gymnast. An unrivaled fencer. A genius mathematician. A university graduate. And my sister? An aspiring historian. Beautiful like our mother. Smart like our father. Nothing made Spencer James prouder than his multi-talented offspring. Nothing made my mother smile harder than her boy and her girl. That evening, my father declared world domination. He told us our future was bright and crime free. And the same evening, our home was blown up by the men my father took from.
My family lay in thousands of pieces amongst bricks and rubble. I dodged death. But watching Otto pull the teeth from my parents, my little sister, and our staff’s cindered remains, and then forcing me to neck half a bottle of vodka before he took one of mine, made me want to die.
And eventually, it made me want to kill.
16
BEAU
I open my eyes and stare at the ceiling, feeling James lying next to me. My breathing is still heavy. My wrists still bound. I turn my head on the pillow, finding him sprawled on his front, his eyes lightly closed, snoozing.
His back.
I use my stomach muscles to sit up, my body aching like it’s never ached before. Not even when I was recuperating after being bedridden for weeks. Not even when I’ve run miles and miles.
I get the full force of his injury. Every last millimeter of his flesh is scarred, uneven, and angry. It’s a sobering sight. It puts my own scar to shame. The front of this man is perfect. His chest, his thighs, his unfathomably stunning face. Even his messy hair is perfect. But the back of him?
I wince.
It’s gruesome.
Ashamed of my thoughts, I divert my stare to my wrists, wriggling to loosen the rope, the sores beneath raw. I hiss, the burn painful, and give up. I don’t want to wake him—he looks so peaceful. But I need to go home.
I glance around the room, wondering how many people he’s had in here. What has he done to them? And why does he do it? I look over my shoulder to his sleeping form. He looks too angelic, too perfect to be so . . . ruined. My eyes fall to his back again. Imperfection stares back at me.
He’s broken.
Like me.
Did he see right through me because he’s the same as me? Feels the same as me? Hates like me?
I’m distracted from my endless questions when I hear something in the distance. My cell phone. I shuffle to the edge of the bed and gingerly place my feet on the hard floor. I expect it to be cold. It’s not. Naked, with my hands tied, I go to the door and negotiate the handle, pulling it open. The sound of my cell gets louder before ringing off, and I take the stairs at a safe pace, finding my purse in the kitchen. I flip my cell onto the counter and see missed calls from Lawrence. It’s after nine o’clock. I’ve vanished for three whole hours.
I call him straight back, pressing the speaker icon and propping my elbows on the edge of the counter to get closer to my cell.
“Hey,” he says when he answers, with a ton of questions in his tone that he’s trying so hard to disguise.
“Hey.” My throat is dry, my voice hoarse. More. “Everything okay?”
“Yes, of course. It’s just you’re not home and you usually are. Are you in Walmart again?”
I smile. It would be easy to say yes. I look down at my bound wrists. “No.”
“Oh.” He’s dying to ask where I am, but he won’t. “I’m not worried.”
“I’m glad.” He’s lying through his teeth. “Do you have a show tonight?”
“I’m on in five minutes. Dexter just arrived. He said you still weren’t home when he left. I just needed to check you’re alive before I go on stage, else I’ll fluff my words.”
I look across the kitchen, seeing the stool we sent flying still on the floor. “We’ll talk tomorrow.”
“Why tomorrow?” he asks.
“Because I’ll be in bed by the time you’re home.”
“Oh, yes. Of course.”
“Uncle Lawrence?” I say, despite knowing he’s actually Zinnea at the moment.
“Yes?”
“Ever wanted to disappear?”
He’s silent for a moment. Contemplative. “Every day, sweetheart. But I have my coping mechanisms. I hope one day you’ll find yours.”
I stare at the glass countertop, worried I already have found it. “See you in the morning.”
“Be safe, be careful.” He hangs up as I assess the blisters on my wrists. They’re sore, yes. But they have nothing on my old injuries. I wander into the middle of the room, circling on the spot. Darkness has fallen, the city illuminated by millions of lights, whether from buildings, streetlights, or monuments. I feel like I’m in a goldfish bowl. And at the same time, standing on top of the world looking down. Not closed in. Not suffocated. Naked—physically and metaphorically.
“It’s freeing, isn’t it?”
I whirl around and find James standing at the top of the stairs. He’s still naked too. Unbothered. And as he slowl
y takes the glass steps, I get time to admire the perfect side of him. The undamaged side. His legs are so long, so defined. His shoulders the perfect width. His torso forms the perfect V. God was kind to him. Yet somehow, I know that’s not true.
“Are you okay?” he asks as he approaches me, a small frown marring his perfect forehead. I immediately worry that he thinks I may have been snooping.
“I heard my cell ringing.” I nod toward the kitchen area across the room, where my cell remains on the counter. “It was a bit of a challenge finding and answering it.” I lift my wrists, showing him why.
“Here.” He steps into me and starts to unravel the rope, and I watch him with interest, his concentration sharp, his care great. When the ropes are gone, I flex my fingers and roll my wrists. “Does it hurt much?” he asks, taking one hand and checking the sores.
“Not really.”
“And your legs?”
“Achy.”
“Would you like a bath?”
I step back, pulling my wrist out of his clasp as I do. “I can take a bath at home.”
“I’d prefer it if you had one here.”
“Why?”
He takes my hand and leads me toward the stairs. “It’s all part of the service,” he says quietly, and I can’t help but laugh on the inside. He didn’t bathe that woman I saw him fucking. He escorted her right out, along with the man. “Then we’ll eat. Then you can go home.”
Fuck me, bathe me, and feed me. “I don’t need you to be all attentive, James. I asked for what I got.”
“Did you?” he replies, not looking back.
I pull my hand from his when we reach the top of the stairs, but he doesn’t stop, just carries on to the bathroom I used earlier. Not his bathroom. Not the bathroom in the room we just fucked in. Did I get what I asked for? “Yes, I did.”
He stops. Looks back. “Did you though, Beau?” He disappears through the door, leaving me standing naked at the top of the stairs, stumped.
My other name.
I pad slowly to the entrance, finding him sitting on the edge of the impressive egg-shaped glass tub as water pours from a waterfall faucet. “I remember saying more many times,” I remind him. I goaded him. Begged for it.
“You did.”
“You asked me to give you what I had, and I did,” I go on.
“You did.” He tips a small bottle of oil into the water, and the waft of lavender is instant. Isn’t lavender supposed to be calming? Does he think I need calming?
“James?” I ask quietly, and he looks at me. His eyes aren’t so cold now. They’re sorrowful, and it throws me. “Are you okay?”
“I don’t know yet, Beau.” He rises to his full six foot four and eats up the distance between us with three strides of his long legs. His palms rest on my shoulders, and a few flexes nearly has me folding to the floor in pleasure, his firm fingers working deep into my screaming muscles.
“What do you mean?” I ask.
“I mean what I said. I’m yet to determine if I’m going to be okay.”
“Your scar,” I breathe, compelled to touch it. Feel it. Show him that it doesn’t bother me.
“You think it’s ugly.”
I lift my arm. “This is ugly.”
He stares at my damaged skin, stroking my arm, his eyes flicking to mine. “You’re yet to encounter ugly, Beau,” he whispers, dipping and kissing my scar. I breathe in deeply, caught between enchantment, wonder, confusion, and lust.
It’s so much better than being caught in limbo, between life and death.
My head falls back as James returns to working my muscles. Part of me wants him to leave them tight and painful; the ache will last a long time. The longer the better. But his touch on my skin is like nothing else.
He starts walking backward toward the tub, and I follow robotically, powered by his working fingers. “There,” he says, flipping the faucet off and feeling the water. He takes me under my arms, lifts me from my feet, and places me in the water. “Take as much time as you need.”
And then he turns and walks out, leaving me alone in the bathroom. I look at my naked body. At my scars. At the welts on my wrists.
Need. Take as much time as you need. I don’t need anything.
Especially not time. Especially not to think. And I definitely don’t want to lose the intense ache I’m feeling on every part of my body. It’s masking things I’ve struggled so hard to mask for too long.
I wash quickly, leaving my hair, and get out to dry myself with one of the crisp white Egyptian cotton towels. I go to the bedroom to find my clothes, snatching them up from the floor and tugging them on. I approach the mirror hanging on the wall. The whole of my front is exposed, my tattered shirt gaping open. I can’t go out in public like this. I glance around the room, not holding out much hope of finding anything to wear. This isn’t even his bedroom. It’s his kink room. The room he brings many people to and fucks them wildly with an audience.
Of their own volition, my teeth clench, and I hate myself for letting foolish resentment cloud the serenity. I spot a closet across the room, and, desperate, I go to it, pulling the doors open. I’m presented with another room. A walk-in closet. Floor-to-ceiling rails and various width drawer units span the circumference, and an enormous snuggle chair sits on an angle in the center. His closet. This is his bedroom?
I look back over my shoulder to the various contraptions attached to the walls, the cabinet full of toys, the leather chaise in the window.
Clothes.
I work my way through the rails trying to find something suitable, an old T-shirt or something. All I can see are suits, dress shirts, and jeans. I can’t go waltzing down in any of those. “Shit,” I mutter, starting on the drawers. I yank the first open. Boxers. The second. Socks. The third. “Watches?” I murmur, casting my eye across dozens of timepieces resting in cushions. I slam it shut. Where does he keep his plain old T-shirts?
I turn, seeing another unit of drawers. Wider drawers. I hurry over and pull the first open, being presented with a perfect pile of perfectly folded, crisp black T-shirts. There must be a dozen, all the same style. I grab one, discard my shirt, and pull it over my head as I make my way downstairs.
As my feet hit the staircase, I hear voices and see a couple sitting at the island with James. He’s leaning on the glass counter, supported by his forearms, and he’s now dressed in jeans and a black T-shirt to match the one I’ve just taken from his stash. They’re talking quietly, and my steps falter, my hand taking the metal rail. A couple. A man and a woman.
I pull myself together just in time for them all to turn and find me hovering on the stairs. Uncomfortable doesn’t cover it. James pushes himself up slowly, his laser stare holding me in place where I stand.
I look away. “Sorry to interrupt.” Convincing my legs to move is a task, and I take the steps slowly, feeling terribly unstable, as I’m watched by all three of them. I glance at my work tools by the door, torn. I can’t carry it all, so I gather what I can manage—I’ll come back for the rest—and hit the elevator call button.
“Beau,” James says softly, and my shoulders rise, like tensing can protect me. The doors open, and I lift a foot to step inside. I don’t make it over the threshold. He takes my arm, keeping me where I am, and I look at his long, capable fingers wrapped around my scarred flesh.
“Let go of me,” I whisper, not wanting to make a scene in front of these people.
“Leave your things here.”
I swing a stunned look up at him. He thinks I can come back? “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
He takes everything from my hands and places them back where they were. “Why?”
I look to the people in James’s kitchen instinctively, while James keeps a firm hold of my arm. They’re not watching now. They’re looking at something together. A laptop.
“That’s Pierce and Michelle,” James says, pulling my attention back to him. He’s showing no expression. No emotion. Giving me nothing to tell me
what he’s thinking or how he’s feeling. Why does that irritate me? “They track my private stocks.”
“Oh.” I immediately feel like a fool. He knew what I was thinking and that my thoughts were bothering me. “You’re obviously busy.” I gently try to tug my arm free, and his grip slides down to my wrist, catching one of the welts. I flinch. He’s doesn’t miss it.
“You didn’t spend very long in the bath.” He steps back, giving me space, and tucks his hands into his back pockets. “You should have soaked a while; it would have eased the discomfort.”
I reach for the call button again, the doors, at some point during the past few moments, having closed. “It’s fine. I’ll soak in the tub at home.”
“I’d rather you did here.”
The doors slide open again as I show him my absolute confusion. “Why?”
“So I know you’ve taken the necessary measures to ensure the fastest recovery time.”
“You fucked me, you didn’t beat me,” I say, louder than I planned, my frustration getting the better of me. He regards me quietly, still with nothing to read on his face. He looks over his shoulder to his people, and I follow his direction, nearly dying on the spot when I see they’ve stopped what they’re doing and are looking this way. “I’m sorry,” I say quietly, humiliation engulfing me. “I’ll be going now.” The doors have closed again, and I bite down on my teeth, smacking the button.
“I want you to get back in the bath,” James says, moving in closer.
“I do not need to get in the damn bath.”
“Beau, let’s not fall out over this,” he whispers. “My request is simple and for your own benef—”
“I don’t want a bath, James,” I hiss, anger replacing the frustration. I take backward steps into the elevator when the doors open, and James follows me, backing me into the corner with his imposing frame.
“Why?” he asks, his chest pushing into mine. “Why don’t you want a bath, Beau?”
My eyes climb his torso to his stoic face. His beautiful, stoic face. “Because I like the pain,” I say through my clenched jaw. It’s a pain I can deal with. A comforting pain. A pain that reminds me that I can escape. A pain that didn’t suggest I was fragile, that I needed to be treated with care. Flogging. Paddling. Hammering. Intense, welcome pain. Everywhere.
The Enigma: Unlawful Men Book 2 Page 12