“If you knew me inside out, you would have anticipated me recording your sister,” I taunt. I wash down the roast beef with some excellent red wine. “What you did to me in high school changed me. Made me tougher. I could have wilted and died, but I learned how to do whatever it takes to survive instead. Sometimes it means keeping my head down, but other times it means standing up for myself when I’ve been pushed too far.”
“Then you should thank me.” There’s a smirk on his face as he shoves a small potato into his mouth.
“Not likely.”
Simon gets up, swaying where he stands. “Sorry,” he rasps miserably, his gaze downcast. His neck is splotchy from where Bastien strangled him; there will be some hellish bruises tomorrow. And he’s begging forgiveness from the man who almost killed him. My contempt for him is tinged with pity. Bastien’s always treated Simon like garbage. Back in school, he would alternate between humiliating him and building him up, and it just made him worship Bastien more.
Bastien doesn’t even acknowledge him, so Simon stumbles from the room.
We eat for several more minutes, then I set down my fork. “So,” I say to Bastien, “you actually think you can tell other men not to put their hands on me, when you go to your club for perverts and have sex with random whores?”
Bastien’s whole body goes rigid, and I see the tension in his jawline. “You want to have sex with Simon?”
I can tell from the steel in his voice that if I say yes, he will kill Simon. Right now. Given how vile Simon was to me back in high school, I am tempted to say yes, but I’m trying to be as honest with Bastien as I can. I don’t know why, but it feels important not to lie to him.
“I have never wanted to have sex with any man besides you,” I tell him truthfully.
He relaxes a little. “I won’t be using the women at the club anymore. I am never going to have sex with another woman besides you, as long as I live.”
I stare at him in wonder. “Why? You hate me.”
“Because apparently you’ve put some kind of spell on my dick that makes me sick when I let anyone other than you near it. If I don’t picture your face, I can’t even come. It’s always been that way.” And he starts in on his salad with a bitter expression twisting his face.
Perhaps I should find that insulting. But for Bastien, that’s almost a declaration of love. I pull a bowl of bread rolls over to me and tear one open, stuffing half of it in my mouth.
Chapter Twenty
Camille
Several days drag by. Bastien seems preoccupied by something, and I can tell it’s important, but he won’t tell me what. I imagine it has to do with whatever attack is coming our way. He banishes me to another room and doesn’t try to have sex with me again; it rattled him, how much he reveals of himself in his sleep. He’s not a man who likes to feel vulnerable, and I’m still waiting for the hammer to fall because of that little slip-up of his.
I spend my days watching television and reading. He doesn’t want me even to step out of the front door. I wish I knew what, or who, he was so afraid of.
Having him so near to me, but so closed off, is a special kind of torture all its own. I can’t stop thinking about how things were between us when we were younger. My parents had done their very best to beat me down, but Bastien did everything to build me back up. He made me feel smart and pretty and worthwhile. He opened doors for me and pulled out chairs for me and made me feel like a princess. His cruel side troubled me, to an extent, but he controlled it for the most part and whenever he started to go too far, I knew exactly how to reel him back in. I saved him from his worst impulses – and that made me feel special too, because nobody else could do that. I was sure that we were very literally made for each other, two puzzle pieces who filled each other’s empty spaces.
Now he’s a million miles away from me, and I long to find a way to reach him. I’m a therapist, I should be able to figure it out, but his walls are too high and too hard for me to scale.
He refuses to let me have his cell phone to call my mother, until finally one day I see one of the guards talking on a cell phone and I snatch it from his hand. He shouts angrily, but I ignore him and run into a bedroom and slam the door shut. I dial my mother’s number as he clomps down the hallway, probably going to find Bastien to tell on me.
What just happened proves a theory of mine—Bastien told all the guards not to lay a finger on me. He doesn’t want any other man touching me. Not Simon, not Landon—no one but him. That knowledge lights a spark of happiness inside me.
But the happiness is snuffed out the minute my mother answers the phone.
“Who is this?” she demands suspiciously, not recognizing the number.
“Mother, it’s me.”
“You call me up like this, after everything you’ve put me through with your shameless behavior? Landon told me what you did to him!” Of course he did. Why doesn’t she just adopt him, or marry him herself? “You are dead to me!” she spits. Then she proceeds to rant about how I’ve humiliated her and what an ungrateful, vile, evil, disgusting—
I’m dead to her, but she wants to verbally rip me to shreds?
I hang up the phone. I won’t call her again. We’ll never have the mother-daughter relationship that I dreamed of, and that will be a wound I’ll bear with me forever, but I have too much on my plate right now to deal with this. My last attempt to reach out to her failed, and it’s time to move on.
The door flies open and Bastien storms in. I hold up the phone.
“Looking for this?”
He snatches it from me. “Called your mommy? How’d that go?” His words jab at me, seeking a tender spot.
I don’t rise to the bait. “About as well as when you talk to your parents, I imagine. When’s the last time you spoke to them, by the way?” Because I’m done dealing with his abuse. I screwed up ten years ago, and he’s more than exacted his pound of flesh for it. I’m finished saying I’m sorry. I’m finished with lying down while he tramples all over me.
His eyes flash with anger and he walks out of the room.
That night, after dinner, he comes to me while I’m sitting in the living room, reading. He tosses a white evening gown with plunging cleavage at me, and it lands in my lap.
“Put it on. Now.”
“Where are we going?” I ask, a little uneasily.
His eyes have that hard, flat look to them. It means he’s going to do something bad to me. He’s going to punish me for what I said about his parents earlier, and for not acting scared and miserable every time I see him. “You can put it on in here, or you can do it in front of my guards.”
He knows my weaknesses as well as I know his.
I stand up and quickly strip down to my panties, then pull the gown on. It’s so light and flimsy, I feel naked. I’m wearing low-heeled nude sandals; nothing on me is covered. Instinctively, I cross my arms over my chest, because my nipples are hardening; they’re stiff little peaks pressing against thin fabric.
“Turn around,” he barks at me as if I were one of the girls at his club. As if I’m nothing but an object to be used and discarded.
“No. You know what? Forget this. I’m not going anywhere with you.”
“You forget who’s in charge, Camille. Let me remind you.”
He spins me around and grabs my wrist, and I feel a click; he’s handcuffed me. He cuffs the other wrist as I struggle. Then he throws a hood over my head, and my world goes black. I panic, crying out; it’s hot and stuffy, and I can’t breathe. I can’t be in the closet. It’s closing in on me, the walls are crushing me, let me out, let me out… My legs flail and kick, and it’s only his arm around my waist that keeps me from falling.
I feel his hands on the hood, and I hear a zipping sound, and the cloth opens up around my mouth. “Be quiet, not a word, or I’ll zip you up again.”
I bite back a sob. With the zipper open, I can just barely handle the hood being on my head; if he closes it, my claustrophobia will swim over me and make
me feel like I’m suffocating.
He forces me to walk through the house, and I’m stumbling, sucking in panicked breaths, cursing him in my head. My cuffed hands make me feel horribly off balance, as if I’m about to fall and smash my face on the ground at any moment. He guides me down steps and into the back seat of a car.
“Where are you taking me?” I cry out, tears running down my cheeks.
“You want me to zip you back up again?”
“No,” I say miserably. I curse the bargain I made with him. What was I thinking, agreeing to sleep under the same roof as this cruel, sadistic bastard?
I was thinking I had no choice. I still have no choice.
So I just sit there, doing deep breathing exercises, picturing myself on a white sandy beach…anything to keep calm. Don’t panic. Don’t think about what he’s going to do to me, oh God. No. I’m on the beach. I feel the sand; it’s grainy. I feel the sun on my skin, I hear the waves… Where are we going? When the car finally stops, he gets me out, and this time he throws me over his shoulder.
We’re going up steps and through a door, then moving through a building. I’m bouncing on his shoulder, body rigid with tension. Then he sets me down on something that feels soft and cushiony. A mattress? Disorientation makes me dizzy—I have no idea where we are. The room is dead silent, offering no clues. He positions me like a puppet, making me kneel. He arranges me so my face is pressed into the cushion, butt up in the air, hands still cuffed behind my back.
Then I feel him dragging the dress up to my waist, and he slides my panties to my ankles, exposing me. I rear up, but he puts his hand on the back of my neck and pushes me back down.
“Stay down,” he orders. “Or baby girl gets a spanking. Keep that tight little ass in the air.” My resistance melts under the heat of his commanding voice.
Where are we? The silence is suffocating. Seconds drag on, then I feel him moving behind me. When his tongue slides down my butt crack, I start and stifle a squeal of surprise. It’s a delightfully ticklish sensation.
He does it again, moving lower, lapping at me from behind. I open my legs for him, and he circles his arm around my leg and begins stroking my little pink bud as he suckles me and thrusts his tongue into me. Flames lick up between my legs, and my core pulses with pleasure.
He pauses.
“You want more?”
“Yes,” I pant. I don’t try to fight. I’ll never win the war against my body. I’m splayed open, eager, oozing with desire.
“Then say it, and say it loud,” he growls. “Yell for me, baby! I want to hear those words come from your dirty mouth!”
I struggle as the familiar sense of shame wraps around me, filthy strands tightening. Only dirty girls say dirty words. You’re not a dirty girl, are you? The taste of soap in my mouth…
Need burns inside me. I fling the suffocating cloak of guilt off me. I can ask for what I want. There is no shame in it, and I want his mouth on me again.
“I want you to lick my pussy!” I shout. “Please, I want it, please!” My voice echoes, bouncing off walls. Are we in a warehouse?
He strokes me with his tongue, and I forget to worry about where we are as I float on a cloud of pure pleasure. The hood isn’t scaring me anymore; it’s enhancing the experience. The sensory deprivation strips away all distractions, and my world shrinks down to the sweet tenderness between my legs. To my pussy. Bastien made me love that place ten years ago, when he taught me how good it could make me feel, and now I love it again.
When he pulls away, I cry out in protest. “Don’t stop!”
“Do you want me to fuck you now?” His voice has a hollow sound, echoing off walls.
“Yes! Fuck me, please, fuck me!” I stutter a little, but I yell the words at the top of my lungs. And it feels so good. I feel so powerful. I feel no shame at all. I can ask for what I want—why shouldn’t I? What’s wrong with feeling pleasure? He grabs my hips and enters me with one brutal thrust, pounds into me so hard I rock forward.
He fills me up completely and we move in rhythm. I love how he slams into me, and I brace myself for each violent thrust. The head of his cock is bruising my cervix.
His cock. His fat, hard, lovely cock is in my pussy.
His passion overwhelms him; I call to the beast inside him, and it answers. He’s taking me like an animal, claiming me completely.
The pleasure builds, layer on layer, until I’m ready to explode.
And then he yanks the hood off and I blink in the light.
We’re on a stage. We’re at Dark Desires! That bastard. That evil son of a bitch! There is an audience of people watching us, listening to our groans and cries of pleasure, greedily drinking us in. They lean forward in their seats, eyes shining in anticipation.
Chapter Twenty-one
Camille
Bastien keeps moving, and I’m crying out in fury and shame, tears running down my face, but I can’t stop my orgasm. It swells and crashes over me in a great wave, splashing all over my body. I come and come, helpless, my inner sheath spasming. White-hot ecstasy drowns me, and I bury my face in the bed so I can hide my shame.
I’m coming and weeping at the same time, my whole body racked with sobs.
Something clicks, and the handcuffs fall off me.
Bastien isn’t inside me anymore. I am panting, trembling as I sit up and frantically push my dress back down.
Everyone in the audience stands up and applauds. They’re not jeering—their shouts of approval sound lusty and eager—but I don’t care. For just a few precious moments, all the shame of my past had fallen away from me and I’d felt so light, so free. And Bastien ruined it like he ruins everything good between us. He made me feel like he’d dumped me into a vat of sewer water, and the stink and filth and shame film my skin and choke me.
Bastien slides off the bed and stands up, and bows deeply from the waist.
Furious, I yank my dress down and turn and run from the stage. A security guard tries to stop me, and I kick him in the crotch so hard he doubles over. I race to a side exit and manage to make it outside, into the alley behind the club. It’s dark out, the stars washed out by ugly wads of clouds, and a streetlight bathes the alley in a sickly yellow glare. I’m running for the street when Bastien catches up to me and grabs me by the arm.
“Let the hell go of me!” I scream, hysterical. “You fucking monster! You make me sick. You ruin everything you touch! I’ll never beg you again, never! If you want me, you’ll have to rape me!”
His fingers tighten around my arm. “Why are you lying to yourself?” He holds my arm tightly, triumph burning in his ice-blue gaze. “You know you love it when people watch us.”
“You make me sick,” I spit at him.
“You love being forced to do things,” he scoffs. “It’s the only way you’ve ever liked it.”
My heart pounds in my chest, and I gulp for air. It’s true. I love it when Bastien holds me down and makes me do things. But Bastien’s taking it too far, making our own private rituals into a public humiliation. “That’s not why you did that!” I seethe. “You did it to punish me! You never do anything to benefit me!”
He kisses my neck, a sweet, gentle brush of his lips. “I saved your life, didn’t I?”
Yes. Yes, he did. He’s tearing me to pieces with his dizzying swings between cruelty and kindness. My tormentor, my savior. My lover, my demon. I can’t take much more.
“The next time I want you, you’ll bend right over for me,” he taunts.
A dizzying collage of memories swarms through my head. That hotel balcony. Mr. Sinclair and Pandora, staring right between my spread-open legs. The audience inside Dark Desires, with their eager, hungry eyes.
“Try it and find out.” I glare at him with bitter determination. “It wouldn’t be the first time I surprised you. You will never make me come again, you bastard.”
There’s a flicker of something that looks like regret in his eyes. Is he even capable of such a feeling?
“
Never is a long time.” His voice goes velvet-soft and he strokes his index finger down my cheek. Before, it would have hypnotized me, melted my resistance, but not anymore. I stiffen with rage and spit in his face.
He rears back, eyes widening in surprise. I brace myself for a slap, but he just wipes the glob from his face, staring at me. “I told you what I would do to you when you agreed to stay with me,” he reminds me. “I didn’t lie.”
“And I just told you how I’m going to react from now on every time you put your hands on me. I didn’t lie either.”
He searches my gaze, and he can see the stony determination there. A spasm of despair contorts his face. Is the ice man melting? “You don’t think you deserve to be punished for betraying me, for lying to the police, for ruining my life?” He’s trying for harsh and scary, but I can hear the actual doubt threading through his words.
He’s pushed me too far, and there’s no coming back from it. And he can see it now.
“You deserve to be punished,” he repeats, but now he sounds lost, and the only person he’s trying to convince is himself.
I suck in my breath. “The hell I do. I saw you in a basement, standing over the body of my dog, holding a knife. Any sane person would have reached the same conclusion that I did. Tell me, Bastien, why did your parents believe me over you? They knew you better than anyone—so what, exactly did they know? What did you do before that, and how many times did you do it, to make them have so little faith in you?”
He lets go of my arm and pushes me away from him, breathing hard. I’ve hit him right where it hurts. What a sick couple we are, constantly jabbing at each other’s tender spots until we’re nothing but bruises and hate.
“Don’t fucking talk about my parents.”
“Oh, I didn’t realize you were such a tender little flower.” I’m poking a tiger. But I’m hysterical with humiliation at what he just did to me in the club, and I can’t stop myself.
His face flushes red. “Get the fuck away from me, Camille!”
Camille, Claimed Page 17