by Maren Smith
He had to resist.
“You’re safe now. I swear it.”
Slowly, she lifted her chin, her expression uncertain. “Am I?” The question hung in the air between them. “Have I ever been safe with you? All you’ve ever wanted to do is own me and possess me. How safe is that?”
Jared’s brow rose at her assertion, and for the second time that evening, Sophie had him. She was right on point with her description. He had been an utter bastard to her when he’d held her captive, and he didn’t deny it, but Sophie was conveniently overlooking one salient fact—she had fucking loved every moment of the way he’d treated her.
“You’re right,” he smirked. “You weren’t always safe with me, Sophie, but that was then, and this is now.”
“And you’re different now?”
He ignored the flagrant disdain in her tone, knowing at another time, he would have turned her over his knee for less, but acknowledging this wasn’t that time. If Daddy wanted his little girl back, he was going to have to earn her trust.
“Yes,” he insisted.
“By following me?”
Jared sighed. “And no.” He chuckled at the contradiction. “I’m still the same man with the same drives, but I know how much I fucked up with you before, Sophie. The day you walked out of that restaurant, you changed me.”
That much, at least, was true. At first, he hadn’t believed she had gone, and for the best part of an hour after, he expected her to wander back in, slide into her place, and finish the salad she’d barely touched, but that never happened. Sophie never came back.
Sophie moved on.
“And what did you learn, Jared?”
“That you deserved more than the contempt I’d shown you. That your consent meant something.”
She pressed her lips into a hard line, and he wondered if that was the right answer. The answer she wanted to hear. The answer that would convince her.
“So, you followed me?”
Jeez, was she ever going to let that go?
“I wanted to protect you.” He emphasized the penultimate word, imploring her with his insistent gaze. “I still do, and that means not abandoning you here on this godforsaken street.”
Sophie folded her arms across her chest. “And where will you take me?” she inquired, her lips pouting, “if I say yes.”
“Where do you want to go?” His lips curled at the petulant display she was putting on for him. “Home?”
“And I suppose you know where that is as well?”
“Yes.” There was little point in deception at this point. Sophie was smart enough to see through his duplicity. “I do.”
“Christ.” She pulled in a shaky breath, rubbing her forehead with her left hand. “How long have you been doing this—keeping track of me?”
Always Sophie. Jared conveyed the message with his eyes.
“For a while, but I never intended to harm you. Just watch over you. Like a silent guardian.”
Sophie snorted. “More like a twisted guardian,” she retorted.
“Perhaps.” Jared looked at his watch. It was approaching eleven o’clock, and the temperature was falling away around them. “How about this? I take you home, and you have your phone out and ready to call the police? If I make one wrong move, you make the call.”
He paused, waiting as she considered his suggestion. After a moment, she glanced over her shoulder at his car before her attention flitted back to him.
Sophie was tempted. He could see that much.
“What do you think, little girl?” He risked the use of the term again, relishing the flicker of her eyelids, though she fought to compose herself.
“I would appreciate a ride,” she murmured. “But that doesn’t mean I trust you.”
That was a start. And a start was all Jared needed.
“I understand,” he told her softly. “Get your phone out and ready.”
Her brows knitted at the instruction, and in that second, he could see the complaint. He was telling her what to do again, and Sophie didn’t like it, but his proposal made sense, and she really did need a ride home.
“Okay.” She sighed, opening her purse and producing her sleek phone from its confines. “I’m ready.”
Jared nodded, consciously playing it cool as he pulled his car keys from his pocket and unlocked his BMW, but it was easier said than done. Especially when he was this close to getting the woman he adored in his car. His heart pounded excitedly at the notion.
“After you.” He gestured toward the car, not wanting to do anything to frighten her at this juncture. “Please, make yourself comfortable.”
Sophie offered him a wry smile. “Are you sure you’re not going to drug me, Daddy?”
Fuck.
She’d said it. She’d called him Daddy again, and even though he knew she was mocking him, it didn’t matter. Hearing that word from Sophie’s lips was mesmerizing, and for a moment, the resonance took his breath away.
“I’m quite sure.” In the end, he forced the reply out, though his voice was raspy with his surging desire. “No more sedatives, Sophie.”
“You promise?” There was the sardonic tone again, the one he wanted to spank out of her.
Jared inhaled, lifting his hand toward his chest. “Cross my heart.”
“And hope to die?”
He smiled at her boldness. Sophie was definitely not the same woman he’d bound and fucked all those years ago. This Sophie was fierce, and he couldn’t wait to claim her.
To tame her.
“And hope to die.”
Chapter Four
Sophie
She was on autopilot as he opened the passenger door, and she slid inside Jared’s car. A small, distinct part of her brain screamed in protest, asking her what the hell she was doing, ceding to a man who had always used her in the basest ways possible, yet for some reason, she subdued that part, and as he climbed in beside her and turned on the engine, she knew why.
It was for all the times he hadn’t been an arsehole. For the times, he came to comfort her when she’d cried. For the times, he had held her and whispered soft words, even if he hadn’t meant them. In the end, Sophie had known she had to get away, but she still held those times close to her heart. In those times, the connection they’d shared had meant something. It wasn’t contrived. It was real, and when Jared was tender, she had almost believed he loved her.
He turned on the heat, blasting the temperature in the confines of the car up to the highest setting. “Are you cold?” He turned to her as he asked the question, large blue eyes drilling into her skin.
“I’m better now, thank you.” Daddy.
Oh crap. The reply was right there, just waiting to be delivered. Somehow, it was absurdly natural to refer to Jared that way, even though she’d never wanted it, and he had never earned it. Over the time he’d held her hostage, the noun had become as normal as taking her next breath. How long could she fight an urge like that for? How long before the term just slipped from her lips again?
“Good.” He smiled as though he’d read her mind, and instinctively, Sophie glanced out the window. Her gaze fell over Mike’s house as Jared pulled away, her belly tightening at the idea of what he might have done in there.
At what Jared had rescued her from.
“I take it I don’t need to tell you my address?”
Jared’s smile widened. “No,” he replied, indicating onto the main road. “But please, don’t hold it against me.”
Sophie laughed. The guy had stalked her for God knows how long, and now, he was seeking some sort of forgiveness?
Jared was crazy. But then, he always had been.
And she’d dreamed about him night after night. Her passion for the man had been so strong, perhaps she’d conjured him into existence with the power of her mind alone? Sophie had just agreed to get in his car and drive off with him. She inhaled. Who was the real crazy one?
She glanced toward him, scrutinizing his profile in the half-light.
“See anything you like?”
“Don’t.” Sophie shook her head. “Don’t, please.”
“What?” He laughed. “I’ve been nothing but a total gentleman this evening. Hell, I even rode in on my stallion and rescued you, Sophie.”
She couldn’t help but grin at his appraisal, but the levity didn’t help the burgeoning nervous energy in her belly. It was always like this around Jared. The butterflies fluttered their wings, and it began. Soon, if she wasn’t careful, that excited apprehension would begin to take her over.
“You’re right. I’m sorry.”
She stared at the dark road ahead, trying to think of something intelligent to say. Something light enough not to morph the mood, but something which steered away from the many sordid memories they’d made.
“I know you don’t want to hear this.” Jared’s voice broke the strained silence. “But I’m glad I followed you. I knew that bugger was up to no good. I guess I just have a sense for these things.”
Sophie bit her lip at that. She supposed he was right. “Because you think the same way, you mean?”
Shit, had she really just said that out loud?
Jared turned in her direction. “Maybe.” His voice had a harder edge than before, the sound making her toes curl. “But still, I don’t regret it.”
They drove on for a few moments longer, Sophie grasping her phone for dear life. She contemplated texting her friend, Karen, who was babysitting for Sophie but reasoned there was little point. She would be home soon, and it wasn’t like she was going to be relaying the story to her. Billy and Lucy were staying with her until tomorrow morning, and she would see her friend then. Her gaze darted back to the window, and gradually, Sophie began to recognize the parks and shop fronts. As they neared the end of her road, she fiddled with her safety belt, keen to make a hasty retreat.
“Leave it on.” His order made her jump, and his focus shifted back to her in response. “At least until I stop. I don’t want you getting hurt.”
“Right,” she replied, but there was no denying the way her heart had frantically increased at his curt command.
He slowed the car, coming to a halt a few feet from Sophie’s house. Leaving the engine idling, he turned his focus to her, his blue eyes boring into her eyes, conveying a hundred different emotions.
“Thank you for the ride.” She didn’t know what else she was supposed to say, so she fished in her purse for a ten-pound note. “What do I owe you?”
He shook his head. “Owe me?”
“For bringing me home?”
His lips curled. “Nothing, little girl. I’m not taking money from you.”
Sophie clenched at the description. It was so long since she’d been his little girl, and for so long, she had dreamed of being that woman again. As the words bounced around the confines of his warm car, she didn’t even know how she felt about them.
“Look.” She gulped before she went on, aware of the weight of his stare. “Thank you for helping me tonight, Jared. I do honestly appreciate it.”
“I know.”
“And for the ride. I…” She hesitated. “It’s been a great help to me.”
“Good,” he smiled. “That’s good.”
But that doesn’t mean you get to control me again. She wanted to say those words, but they wouldn’t come.
Because you don’t mean them. Sophie wanted to slap the unhelpful little voice which purred inside her head. That’s why you can’t say them.
No. She just wasn’t ready to say them to his face, that’s all.
Accepting a ride didn’t mean she was going to cede. It didn’t mean anything. Sophie pushed down the skeptical chuckle of the snide voice and blinked back at Jared, trying to send him the message with her eyes.
It doesn’t mean you get to be my Daddy.
“There is one thing you could do.” He leaned closer. “In return for the ride home.”
She gasped at his assertion. After everything, she hadn’t expected him to make demands on her tonight.
“What?”
Though even as the word escaped from her mouth, Sophie knew. She knew what he wanted. What he’d always wanted. What Jared would always want.
He wanted her to call him Daddy once more.
He wanted to hear the word from her lips.
“Jared, I can’t…”
Christ, she sounded pitiful.
“I haven’t even asked you anything yet.” He grinned at her. “Don’t look so worried, little girl.”
He was close now, perhaps only a few inches from her body, and as Sophie looked around her, she realized she was leaning toward him as well. When the hell had that happened?
“You want me to call you Daddy?”
There. She’d said it. Or, more to the point, the words had come bursting out in an awkward and cringeworthy way, but nevertheless, they were out there.
He laughed gently, the scent of his cologne mingling with the mint of his breath.
“Well, I would love that, but no, Sophie. I know you don’t want that.”
The muscles of her sex all clenched.
Fuck, she did want that. She wanted that so badly, but there was no way she was going to give in to the dark need.
“Then what?” She scarcely recognized the sound of her own voice anymore. Her every fiber was focused on the man in the driver’s seat, the one whose hand was at that moment, reaching for her face. She held her breath at its approach but didn’t try and pull away, and when his palm brushed her cheek, her eyelids fluttered closed.
“I only wanted this.”
Sophie’s gaze flickered open at his lulling words. “This?”
“Yes.” He smiled at her as his fingers tightened in her hair. “Just this. Being close to you, Sophie. I’ve missed it.”
“Oh.”
What was that in her tone? Was she actually disappointed this was all he wanted? Jesus, what was wrong with her?
“You thought I meant more.” Jared’s gaze lowered for a second, though his grasp at her hair never lessened. “I understand, little girl. In the past, I have always just taken what I wanted.”
“Yes.” She bit back on the ‘D’ word, which wanted to surface.
“Not this time.” His attention was back on her face, his palm encouraging her closer toward him. “This time, we go at Sophie’s pace. Nothing happens unless you want it.”
She gulped at his proclamation. “Really?”
“Really.”
Oh. Fuck.
The power of his gaze was almost hypnotic, mesmerizing her as she considered his words.
“So, you’re not going to kiss me?”
Sophie’s lips curled at her own audacity. Here she was, sitting in the car of the man who had bared her soul in the most depraved ways possible, playing with him, teasing him, daring him into intimacy.
It should be daunting.
Helen would say it was insane, but she didn’t care.
It was right. It felt right.
Jared grazed his lips over her mouth. “Not unless you want me to. Not unless you ask me to.”
Oh my God, Sophie wanted him to all right. Had she ever wanted anything more?
“I want you.” She was practically panting at the confession. “I want you to kiss me, please.”
There was a moment of hesitation—a moment when he smiled, his dark eyes twinkling at her words—then he moved, his lips crashing down against Sophie’s.
Claiming her.
Controlling her.
And it was heaven.
Chapter Five
Jared
Five days. It had been five days since he’d last seen her. Five, long days of overthinking, of fighting the urge to do what he always did—take control. But Jared had promised Sophie he wouldn’t follow her anymore, and in return, she’d believed him—trusted him—and agreed to meet him again for lunch.
Those had been her final words after their sweet, lingering kiss. A sensual demand that he gave her some space to think.
It hadn’t been easy for Jared.
Resisting his every natural impulse was tantamount to resisting the urge to breathe—damn near impossible. For days, Jared had avoided his laptop, where he used to track Sophie’s emails and online exchanges. Technology, which had always been an ally, suddenly became his enemy, goading him from the corner of the room while he reran their interaction in his car over in his mind again and again.
“I want you.” Sophie’s voice had been breathy and hot, hardening his already desperate cock. “I want you to kiss me, please.”
That was all she had to say. Jared was right there, ready and willing to make her wish his command. The kiss had been unhurried and more sensual than he’d anticipated. He’d felt so highly strung and desperate for her, he’d half expected to devour Sophie right there and then, yet as their lips collided, it wasn’t like that. Sophie was his—his little girl—as she always had been. There was no reason to rush intimacy—no reason to smother it—and boy, had it been good. Even now, the power of the caress lingered, soaking into his subconscious as he slept as well as haunting his waking hours.
Of course, he could have cheated. Jared could have logged onto his laptop and checked on Sophie without her knowledge. There was no way she could ever find out, but he hadn’t. He checked his reflection quickly in the rear-view mirror as that thought resonated.
He hadn’t.
Why hadn’t he?
Because you don’t want to cheat her. The answer flew into his conscience with absurd clarity as he waited near the café where she’d chosen to meet.
Because you want to do this right. For once.
Jared sighed at his silent verdict, knowing it was accurate. He’d spent so long following Sophie online and in person, so long thinking about her, dreaming about her, longing for the one who got away, he was petrified at the prospect of losing her. If he overstepped the line, or if she even suspected as much, that was a real prospect.
Sophie had tried to run from him twice when she’d been his captive, and on the third occasion, she’d achieved it, leaving him for dead. He snorted at the idea as he glanced out of the window at the passing traffic. A part of him still couldn’t believe she had done that, although he could understand it. Jared had been a complete arsehole to Sophie back then. And he’d loved it.