by Aria R. Blue
16
Belle
His fingers trail up and down my back, caressing me with heartbreaking gentleness.
The man who just claimed me like a predator is gone.
He’s been replaced by a protector.
My protector.
I let my eyes drift close. With my cheek pressed against his chest, I can hear every beat of his heart.
It’s strong, steady.
A powerful lullaby.
Tears sting my eyes. I try to keep them in, but the rush of emotion inside of me is overwhelming.
Leo smooths my hair when he feels the tears against his skin. “Belle.”
I shake my head once. “I just had a scary thought,” I whisper.
“Tell me,” he says. Not a request. A command.
Fuck it. I might as well jump off the cliff’s edge.
This might leave my heart in splinters, but if I don’t take the risk, I’ll never find out.
“I don’t want to move, Leo,” I say.
Because in this moment right now, I’m saturated with joy.
I’m afraid that if I move, I’ll forever be craving this kind of happiness. Nothing will ever compare.
And what if I never get to feel it again?
He doesn’t say anything for a moment. But then, he tips my chin up so I’m looking at him.
I hear the rumble of his chest before I hear his words. “This is where you belong.”
“In Blackwood Estate?” I chuckle dryly.
My real life is back in the white cottage with my two sisters and Papa. They need me there.
“No, not this house. You belong in my arms,” he says. “It doesn’t matter where we are. As long as I get to hold you like this at the end of each day, it’s all going to be okay.”
“What about my family?”
He squeezes me so hard that the breath is knocked out of my lungs. But then he relaxes, and asks, “Do you miss them?”
It’s been a week.
I’ve been here for an entire week. It’s the longest I’ve ever been away from my family.
I think about them now.
Julie with her paint-splattered clothes and mirthful laugh. Papa with his head lost in his inventions. Hazel with her soul lost in the past.
“They’re all I have,” I say honestly. “Taking care of them has been my whole life. It’s all I know.”
“It’s not your responsibility to take care of them, Belle,” says Leo.
“That’s easy for you to say. You don’t have anybody who depends on you for survival,” I say.
I mean to say it lightly, but the words come out bitter.
What does this say about me?
Leo’s holding me like I might try to run away if he doesn’t hold me hard enough.
I press my lips against his jaw to let him know it’s okay. He relaxes, but only slightly.
My words have bothered him.
“I’m sorry,” I apologize quickly. “I shouldn’t have said that. I guess…I resent Papa sometimes. For leaving everything to me.”
“He’s not there for you,” Leo states. It’s not a question.
“Never. He’s never been there for me,” I say, opening up my wounds for him to see. “He doesn’t try to talk to Hazel. He doesn’t bother to remember Julie’s birthday. He doesn’t help me with any of the housework.”
“It must be hard to bear that burden on your shoulders.” He presses a kiss against my bare shoulder now.
Hot desire tugs at my belly once again.
“I love them,” I shrug. “I would do anything for them, but I still wish to do things for myself.”
“If you could do absolutely anything you wished to, what would it be?”
Dreams.
He’s asking about my dreams.
The ones that I held so firmly inside my heart, because I was afraid of being ridiculed if I dared to share them with anybody.
I sigh against his sturdy chest.
My arms are wrapped around his shoulders, and my breasts are pressed against his muscled torso. One of my thighs is hooked around his waist, and he’s lazily plumping my ass in his hands as we speak.
The desire is always just under the surface.
We’re both consumed by it, but equally powerful is the need to talk to him, and tell him about everything in my life that breaks my heart. About everything that lifts me up and fills me with hope.
“I want to love, Leo,” I say, looking into his dark blue eyes. “I want to spend my life living and loving. Does that sound corny?”
He opens his mouth to speak, but words don’t come. He resorts to merely shaking his head.
I drop my head back on his chest. “That’s all I’ve wanted to do for as long as I can remember. Just simply love.”
I don’t tell him about my dreams of a husband just like him, or about the children I want to have.
I shift on top of him.
Against his protests, I sit up and prop my weight on an outstretched arm. I gaze down on the mountain of a man who’s staring back at me.
Everything is the same.
Everything has changed.
Ever so slowly, his eyes lazily rove down my body.
From my parted lips to my heaving breasts, all the way down to my still-glistening pussy. A smirk of satisfaction tugs at his lips as he looks at the marks he left on my body.
From the bruises his rough kisses left on my breasts to the cum that still smears my pussy.
As he watches me, my nipples pebble into painful peaks. They become heavy for him. For his touch and his mouth.
He watches the shift in my body.
He watches as I start to squirm in place, ravenous for the kind of love only he can give me.
“Are you going to call me Mr. Blackwood again, Belle?” he taunts.
I blush. Fiercely.
It spreads down my torso.
“Marvellous,” he mumbles, more to himself than to me. “That an innocent creature like you can get so hungry for cock. You miss the way my big cock feels inside your little pussy, don’t you?”
He’s doing this on purpose.
Here I am, completely naked in front of him, and he chooses this moment to watch the effect his filthy words have on me.
“You’re not playing fair,” I mumble.
A low growl escapes his mouth.
He gets up, towering over me even though he’s on his knees.
Hooking his arm around my waist, he pulls me down underneath him. Pinning my body to the ground.
“This is how I like you, Belle,” he rasps. His eyes are a starless night sky, the black of his pupils taking over. “Blushing, gasping, thighs wide open to accommodate me.”
“Then what are you waiting for, Mr. Blackwood?” I ask, raising my hips up so I’m pressed against his shaft.
I buck my hips, and slide my messy core down his length.
His grip on my hips tightens. His other hand clasps at my breasts, massaging it roughly in his calloused palms.
He grabs me like I’m his possession and his prize.
He’s going to leave more bruises on me if he keeps handling me so roughly.
But instead of sinking himself into my waiting pussy like I expect him to, Leo closes his eyes.
“One. Two. Three.” He counts all the way to ten.
And when he opens his eyes again, they’re a dark blue again.
He stares into my eyes, as if he’s trying to memorize every fleck of color, count every single eyelash.
With his face this close to mine, it feels more intimate than all of the things we’ve done until now.
The wildfire inside my body is now a slow simmer.
Something more heartbreaking replaces it.
A heaviness in my chest. That’s my heart swelling. That’s my heart making room for him.
His eyes flicker down to my lips.
My tongue darts out to wet them, making him groan. I feel his thickness throb against my inner thigh.
Just one thrust, and he’d be ful
ly sheathed inside me.
A few more, and he’d be flooding me with his cum again.
But Leo is a man who does what he wants. And what he wants right now is to stare at me until I’m a gooey mess for him.
“It will hurt,” he says, choking on the words.
“That didn’t stop you before.” My heartbeat kicks up as I think about the words we exchanged right before he pushed past my barrier.
“That pain was unavoidable. If I make love to you now, before your body has had time to rest and heal, you’re going to hurt again.”
I arch my back, and drag my nipples up the planes of his torso. “You can’t hurt me, Leo.”
He squeezes his eyes shut.
I take his hand, and place it between my thighs.
“This,” I whisper. “This is where it still aches, Mr. Blackwood. You’ll make it go away, won’t you?”
Leo’s eyes snap open.
A starless night again.
“Does your Papa know that his precious daughter is a cock-hungry slut? He’d be horrified if he ever found out about even half the things you let me do to your perfect little body.”
Dirty talk.
He curates each and every word just for me.
He knows fully well the effect his words have on me, and he uses them to make me soar as I go over the edge with him.
“So responsive,” he says, tracing lazy circles on my lower stomach and watching as I writhe on the floor. “So willing to be my little plaything. So eager to suck my cock. So fast to let these thighs fall open.”
His words add fuel to the inferno building in my core.
This man doesn’t have to lift a finger to pleasure me. No, he could make me come with his words alone.
“You’re in the right hands, Belle,” he purrs, his fingers dipping low, low, low. Stopping at the edge of my desperate need. “I’m so glad you came to me, because I know exactly what this horny cunt of yours needs.”
He skirts around the edges of me.
His fingers dance near my inner thighs, massaging the soreness away, building heat. He takes his time with it.
“What does it need?” I ask breathlessly.
“Why don’t you tell me,” he says. “I love watching that pretty mouth of yours form obscene poetry for me.”
“Mr. Blackwood,” I plead, eyes fluttering close. “Please.”
“Please what, Belle?”
“Just-“ Words get lost in my throat. My lust takes over my head until I can’t even think straight.
He squeezes my breasts as he waits for an answer.
“I want to be claimed,” I say, probably revealing more than I should. “I want you to own my body.” I want to be his submissive.
He touches me then.
Not gently this time.
His mouth crashes down on mine, as he cups and squeezes the flesh between my thighs.
My hips are lifted off the ground again, seeking his hardness.
“Such a good girl,” he praises, grabbing my hair in a fist as he mauls my neck. His teeth nip at my sensitive skin, before moving down to my collarbone. “I knew you’d be perfect for me. I knew it the second I saw you, Belle. I knew you’d be my queen, but I also knew that you’d worship my cock from your knees.”
“It’s yours,” I moan. “I’m all yours.”
“A man can only hold back for so long,” he continues. “You were starting to drive me insane with all of your low-cut tops and cotton shorts. If I hadn’t made that promise to you, I would’ve sneaked into your bedroom to have my way with you that very first night.”
“You should have,” I say, a scream of release building in my throat as his thumb presses down on my engorged clit.
“I wanted nothing more than to get into your bed, grab your curves, and rut into this tight cunt until I filled you up with my cream. You would’ve woken up with your clothes in shreds and my cum smeared all over your thighs.”
“Oh God.”
“You know what the worst part is?”
“What?”
“Even though you know it’s wrong, you would’ve left your bedroom door unlocked the next night too. Because you love it when I sneak into your bedroom to do dirty things to you. Because you crave a nice, hard pounding that ends with my cum coating the insides of your hot pussy. Isn’t that right, Belle?”
His hands furiously work at my clit, but he doesn’t dip into my opening. His head lowers to rest on my breast.
I reach down to hold his hair as he plumps my tits in his hands before sucking on a nipple.
All of the pressure building inside me and all of the pressure he’s applying on me, it becomes too much.
“Come for me, Belle,” he orders. “Come apart for me.”
I shatter.
Into a million shards of blinding white light.
He makes me come apart, and he pieces me back together.
When I’m vulnerable and shaking in his arms, he’s gentle, kissing me with reverence and softness.
My eyes are half-closed as he fetches a soft warm towel to clean me up.
He sets up a bed for me in the library, laying me down on piles of warm blankets.
It doesn’t feel right though. Not until he lays down next to me, and wraps those thick muscled arms around my body.
I feel so small next to him.
Safe.
Home. His arms become the home I never want to leave.
It could’ve been minutes or hours. All I know is that I’m starving by the time I awaken.
He greets me with a kiss on my forehead. “Morning, sleepyhead.”
“How long has it been?”
“A few hours,” he says, stroking the groove of my spine, awakening desire in my body just like that. “You needed the rest.”
I look down at my body.
As he promised, the bruises on my neck and breasts have darkened, marking me as his.
There’s a sweet soreness between my thighs, a reminder of the lovemaking. As if I need any reminding.
“Are you hungry?” he asks.
I nod vigorously. “Starving.”
“Good.” He lifts me up gently, and hands me a brand new robe.
It’s the lightest shade of gold, and shimmers like sunlight bouncing off still pond water. This one has full sleeves and comes all the way down to my toes.
I let him lead me out of the library, his large hand holding mine.
All of it feels like a fairytale.
I know it’s a fairytale when he feeds me the fluffiest pancake I’ve ever had. It has the texture of a cloud, soaked in just the right amount of butter and maple syrup.
“Aren’t you going to eat?” I ask him.
“Not until you finish,” he answers, filling my mouth with more fluffy pancake.
He’s feeding me. I guess I should tell him that my body might be sore, but my hands work just fine.
But I like it.
I’ve been taking care of people for so long that I never had the chance to realize how much I enjoy being pampered.
It’s not until I’m sipping my espresso that he starts to eat.
A smile tugs at my cheeks as I watch him.
All of these little things about him that he tries to hide from other people, they’re what I find most endearing.
Even now, he’s sitting at an angle where I can’t see the left side of his face. I know he does it on purpose, because I’ve seen him do this multiple times.
It breaks my heart that he feels the need to hide.
I look him over while he’s preoccupied.
His long golden hair. The square cut of his jaw. The way every muscle of his body ripples as he moves. Those dark, dark midnight eyes. A blue so dark it’s almost black.
My eyes land on the golden chain around his neck. A large diamond is hanging from it.
Rose, he called it.
It must be important to him.
I wonder why.
He catches me staring at it, but he doesn’t offer an explanatio
n. And I don’t ask.
“So,” I say. “Why did you actually come to the library this morning?”
“I thought you were glad I did,” he says, pouring himself some coffee as well.
“I am,” I say, sucking on my lower lip. “But it’s so far away from your bedroom. What were you doing in the East Wing?”
He glances at me, and then away. “I was hoping you wouldn’t ask.”
His reply catches me off guard. “Oh?”
“I was coming to see you, Belle. You weren’t in your bedroom, and I knew I’d find you reading in the library.”
I lick my lips. “Is there something you wanted to talk about?”
His fists clench on the table. His bare shoulders are hunched and taut.
“Give,” he says. “I had something I wanted to give you.”
I wait for him to continue.
“I’m regretting this already,” he sighs, reaching into his pocket and thrusting something into my hands. “Here.”
The object is cold and smooth.
I flip it over, and find…a watch.
When I look up at him, he’s glaring at the watch like it’s his archenemy. “You asked for a set of keys,” is all he says.
I look back at the watch. The onyx screen reflects my face. I swipe a finger over it, and it flickers to life.
He shows me how it controls everything, from the fireplace in the library to the main doors of Blackwood Estate.
“So you can come and go as you please. I don’t want you to feel like you’re stuck here or anything,” he mumbles.
I look up at him. My voice wobbles as I say, “I don’t feel stuck here. If anything, it’s the opposite.”
I found freedom here.
To be my true self and to explore what I really want in life.
He nods, and both of us stare at the watch.
It’s different from his. His is all black, whereas mine is more delicate—a dark screen and an ivory band.
It’s sleek and beautiful, but it also fills me up with a strange sense of dread.
That the time I have with Leo will eventually come to an end. That my life won’t be this carefree forever.
“Thank you,” I say politely.
“What is it?” he asks, picking up the subtle change in my voice.
I look up at him. “Do you give a watch to everyone who works for you?”
He leans back. “Of course not. Well, I suppose Luna has one too, but that wasn’t why I had this watch made for you.”