Hundreds

by Pepper Winters

I plunged inside her again and again.

  See? So good.

  My thrusts were so forceful she inched up the bed beneath me. I moved with her until my knuckles nudged the knots she’d tied me with.

  She likes it, too. And who cares if she doesn’t?

  Her struggle beneath me echoed in my ears. Her heart flurried in her chest sandwiched so tight to mine. She was so breakable. She was just bone and breath and belief that I was different. That I would protect her and not hurt her like I was doing now.

  Silly Pim.

  I’d tried to warn her, and she didn’t listen.

  Now, I needed this over with.

  So I could start it all over again in a matter of minutes.

  Giving myself over to the mosaic of monstrous urges, I reared back and looked down at her. Her skin was splotchy and eyes wide with unshed tears. I knew I should have thoughts and consideration to her plight, but nothing was left. Just instinct. Just raw, basic instinct.

  I’d already reserved a throne in hell for what I’d done to my family. This just solidified my membership.

  She did her best to wriggle away. I waited for her to scream or beg, but her past and my past were not good companions. I lost myself in my thoughts. She lost her voice in her fear.

  She wouldn’t utter a single syllable even if terror decorated her face.

  She feared me.

  I feared me.

  She wanted me to stop.

  I wanted to stop.

  She would hate me, curse me, and would vanish into her mind and leave me any second now.

  I knew that.

  I knew everything as if I were a voyeur to my own predicament.

  But it still didn’t stop me.

  It didn’t stop the aroused anger and helplessness tearing me apart.

  “You’re mine now.” I drove deep. “I won’t be able to stop.” I fucked hard. “Are you happy now? Happy that you made me do this?” I thrust over and over. “You’ve ruined me. Fucking ruined me.”

  I took her mercilessly, piercing her goodness, her generosity, her love. This was why I was alone. Why no one wanted me. Why I was dead to them.

  Because I destroyed everything good in my life.

  Humans most of all.

  My cock filled her cruelly as I thrust and penetrated and gave in to the final savagery consuming me.

  This wasn’t love.

  This was destroying.

  And I threw myself head-first into it.

  My hips pistoned faster and deeper.

  Pim returned to her silence. Her eyes wedged tightly shut. Her fingers latched on to my shoulders.

  The pulsing on my spine crept between my legs. Heavy and hot, needing to crest and deliver. The orgasm found me deep in the darkness as I drove into Pim again and again. But it wasn’t tingly and warm and promising good things like normal climaxes did. This was black and oppressive and wrong.

  I didn’t want it because the moment I had it, I’d need another and another and another.

  But I fucked Pim faster, giving in to the pressure and press of delight.

  And when it found me, I howled as it burned like vinegar in my veins.

  I spilled inside her, breathing hard, wishing I’d never agreed to break my law and have her more than once.

  Because of that, I’d just committed a fatal mistake.

  There was no going back now.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  ______________________________

  Pim

  WHERE HAD ELDER Prest gone?

  Where had the caring, secretive man who’d saved me disappeared to?

  What had just happened between us?

  Elder collapsed on top of me, his climax wringing him dry. His breathing wasn’t of a man who’d had sex and orgasmed but that of a wounded animal, tortured and lost.

  I stayed frozen beneath him.

  My skin drenched in sweat while ricochets of terrified pleasure coursed through my body. My voice had vanished just like my mind had attempted. I no longer knew what was up and what was down. Things I’d trusted had turned out to be false. People I’d known had turned out to be imposters.

  Who was this man inside me?

  Was I wrong believing I could love him? Care for him?

  He was just like all the other males I’d survived.

  My body wracked with silent sobs as I did my best to hold back the crashing, swelling confusion. Elder had ruined me. Not because he’d been rough—he was still a saint compared to others—no, he’d ruined me by the sacrilegious act of twisting my disgust for sex into a tentative enjoyment of it.

  He’d disorientated me. He’d perplexed me. He’d shoved me into a storm with no coat or umbrella and expected me to survive the icy needles of reality.

  I stemmed my tears by burrowing into his heavy body even while I knew I should be appalled by him. I shouldn’t seek comfort from the man who’d just stripped me of everything. I’d never sought the approval or company of my captors.

  I wouldn’t start now.

  So why didn’t my body detest his inside me?

  Why was I still wet? Still swollen for more?

  Elder had been bitterly brutal, yet my body remained sensitive and singing for him.

  I shouldn’t like what he just did.

  And I didn’t.

  But he’d been the first to show me pleasure. I’d trusted in that pleasure. I wanted to believe in that pleasure.

  How dare he twist it back to hate?

  I was sick of hating something that was natural to want. I was sick of resenting something that I should embrace.

  My mind split from wanting to hide from him and wanting to stay. I wanted him to talk to me to perhaps help with the maladies he suffered.

  Wasn’t that worth something?

  The fact I hadn’t let my panic attack whisk me away to an imaginary castle?

  I’d stayed.

  For him.

  I was willing to change. To grow. To deal with my issues.

  So what the hell is going on?

  Above me, Elder groaned, reminding me all over again of his vicious rutting and blind rage to finish. When I’d kissed him, something had connected us. When I’d placed him inside me and sank down until the tip of him pressed against deep, dark places, I’d felt as if I’d found someone I could rely on.

  Yet once we were joined in a way I would forever battle just a little, that slow burn turned to wild-fire as mutual affection became heavily one-sided.

  Physically, he’d overthrown me, smothering me with his lust. Emotionally, he’d vanished. His eyes turned empty. His face vacant. There was no more heart joining and mind fusing.

  Just unemotional fucking.

  He’d used me.

  And I couldn’t quite believe it had happened.

  I didn’t care that I should’ve seen this coming. That I was stupid to think it could be any different. I’d felt Elder. I’d believed in what my instincts told me. That he wanted me deeper than just lust. That there was something rich and raw and worthy of taking a risk.

  So what had happened?

  And how could it be fixed?

  Wearily, as if he’d just returned from battle and still saw blood and carnage instead of a luxury suite and me, Elder disengaged and removed himself without apology.

  With a heavy sigh, he collapsed onto his back, his wrists crossed and tangled with rope above his head. His hands were white from lack of blood, but he didn’t seem to notice or care.

  His handsome face turned waxy with things that terrified me.

  I sat up, hugging my knees to my chest.

  He didn’t look at me, just stared at the ceiling, his neck working as he swallowed, fighting thoughts he wouldn’t share.

  The golden glow of the lamps painted him in reflections and interrogations. Somehow, even after what’d just happened, I still found him otherworldly in his perfection. He was a broken prince. The knight who didn’t fight the dragons but pencilled them on himself, borrowing their power to fight the
darkness within. The flames from the chimerical beasts might help ward off what he most feared.

  He cleared his throat, making me jump.

  His lips twisted with a bitterness that hurt my heart. “Untie me, Pimlico. Immediately.”

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  ______________________________

  Elder

  IT WAS OVER.

  It was done.

  I had a split second of blissful mental silence before everything I’d been running from found me. The noise, the chatter, the obsession to fix and collaborate and order. I yanked at the rope around my wrists. “Pim. Now!”

  Her body tightened into a smaller ball as if she could pretend we were the same as before. She rubbed her nose with the back of her hand. Her eyes strained and stark.

  She didn’t move.

  My imprisonment drove me crazy. My cock already switched from minor relief to stoney need. I wanted to be free to take her again. There were many hours in the night, and I wouldn’t waste them by not being inside her.

  Jerking my arms, I snarled, “Pim! Untie me. Instantly.”

  My yell finally knocked on the shut door of her mind, making her flinch. Quickly, she unfolded from her ball and reached over my head to fumble with the knots.

  Her breasts swung over my face. An invitation. An offering.

  I couldn’t stop myself.

  My mouth opened and I sucked on her nipple hard. So fucking hard.

  She cried out.

  Her spine bowing, her belly clenching, her moans undoing the last figment of my control. My hips rocked with need, desperate to start again.

  My heart skipped a beat then two, tattered and torn with adrenaline.

  Get it together.

  Fight it.

  Sucking her nipple, I groaned at how weak I was. If I was free and not strung up like a dog, I would’ve been back inside her and chasing my second release by now.

  It was a good thing she struggled with the knots I’d pulled far too tight in my rush to fuck her. It gave me a few seconds’ reprieve where my rationality could tiptoe in front of my feral desires and slap some sense into me.

  You need to leave.

  Right now.

  Tearing my mouth away from her breast, I growled. “Now, Pim. Let me go. Now!”

  I had to get away.

  Fast.

  If I could run while sane, I had a chance.

  The rope tightened and then loosened as Pim finally undid the left wrist then my right.

  The moment I could move, I shoved her away from me and threw myself off the bed. I stumbled to one knee in my rush to run, the rope still tethered to one wrist by a loop.

  I didn’t care it trailed after me. I didn’t care I wobbled on legs compounding with pain to return to her.

  I half-ran, half-tripped to the bathroom.

  I didn’t stop to make sure she was okay. I didn’t look back. I careened into the marble tiled haven and slammed the door before locking it and wedging the plush chair by the bath beneath the handle.

  Only once my solitude was secure did I lurch to the mirror, look into the crazy eyes of my youth, and come face-to-face with the man who’d destroyed my everything.

  I clutched the sink as ghosts I’d long since killed came back to haunt me.

  The pain was agonising.

  The urge to return to Pim and pin her down terrorising.

  My muscles quaked as I held onto the basin, locking myself in place even as my flesh bruised to obey other orders.

  Orders to fuck and never stop.

  Orders to give in and let go.

  The infection turned thicker, louder. Bending in half, I clutched the sink with all my might.

  I won’t give in.

  I won’t.

  I won’t.

  But even as I promised myself, I knew it was only a matter of time before I failed. Pim had crossed the line. But I’d sprinted over it. I was so far gone, I couldn’t see who I’d been or how to get back.

  Denying my mind the allure of what it most wanted made it hiss and crow and turn to other things. I had no cello. I’d run out of marijuana. There was no reprieve from the ceaselessness inside my head.

  Just the knowledge that Pim was outside that door, waiting to spread her legs—

  Christ!

  I shook harder as things crawled over my hands. Not insects. Not phantoms. Just itches and imaginary filth. But it had to be cleaned. Immediately.

  Ripping open the taps, I lathered my hands with soap and washed.

  I rinsed.

  I washed again.

  I rinsed.

  I washed again.

  One, two, three times.

  And once the magical number was met, my thoughts hopscotched to a new one.

  The drive for utter cleanliness overrode my teeth-chipping tension for more sex.

  I threw myself into it, accepting the lesser of the two evils.

  Crashing into the shower, I didn’t wait until the water was warm before hurling myself under the spray.

  I never stopped shaking as I palmed handfuls of hotel shampoo and dug it into my scalp.

  I rinsed.

  More shampoo. More washing. Nails scraping my skin and bubbles stinging my eyes.

  I rinsed.

  One, two, three times I washed my hair.

  The rest of my body was next.

  One, two, three towels I used to dry every last droplet.

  One, two, three times I brushed my teeth.

  One, two, three razors I used to shave.

  One, two, three…

  One, two, three…

  Stop it!

  Breathing hard and out of control, I once again bent over the sink and held on as if my life would end if I let go.

  Which was true.

  The life that I knew and carefully cultivated would be gone if I didn’t find the strength to ignore these awful psyche-bending urges.

  I fought the need to wash the basin three times, to cut my nails three times, to rub the foggy mirror one, two, three.

  I listened to the noise of numbers and became physically ill trying to fight them. I was microseconds away from tearing from the bathroom and spreading Pim wide.

  Every inch of me howled for her. I wanted to be inside her for every goddamn minute of every goddamn day. I needed her more than I needed blood in my heart and oxygen in my lungs.

  Stop it!

  I clutched my head.

  It couldn’t be like this.

  I’d had myself under control for years.

  I hadn’t had a breakdown since the last heist that made me who I was today.

  I needed Selix to bring some weed and for him to remove Pim from my immediate vicinity.

  What I needed were the open seas. I needed the waves beneath my feet and open skies upon my face. I needed to be free. I needed to dive into cool water where everything was muted. The ocean was my medicine. And I was in desperate need of it.

  All I had to do was get it together, stay the hell away from Pim, and make it until morning when all of this could be over.

  It would be the hardest night of my life.

  You could be fucking her all night and stop this in the morning.

  I’d never heard a better plan.

  I spun and had my hand on the door before I understood I’d moved.

  No!

  Spinning around, I met my eyes in the mirror, and I did something I hadn’t done since my father and brother died.

  My eyes misted with furious, panicked tears.

  I lied to my reflection. “It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay.”

  But nothing was okay.

  And I begged for the sun to rise.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  ______________________________

  Pim

  ELDER NEVER CAME back to bed.

  I’d waited for him. I’d sat up until my eyes became dry pebbles and the tired scratch made me close them.

  I slipped into fitful sleep.

  In my drea
ms, I hated him and ran far, far away.

  In my nightmares, I loved him and begged him to stay.

  By the time I woke up, I was confused and angry and ready to forget what had happened. I didn’t know if it made me weak or brave, but I was willing to trust him despite the circumstances of last night.

  Maybe it was because of last night.

  He’d shown he wasn’t as invincible as he believed.

  He was fragile…same as me. And that fragility made him brittle and incapable of bending.

  He’d broken something.

  I was willing to see if there was a cure before running away.

  I didn’t know the time when he finally exited the bathroom, but the sun pinked the sky and dawn had well and truly stolen the night.

  I lay still beneath the covers. The same covers that smelt like him. Like us.

  My heart reached out to soothe him, but I didn’t ask if he was all right. Something had happened. I could taste, touch, and hear it.

  Tension cascaded in giant rolling sheets off him like a cape or royal cloak, strapped tight to his throat and trailing wherever he went.

  Shedding my tiredness, I lay stiff and uncertain as he prowled around the room, gathering his clothes and slipping from white towel to black suit.

  I waited until he was dressed before I sat up, clutching the bed covers to my throat. I didn’t ask if he was okay. It was obvious that he wasn’t. I didn’t ask what had happened. It was obvious he wouldn’t tell me. I didn’t ask a million things I should’ve asked. Instead, I asked the one thing I probably shouldn’t.

  The one thing I’d fretted over all night.

  The one thing I needed to know to be able to put this behind us.

  “Elder…”

  He didn’t look up from fastening his tie.

  “El….

  His body twitched—the only sign he was faking ignoring me and was as attuned to me as I was to him. He didn’t reply and another interminable long minute passed. I let him believe I wouldn’t press. That whatever I needed to say wasn’t that important.

  But that was the thing. It was important. Deathly important because I wanted more of what we’d shared—despite the terrifying ending. I wanted more of the magic he weaved and not just from intimacy but from the emotional bond linking and looping, tying and tethering us the longer we spent together.