Angel (A Companion Book to Monster) (Impossible #1.5) (11 page)

But she drew away from me quickly, the confusion, the fear of what she felt for me, still haunting her.  “Thanks,” she said, her voice trembling ever so slightly.

She looked so damn breakable in that moment.  At one time, the sight of her weakness might have driven me to shatter her, to exploit her vulnerability so that I could destroy her resistance.  But that had all changed now.  My only job was to keep her safe.  If I truly cared for
her – and the depth of my feelings for her scared me at times – then I would do what was best for her and forgo my own selfish desires.

I settled down on the bed beside her, careful not to invade her personal space as I cracked open my own book.  But I didn’t miss the longing glances that she shot me, and the way that she shifted uncomfortably from time to time, crossing and uncrossing her legs, let me know that wicked, lustful thoughts had taken hold of her.  It was going to take all of my willpower to resist her when she looked at me like that.  And I wasn’t at all sure that I was strong enough.

Yep, she scared the hell out of me.

I endured hours of excruciating silence as the sexual tension swelled between us.  A lopsided smirk broke out on my face of its own accord every time I caught her stealing glances at me.  Although I didn’t intend to act on it, her irrepressible attraction to me was undeniably gratifying.

It was late afternoon when she finally broke.  The sound of her heavy sigh elicited my triumphant grin, and her eyes focusing on mine was all the excuse I needed to talk to her.

It crossed my mind that maybe
I
was the one who was breaking.

“So,” I said, eagerly anticipating the sound of her voice.  “What do you want to talk about?”

“Not the weather,” she replied, a small smile playing around her lips.  Pleasure surged within me at the return of her flippancy.  We were going to move past the fear from the night she had been attacked, past the damage that I had inflicted with my insane attempt to break her to my will.

“Okay,” I agreed easily. 
“How about you tell me more about you.”  I intentionally phrased it as a statement rather than a question.  She had resisted opening up to me for so long, but if I was going to make good on my vow to make her happy, then I needed to learn her triggers.  It was essential that I no longer upset her every time I opened my mouth.

“Okay,” she assented, her tone colored with reluctance.

My first question probably wasn’t the most cautious opener that I could have chosen, but I burned to know the answer.

“How is it that you don’t have a husband or boyfriend?”  I asked bluntly.  “You’re intelligent, successful,
beautiful; How come some dashing, wealthy businessman hasn’t snapped you up by now?”

Why have you kept yourself closed off for so long, and how can I change that?

The corners of her lips twitched, a frown threatening to twist her expression into something forbidding.  But she was well-practiced in hiding her more painful emotions, and she held it back.  “I just haven’t had the time to date,” she hedged.

“Ah,” I said sagely. 
“The classic workaholic excuse.”  Well, I wasn’t settling for that.  The days of barely scratching the surface were over.  “What’s the real reason, Claudia?”  I asked softly.

She pursed her lips and fixed me with a glare.  I had pushed too hard with that one.  We could return to that later.  I changed tactics.

“Okay,” I allowed.  “When was the last time you
did
go on a date?”

She still looked annoyed, and for a moment I feared that she was going to shut down on me completely.  Finally, the lines of her face relaxed, and she sighed, capitulating.  “Seven years,” she said quietly, dropping her eyes as she made the admission.

I let out a low whistle, determined to keep the conversation moving so that she didn’t clam up on me.  “Damn,” I declared.  “So that was what, during college?”

“Yeah.”
She sighed again, and I was thrilled to see her resistance finally falling away.  “He was a junior, I was a sophomore.  He said he loved me, and I believed him.  But it wasn’t much more than a fling.  It was over before the end of Spring semester.”

“Ouch,” I said.  “Sounds like a real douchebag.”  I meant every word of that.  How could any man leave her once he had her in his bed?  The concept was baffling.

“Pretty much,” she agreed, her lips pursed in distaste.

“Have you had sex since then?”

Alright, learning the answer to that wasn’t exactly essential in figuring out her triggers, but I craved to know if I had been right in my assumptions about her sexual innocence.

She gasped, shocked at the utter gall of my inquiry.

I couldn’t help chuckling at her adorably hostile expression.  “Alright, alright,” I said, relenting.  “A lady doesn’t kiss and tell.”  But her reaction was all the response I needed.  She was every bit as innocent as I had suspected.  The knowledge made my mouth water.

I guess I’m a glutton for punishment,
I thought wryly as the ache of my insistent desire tormented me.  I couldn’t remember the last time I had gone this long without release.  The denial would have been bad enough without the constant temptation that she posed.  I was going to crack very soon.  Some of the pressure that had built up within me had to be siphoned off, weakness in the face of her allure be damned.

“New topic,” I declared, needing to move on for both our sakes.  “Why did you choose to become a pediatrician instead of a surgeon like your dad?”

Her lips twitched again, but mercifully, she kept talking.  “I told you,” she said simply.  “I like helping kids.”

“Why?”  I pressed, no longer allowing her to keep secrets.

Pain flashed in her eyes and her brow furrowed.  For a moment, I didn’t think that she was going to answer.

“Because they need someone watching out for them,” she said quietly.  She took a deep breath, bracing herself.  “Like no one watched out for me.”  Her voice was barely a whisper, and the sight of her naked pain – finally fully revealed to me with horrible, stark clarity – sent a sharp pang shooting through my heart.  I almost wished that I hadn’t seen it.

Almost.

But the fact that she had confided one of her most deeply-held secrets helped to alleviate any regret that I might have felt at drawing it from her.  Even more than I craved her body, I hungered for this.  This was the true desire that had rendered me powerless to her since the very beginning.

No one had ever trusted me like this; no one had ever needed me.  The knowledge that she accepted my protection, that she found comfort in my care, buoyed me in a way that nothing else ever had.  It was as though an essential, primal imperative had been fulfilled; I had never realized the extent of the gaping emptiness inside of me until she filled it with her trust in me.

I reached out and took her hand in mine, and for once the satisfaction that I felt at our contact had little to do with the lust that it awoke within me.  Her glistening, tear-filled eyes widened slightly when they met mine.  She was evidently as overwhelmed by my show of open vulnerability as I was by hers.

Beneath our false exteriors – mine cocky and hers cold – we were both broken.  Each of our souls recognized our shared pain.  And in our longing to be whole and healed, we reached out to one another.  We would no longer have to pretend, to bear the weight of hiding our deep-seated anguish.  When we were together, we could be our true selves, with no fear of risking further damage if we dropped our guards.

My heart skipped a beat when she twined her slender fingers through my calloused ones, and I watched her in wonder as she slowly leaned into me, seeking comfort in physical as well as emotional intimacy.  My brain stalled out, devoid of any thoughts.  All that existed were her gorgeous eyes and her perfect, plump lips.

My heart swelled almost painfully when she softly, tentatively, pressed them against mine.

Chapter 9

I hesitated.  I shouldn’t let her kiss me.  Because I couldn’t let
her
kiss
me
.  If I didn’t pull away now, I wouldn’t be able to hold back.

But she needed this, needed
me
.  And not out of lust, but out of the basest imperative for human contact.  She had been alone for so long.  And while I had certainly fucked my way through dozens of women, I had been alone too.

I would be gentle with her.  I had to be gentle with her.  We would share this one kiss; I couldn’t reject her when she had just opened up to me, couldn’t bear to see her retreat behind her walls again.

My lips softly shaped themselves around hers, allowing her to control the intensity.  Still, I couldn’t resist the impulse to wrap my hand around the back of her neck, holding her close.  When she shuddered in response to the barest hint of my dominant side, I surrendered to it just a touch more, my resolve slipping.  My tongue traced the line of her lower lip, and she opened for me willingly, welcoming my exploration.  She didn’t defy me this time, didn’t challenge my control of her mouth.  She ceded it to me almost eagerly.

Her low, husky moan destroyed my last vestiges of resistance.  I gave in to the part of myself that I craved to release –and that she craved to have unleashed upon her.

My tongue plundered her depths in earnest as I wrapped my hand around the front of her throat, pushing her down onto her back.  The feel of the slender column of her neck in my gentle grip was sweeter than I could have imagined.  But my pleasure magnified exponentially at her response.  Her body went limp beneath me, her arms falling to either side of her head as she exposed her vulnerable wrists to me.  She was soft and supple, compliant in my hands.

Submissive.

I drove my tongue in and out of her mouth with rough, demanding strokes, a lewd mimicry of how I would penetrate other parts of her body; a fierce promise that I would do so.

As much as I loved her hot mouth, I hungered to explore more of her.

Her low, protesting whine when I tore my lips from hers was exquisite.  Even more pleasing was the fact that she didn’t fight to maintain the kiss.  She accepted that I would touch her as I wanted, not as she demanded.  And her pleasure would be all the more intense for it when I finally did grant her release.

My lips brushed against the sensitive skin just below her ear, the tip of my tongue heating her flesh as I traced little teasing patterns over it.  Her shiver when I blew a stream of air over the enflamed area wasn’t just a reaction to the sudden coolness.  She responded beautifully to my skillful manipulation of her body, her mind falling under my thrall as she became consumed by the sensations that I was inflicting upon her.

I pulled back slightly so that I could study her, and the sight of her parted lips and the lust that clouded eyes filled me with triumphant satisfaction.  She was truly mine now; I possessed her in every way that had ruled my fantasies for long, agonizing days and nights.  And unlike in my more twisted imaginings, I didn’t own her, I hadn’t broken her.  She fully trusted me with her body and her mind, and that made the excruciating wait worth it.  Her submission was willing, not forced.  This was how it was meant to be between us.

A pleased chuckle rumbled through my chest as she finally ceded to my control.  Now that she had let go of her fear and confusion when it came to her reactions to me, she could accept the fulfillment that I had longed to grant her.

I fully intended to claim all of her; she was no longer allowed to hide her body from me.  It was my possession, and it was might right to look upon it, to touch it, whenever I chose.

I grasped her camisole, my hands fisting in the thin material.  My grin was hard-edged and predatory as I paused, savoring her rapt expression.  The fabric parted with a satisfying ripping sound, a symbolic echo of my destruction of the barriers that she had kept between us.

She gasped, her eyes rolling back as the eroticism of what I was doing to her overwhelmed her.  Her naked body arched up into me, silently begging me to touch her.  The way that her taut nipples strained toward me was undeniably enticing.  But I had to teach her that she couldn’t manipulate me into touching her the way that she wanted.

I pressed my hand against her sternum, careful not to stimulate her breasts as I shoved her back against the mattress.

“I didn’t say you could move,” I reprimanded, my voice a low, warning growl.

Her lustful moan sent blood pulsing to my already-stiff cock, the sound sweetly tormenting me.  The way that she stilled beneath my hand only further aroused me.

My tongue flicked over the tight peak of her dusky nipple, a reward for her compliance.  She whimpered in response as painful desire claimed her, but other than her trembling, she remained still.  My lips curved in a small, slightly cruel smile as I planted gentle kisses around her areola, teasing her, testing her obedience.

When I knew that the hardened bud must be aching from the need to be touched, I closed my teeth around it, biting sharply.  Pleasure mingled with pain in her shocked cry, and she writhed
beneath me as she was wracked by the unfamiliar sensual torture.

My cock hardened further in reaction to her beautiful response to the pain that I had given her.  She was perfect, and I was going to relish every minute of training her, of pushing her limits as I slowly consumed every delicious scrap of her innocence.  I would master her body so that she was ruined for any man except me.  She would never want anyone else.

“Please,” she groaned.  “Sean, please.”  She ground her hips up against me as she desperately sought release, and the friction against my dick almost made me lose control.

Her first lesson: disobedience had consequences.  I had ordered her not to move, but she was flagrantly defying me.

I pulled my mouth from her and drew my hand back before bringing it down sharply on her breast.  The shock in her wide eyes was even more gratifying than the gorgeous shade of red that bloomed on her milky flesh.  Her mouth formed a perfect
O
as she gasped, and I eagerly anticipated the day that I would see my cock sliding between those lips.

“I told you to stay still,” I reminded her forbiddingly.  It was essential that I inform her of why she was being punished so that she would know what behavior to correct. 

A hint of erotic fear mingled with the lust in her eyes, and she shivered beneath me.

“I…  I’m sorry,” she gasped out.

Her breathless apology elicited my twisted grin, and she flinched slightly when I reached for her, anticipating more pain.  She still didn’t understand how this worked.  I cupped her face tenderly to demonstrate that she was forgiven for her small transgression.  Confusion flashed across her features even as she leaned into my touch, as though she couldn’t help herself.  I traced the pad of my thumb over her full, beautiful lips.

It was my turn to be shocked when her hot tongue darted out to lick me tentatively.  I studied her with rapt fascination as I applied the slightest pressure, and she opened for me, allowing my thumb to penetrate her mouth.  She closed her lips around it, sucking gently as she swirled her tongue around it.

She might be innocent, but she knew how to suck cock.  My own jerked against her hip in response to her ministrations.

“Fuck, Claudia.”  I breathed her name like an erotic prayer.

I pulled my thumb from her mouth so that I could claim it with my own.  Her lips were parted for me, offered up to me.

She was so goddamn beautiful.  I could happily spend an eternity exploring her body and never tire of it.  Perfect pleasure surged through me as I realized that my deepest desire was my reality; she would be with me always.

Because she can’t escape you.

With that one cruel thought, my joy shattered, the shards of it slicing viciously at my insides as it blew apart.

Fuck!

This was exactly what I had sworn to shield her from.  She might have been the one to lean in for the kiss, but I had seized her moment of vulnerability and twisted it to my advantage.  It didn’t matter that I had been vulnerable in that moment too.  It was my responsibility to take care of her, to protect her, and just now I had been intent on corrupting her.

And even now, my lust for her, the compulsion to possess her, was undiminished.

Clinging to my revulsion, I forced myself to roll off of her, to put distance between us.  The loss of the heat of her made my gut clench.

The hurt in her eyes as she looked at me in confusion tore at me.  “Sean?  What’s wrong?”  The sound of my name on her lips, the concern for me that bled into her tone, tempted me to return to her.

I rounded on her, my ire at myself exploding out of me. 

“
What’s wrong?
”  I shouted furiously.  “Everything about this is wrong, Claudia!  You were right: I’m really fucked up. 
This
is really fucked up.”

“But I-
”  She began.  But I cut her off, refusing to allow her to make excuses for my indefensible behavior.

“I’m taking advantage of you, Claudia,” I snapped at her, determined to make her understand just how depraved I truly was.  “And you’re letting me.”

I was toxic for her.  I was slowly, insidiously poisoning her mind, warping her true nature until I fashioned her into what I wanted her to be: my possession.  Of course she would cleave to me, inevitably yield to me.  She couldn’t escape me, and I had become the only thing in her life.  Her continued existence hinged upon my goodwill.  Even if she didn’t realize it, it was imperative to her survival that she keep me happy, and her mind was slowly succumbing to that truth.

Her cheeks flamed scarlet as she tried to cover herself with the tattered remnants of her camisole.  I had to fight back the sick impulse to order her not to hide her body from me.

The threat of fresh tears made her eyes shine.  “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

She
was apologizing to
me?
  God, was her deference already becoming that ingrained?  My stomach roiled at the evidence of how I had perverted her.

“You’re sorry,” I echoed hollowly, disgusted.  I couldn’t bring myself to look at her any longer, to be tormented by the sight of how I had despoiled her.  “Maybe it’s better if you aren’t in here with me,” I told her.

Fear flashed across her features.  “Please,” she begged.  “Don’t.”

I realized that she was afraid that I intended to leave her in Bradley’s care.  The fact that she could ever think that I would leave her at his mercy just proved that her need for me was a product of her terror, not her trust.

It was a struggle to move away from her, as though my limbs had suddenly turned leaden.  It took all of my strength to walk away.

“Don’t worry,” I said, my voice detached, deadened rather than reassuring.  “I’m going to stay on the couch.”

I left my bedroom, hating myself more than ever when I slid the lock home behind me, trapping her in her cell.

It turned out that solitary confinement would be much better for her than being trapped with me.

I barely slept that night.  Not only was the couch about two feet too short for me to stretch out properly, but I was haunted by what I had done to Claudia.  I couldn’t stop turning everything over in my mind: the trust in her eyes, her beautiful submission, her hurt and disappointment when I pulled away from her.

These thoughts continued to plague me the next day.  I had known since the very beginning that she was attracted to me.  Was it possible that she actually wanted what I had to offer her?  Was her surrender a product of her warped situation, or would she desire me regardless of the circumstances?  I wondered what we might have had if we had met in real life rather than being thrown together in this clusterfuck.

But the reality of it was that I never would have met her if not for Bradley’s rash decision to abduct her.  We came from different worlds, and the likelihood of our paths crossing was slim to none.  And even if we had met, her impenetrable walls and my cocksure mask would have prevented us from connecting, from recognizing just how similar we were in the ways that mattered most.

When I thought of it in those terms, I couldn’t bring myself to truly regret having forcibly kept her in my life.  I was better for having known her; she made me want to be better.

And even knowing how much pain and turmoil I had caused her, I recognized that she was better for having known me.  The life that she had been leading hadn’t really been a life at all.  Facing her demons might cause her anguish, but at least she was feeling
something.

At the end of the day, the harsh reality of our situation was unalterable.  If I freed her, she would likely be dead in a matter of days.  No way was I going to allow that to happen.  We were stuck with one another.  Would it really be so wrong if we built a life together?

I had been desperately trying to maintain control, to take full responsibility for the nature of our relationship.  But it occurred to me now that I had never once asked Claudia what she wanted.  I had flirted with her, toyed with her, questioned her, and seduced her as my ever-changing resolutions as to how to treat her no doubt caused her to feel utterly powerless.  She deserved a say in this.  I was going to sit down with her and explain our options.