IT’S my new favourite song. Cassidy and Shoshanna went back to their room half an hour ago to sleep but I slept all day, so I’m still wired. And he isn’t home…
I lift my arms up, making little circling motions in the air above my head with my fingers. The silk of my dress rises to my underwear seam, the fabric caressing my skin, that sensual caress of silk on flesh arousing me.
Closing my eyes, I hum to the melody just as the sound of a door opening snatches me from my dreamy state. I open my eyes and meet the owner of a heated blue gaze. My heart fills with love for this man. My everything. A guardian. A boyfriend. A lover. A teacher.
He frowns at me, and I smile a little harder. Happy. I’m so happy when he’s close. When he sees me.
‘Who touched your hair?’ he asks smoothly, but he might as well have asked who broke my arm because his body takes on a predator’s cold, alarming stillness.
Continuing to sway my hips under his penetrative stare, I ask sweetly, ‘Don’t you like it? It’s just a few inches shorter.’
He lowers his head, staring at me through his top lashes. ‘Do you like it?’
Swooning at his protective nature, I nod, still dancing seductively. ‘Yes. I do.’
‘Very well. But next time, little deer, you ask me before you change anything about yourself. Give me the opportunity to prepare for that change. Do you understand?’
‘Yes, Sir,’ I agree as he takes a measured step towards me, his potent energy filling the room.
His attention seems to have tangible depth— God, it can slide along my skin, squeeze my flesh. I roll my head as the reverie of his touch forces a soft hum through my lips. And as he traces his lower lip with his tongue, my nipples tighten.
Absolute control.
Even from this distance.
I’ve never danced for him before. I skim my hands down the side of my face and over the front of my dress, rolling my hips as my palms slide over the now aching pointed beads.
He deadpans.
Then he’s not looking at me.
I drop my arms immediately as I follow his gaze to one of the foreign henchmen standing across the floor, dutifully at his post, but transfixed on me.
I look at Henchman Jeeves who is staring ahead, not at me or Clay. He isn’t oblivious though; the tic in his jaw is proof enough that he knows what is coming.
Time moves slowly now as I flick my eyes from him to watch Clay stride towards the man. Across the floor.
I look at the guard; his eyes haven’t left me. Stupid. To Henchman Jeeves, who is now closing the gap between us. To Clay Butcher as he passes a cabinet. Back and forth. The man’s attention is still fixed, ignorant to the slow, quiet movements that have death and danger circling him.
Stupid—
Clay reaches for a thick based bottle of alcohol. Then everything speeds up, and he’s on the man instantly, smashing the bottle on the wall beside his face, brown liquid glistening with shiny shards. The man breaks from his trance, startled.
The sharp blades meet the underside of the henchman’s right eye. He is now pinned to the wall by Clay Butcher’s formidable form, and I hold my breath.
‘See something you want to taste?’ Clay hisses, leaning in, but suddenly Henchman Jeeves steps in front of my view, hiding his boss. Yet, I still hear the man howl even though I can’t see what’s happening. ‘I should hollow your eyes from your skull.’
My eyes shoot to HJ’s tight features. My friend. My guard. The man shielding me from witnessing something I may not be able to handle, but I can handle it.
‘Move,’ I order, trying to step past him. He refuses. I don’t need nor desire his protection in this case. I understand this. I’m not that soft. ‘Sir,’ I call soothingly, hoping my voice will somehow break Clay Butcher from his state of feral possessiveness.
HJ twists to see his boss, so I take the opportunity to sidestep from the blockage of his body. Clay’s back bunches as I speak. The glass is an inch inside the man’s flesh. ‘Tell him to leave so you can come here and touch me,’ I plead in a breathy cadence, experiencing a thrill and love and a kind of intoxicating power stir within me.
I watch Clay lower the bottle to his side. We are both learning how to be together. What it means… All these feelings. I miss him. When he’s away it sickens me.
And then when he comes home, returns to me, there is this eutrophic moment. The moment I need. A passionate display that he cares. I’m insecure… I know.
How can I not be?
‘Apparently, she is allowing you to keep your eyes,’ he states, his tone somehow smooth and commanding, but also flaring with a snarl of restraint. ‘Leave. All of you.’
They don’t waste any time.
All three henchmen leave.
I glance at Henchman Jeeves, the last man to exit, closing the door behind him and he nods at me.
But my breath hitches when I look back at Clay. He’s staring at me and then at the door HJ disappeared through, his shoulders squared and stiff. His jaw pulses and I realise the interaction just now—HJ nodding at me—bothers him.
With Clay’s eyes fixed to my body, he places the smashed bottle on its side, blood dripping from the shiny surface. Not a lot. Just enough to explain the man’s choked howl of anguish.
Leisurely loosening his tie, his tall, dark, muscular figure walks confidently over to me. He takes a firm hold of my chin, his fingers dipping into my cheek, arching my face up. A harsh hold to foreground a serious message.
Leaning down so that his lips talk against my puckered mouth, he says, ‘Do you need some kind of reassurance from Bolton, little deer?’
My heart thrashes in my neck, but his mouth is so close to mine, his energy sparking in volatility, I’m quivering with need for him. Finding his feral state of jealousy seductive.
Breathing deeply, I pull away from his grasp, provoking his fingers to give and allow me reprieve.
Softly, slowly, like edging towards a growling dog, I reach up and touch his face. ‘Have you ever been in love before, Sir?’
His jaw clenches beneath my palm, while his eyes are intent on mine. ‘No, sweet girl. I don’t believe I ever have. Until now.’
My heart grows, and I beam, unable to bridle my smile at his honesty. He loves me. I know. He knows too. ‘Scary, isn’t it?’
He grins, and it’s devilish and cunning, and my knees buckle from the devastating beauty of it. ‘For the world, sweet girl. It is incredibly scary for the world.’
He scoops me into his arms, and I gasp at being so easily manhandled by this terrifying man. A commanding force who is suffering the volatility of love for the first time. He walks with me, cradled to his chest, over to the mattress.
He crawls on, bracing the nape of my neck and head in his large hand before settling down with me under him. One of those trivial things that I love so much. The hand behind my head. Protecting my neck.
And then he kisses me.
His lips slide over mine, and my chest fills with air, my moans and his, and my ever-growing heart. Leaving my lips with a small nip, he drags his down the length of my body at an excruciatingly slow pace. Skating over the silk of my gown, he is soft, and I arch my back off the mattress, wanting more pressure from him. Clutching at him. Wanting to be bruised with his intensity.
He stops at my waist, quickly kneels, grips me either side of my hip, and flips me so I am face down on the mattress.
My dress slides up with the motion, the air now touching the lower globes of my arse cheeks. He slaps the side of my arse hard enough to send a sting through me, but it’s only a passing action as he is now pulling my underwear down past my knees.
He stuffs a pillow below my hips. Listening to him remove his belt and drag his pants down, I push up on my elbows to see better. His large hand meets the centre of my back, spanning out and pushing me back into the cushioning beneath me.
I groan at being pinned as his other hand slides to dip inside me, priming me. He growls when his finger slides around my arousal. ‘So wet. For me? I hope.’
I frown. ‘It’s always you, Sir!’
With that, he feeds his cock below my arse, between the delta at my thighs, and slams in fast and deep with one long, possessive thrust. “Pretty little liar.”
I cry out, taking him so quick.
There is a message in his depth.
A warning in his formidable presence.
‘Your body’—he starts to fuck me, his hips dragging a gasp and then a groan from my parted lips—’is so’—my pussy clings to every thick inch as he moves relentlessly, pointedly, purposefully—’fucking dangerous.
‘So pretty, men risk their eyes for the view.’ He sweeps my blonde hair to the side, jack-hammering a message into me from behind. ‘Love from a man like me isn’t just scary, sweet girl. My brand of love is lethal. I will hurt them.’
I fist the sheets as he works out his possessive demons using my writhing body for therapy. I know what he’s saying, but I ask anyway, the question expelling in bursts that match the pounding of his hips. ‘Hurt.’ I gasp. ‘Who?’
His lips meet my ear, his voice dark, while the rest of his body only tenses and powers through with more unyielding focus. ‘The men that you let look at you.’
A pulse begins low in my abdomen, and I pant while taking this fierce man’s thrusts. ‘I didn’t.’
‘The men that you blush for.’
‘I don’t.’
‘Smile for.’
‘I don’t!’
‘You blushed the prettiest colour for Malik,’ he growls, laying his large body on my back, his thighs locking mine in tight. It’s an intimidating hold, but the pulse in my core only becomes more erratic. More stirring. The energy moving lower. Seduced by the growl in his tone, the weight of him, the heat of his feverish skin. ‘And I don’t care that he’s one of the richest men in Dubai, little deer.’ His lips touch my spine. ‘If you flush under his smile again, I’ll gift him to you in small pieces.’
He goes on roughly. ‘You did this on purpose… Pushed me to the edge of my resolve. Testing your boundaries. Admit it to me, little deer. Don’t lie.’
I roll my head from side to side against the pillow. ‘No.’
‘Lie.’ He slaps the side of my arse, forcing a cry through gasping lips. Pain and pleasure surge and wrestle for dominance. He drops his voice further, saying, ‘You did it in the dressing room when you panted Aurora’s name. And kept touching yourself for me to see. You wanted me to take you. You didn’t like that I kept my cock from you while you healed.’
‘No. I didn’t even realise I said her name.’
‘Lies.’ His palm connects again, a sting ripping through me. ‘My sweet girl who wants to experience and experiment.’ He slows down, teasing the muscles inside me with the perfect rhythm. ‘And smile at other men and drive me out of my goddamn mind. Do you want to lie again?’
I only shake my head, but it’s enough to earn me a slap harder than before, and while he takes my body in a way that roars it’s for him, the sting on my arse cheek reminds me that he holds me accountable. That he sees me.
That sensation is for me.
The thought of his affections, of his attention, throws me into pleasure’s grasp. I begin to tense, my orgasm cresting because of the perfect pace and—
He rams into me and holds, halting the sensation—my climax—from building further, from peaking.
No!
Bastard.
He did that on purpose!
I whimper at the loss.
He begins again, his rhythm brutal and abrupt.
‘Admit it, sweet girl,’ he growls, shoving me up the mattress with each pound of his hips. ‘Admit. That you. Want me. Like this. Territorial. Obsessive.’
‘Fine! I do!’ I relent.
He stills. A long guttural moan escapes my lips, warmth from my breath hitting the pillow, heating me further. Defeated. I’m fucking defeated. I want him like this.
I want you jealous, Sir! Dammit.
I want him jealous like I am! He’s married. He’s married, so he’s not mine. His words from the past hisses at me. ‘I’ll never be yours.’
Fuck.
He knows everything. He always knows, and I’m the stupid girl who can’t keep up with this impressive man.
Bastard.
‘Good girl.’ He softens. He threads his fingers tenderly through mine, leaning on his elbows to give me a big breath of air. Humming his approval, he rolls his hips upwards, hitting the twitching bundle of nerves inside me.
He understands my body.
With his approval, I start to come even as I shake from the truth that he wrenched from me. The acknowledgement to who owns my pleasure, expels me as a deep throaty groan muffled in the plush fabric below my face—Sir.
He works his cock in and out, dragging the full, throbbing length along every muscle, and I clench around him, holding him to me in a way Aurora never has. And never will. And for a moment, that is enough… I breathe out that lie. A lie. It’s another fucking lie.
I want all of him.
‘This is my sweet, young body,’ he says smoothly. ‘I’ve felt your heartbeat. Tasted your pussy. Touched your blood and licked your tears.’ His breaths become heavier, and I’m now burnt out, spent, from his words, from the pumping of his cock inside me. From the honesty he fucked from me. Yes, I was enjoying the attention—even from Aurora. I want to be close to her to be closer to him. I want to be a part of every aspect of his life.
I. Am. Obsessed.
I am the one obsessed, territorial, and crazy because he is my fucking everything. ‘I just want you,’ I cry out, utterly overwhelmed.
His warm breath blankets me. ‘You have me, little deer. And you’re going to be swollen with my children soon.’
What?
Soon?
A deep groan rumbles through his chest as his words seemingly spur him on. His hips become rhythmic, chasing. ‘Another way you’ll have me. Play your games. But remember what happens when you do. I’ll fuck you until you feel me rattle your goddamn bones.’
My moans break from me. ‘Oh. Oh.’
The packed muscles lining his powerful physique tighten against my own soft body, his thighs bracing my legs harder, and with a possessive growl, he comes inside me, shaking us both.
Groaning, he holds himself buried deep, the pulsing of his release making me swim in the pleasure he’s experiencing as if it were my own. ‘Fuck.’
He slowly winds himself down by rolling slowly, wringing out every powerful burst of cum. I feel it inside me. Wet. Thick. Powerful.
I wriggle on the pillow stuffed below my hips, so entirely enjoyed and possessed by the man holding me down. I pant deeply, my own orgasm a trickling sensation now.
Still breathing hard, my brain reaches for the sentence he uttered about children. ‘Did you say soon, Sir?’
‘Don’t move, little deer,’ he says, easing himself from me with gentle precision, so as to not drag his cum from inside me. ‘Be a good girl. Stay nice and still for me.’
He kisses down my spine, and I close my eyes, feeling each gentle touch of his lips on my back like the promise of a future. Like the gift of our forever. And emotions build, tears rising. He wants to have a baby with me.
His declarations to keep me, care for me, spoil me, have never been so concrete, so real… He wants to have a baby with me. Not like before. Not just accept the responsibility of the one already growing inside me when no one else would but to actually make one.
With. Me.
God.
I start to sob softly, tears wetting the fabric beneath me. ‘Are we going to have a baby together?’
‘Yes, little deer. ‘ He kisses my spine again. ‘Don’t cry. It pains me. You asked once if I could love someone who found their accomplishments in being a good mother. You spoke of this in your grief. And I promised to spoil you. You want to be a mother. I want to watch you swell with my babies, watch you nurse them and bring them comfort. Be sweet with them. Give them all the things—’ He stops talking but I hear his mind whispering, ‘All the things we didn’t have.’
All the things we didn’t have.
A sense of home.
Luca admitted to his inadequacies as a father, but what about Clay’s mother? She seems to adore him. Was she really that terrible a parent? A neglectful woman, maybe?
I sniffle a little as relief reaches out and wraps me in a weighted blanket. I didn’t realise just how much I wanted this. Yearned for this. How I found a sense of purpose when I was pregnant. Like the baby gave me a new life…
It’s why I want to cook and stack pillows and make spaces comfortable and fun.
It’s because other little girls laid in bed, held awake by their father’s snoring and the sugar-high from their mother’s freshly baked cake, and they imagined their future of fame, of degrees and doctorates, of money and wealth. Of being successful and independent.
While I imagined being them.
I’m an orphan.
My fairy-tale is family.
And Clay Butcher knows it.
