Hurt the One You Love

by Megan Hart

  "I don't like gin," Elliott said.

  "I don't like being talked to in that tone of voice," Simone shot back.

  He didn't answer her right away. She waited for his expression to soften. For an apology. All she got was a shrug.

  The meal was silent and uncomfortable, and though there'd been times before when he'd made her angry, and sometimes he'd made her cry, before now Elliott had never made her feel this . . . anxious despair. Simone didn't give in to that, though. Nor did she try to coo or placate him, or try to jolly him out of his mood. He didn't even bother to make small talk.

  Neither of them ate very much.

  Afterward, he did carry the dishes to the sink and help her put away the food. He moved around her kitchen as though he owned it, finding the right containers for leftovers without having to ask. Cleaning up the messes she'd left on the stove and in the sink. Simone stood back and gave him his space, but in her small kitchen it was only a matter of time before they bumped into each other.

  "Sorry," Elliott said grudgingly as he turned. When she didn't say anything but tried to move past him, he took her by the elbow to get her to look at him. "Simone. I'm sorry."

  Emotion flooded her, and she blinked back tears. "What's wrong with you tonight?"

  "Nothing. Forget it. I just . . ." He shrugged and took the butter dish from her and set it on the counter behind him, leaving her hands empty. He pulled her close.

  He kissed her.

  And dammit, even though she'd been angry with him for being such an asshole, there wasn't much she could do when he kissed her other than to kiss him back. It wasn't anything like gentle, and Simone whimpered at the crush of her teeth against her lips. When his hands gripped her hips hard enough to pinch, shudders of pleasure rippled through her.

  He backed her up against the counter, pinning her. When she tried to put her arms around his neck, he grabbed her wrists and kept her hands at her sides. He squeezed, tight and tighter, and she loved it.

  She gasped when he put his mouth to her throat, using his teeth. She gave him her neck, arching her back to encourage him as he pushed her harder against the line of the counter, causing it to sink deep into her back.

  This was what she wanted. This urgency, this roughness. Yes, this pain.

  When he put his hand beneath her dress, finding her garters, Elliott groaned and buried his face against her. "Fuck, Simone. You are so fucking sexy."

  His words thrilled her. The way he pushed his fingers inside her panties even more so. When he found her clit, rolling it, her hips bucked and she cried out.

  "Harder," she breathed. "Oh, please, Elliott . . . hurt me. . . ."

  He stopped.

  Pulled away. There were inches between them when only a heartbeat ago there'd been no space at all. Breathing hard, Elliott backed even farther away.

  Confused, Simone shook her dress down over her thighs and pushed away from the counter. "Elliott . . . "

  He held up a hand to silence her. "I'm leaving."

  "What?"

  He didn't answer her. He just left her in the kitchen. Simone didn't settle for that. She went after him.

  "Don't you walk away from me," she told him in a shaky voice. It was hard for her to catch a breath.

  He looked back at her. "I can't do that."

  "Can't do . . . what?" She realized what he meant before he answered her. "Hurt me? Is that what you mean?"

  Elliott shook his head, though he was not disagreeing. "What kind of man puts his hands on a woman and uses them to hurt her?"

  The self-loathing in his voice stunned her. She reached for him, but he shrugged away from her touch. "You do understand, don't you, the difference between trying to hurt someone out of anger, and playing with pain to give someone pleasure? I mean . . . there's a difference, Elliott."

  "It's sick." His voice grated, harsh, not like his normal tone at all. It sounded broken, like a bottle shattered on brick. "It's sick to hurt someone and like it."

  "Not if the other person likes it, too," Simone said. "Not if you both like it and agree--"

  "I don't agree!" Elliott shouted. "It's wrong and sick and disgusting."

  She stared at him. "I like pain, in the right circumstances. I like it when you give it to me. I thought you understood that. And you seemed to like it, too. And there's nothing wrong about it, or sick, or twisted, or dirty."

  "It makes me feel that way," Elliott said.

  Sickened, Simone swallowed hard against a surge of bitterness. "I would never want you to feel that way about anything we do together, Elliott. But I don't understand why, if you feel that way, you . . . did it. With me. Before."

  He said nothing, his hand on the doorknob. His shoulders rose and fell with his breathing. He looked away from her.

  She didn't try to move closer. In fact, Simone thought if she tried to walk, she would trip and fall and not be able to get back up. She was shaking again, but this time not with passion.

  "I would never want you to do something that made you feel bad about yourself," she told him. "I love you."

  Elliott flinched. "Don't."

  "I love you," she said, a little louder. A little stronger. She waited another handful of seconds before saying, "Now would be the time for you to say something, Elliott."

  "I don't want to see you again."

  Simone drew in a long, sobbing breath that hurt her in every single pore, but managed to find the voice to answer him. "That's not what I was hoping to hear."

  "I'm sorry."

  "You're not sorry!" she shouted, sending him back against the front door though she hadn't done so much as take a step toward him. "You're not sorry, you're a fucking asshole!"

  "Fine. Then I'm an asshole."

  "I'm not going to beg you to stay with me," Simone said.

  "I wouldn't expect you to." He opened the door.

  "Now would be the time," Simone called after him, barely able to get the words out, "to tell me that being with me did not disgust you."

  He looked over his shoulder at her. "I can't tell you that."

  "Get out," Simone said. Her voice rose into a throat-shredding scream. "If being with me disgusts you so much, then just get out! Go!"

  And then, damn him, he went.

  Chapter 33

  Simone ran.

  Not physically--the shoes made that impossible. But in her heart, she ran. As fast and far from Elliott as she could.

  She ran to Aidan. Of course she did. He'd always been there to give her what she craved, what she needed. What she had long ago discovered she could live without only if she decided to be unhappy, dissatisfied, discontent. Until Elliott, Aidan had been the only man to ever understand her well enough to make her happy.

  At the thought of it, a giant fist squeezed her heart and her throat until she couldn't breathe. On the sidewalk in front of Aidan's building Simone staggered as though drunk, turning the heads of the couple passing by. She bared her teeth at them, daring them to offer to help her. The man took in the sight of her dress, the stockings, the shoes, probably the makeup smearing her face. For a moment he half reached for her, but the woman on his arm pulled him back with a glare.

  There was a moment, standing in front of Aidan's front door, when Simone second-guessed herself. Her knuckles brushed the painted wood without knocking. She put both hands flat on it. Then her forehead. She could walk away now, before he answered. He would never even know she'd been there, but she would remember it. What she'd done when Elliott rejected her. Who'd she'd come to. She would always remember that.

  With a hitching sob, Simone knocked. Then again, harder, bruising her hand and not caring. It was a different kind of pain, the sort she inflicted on herself, but that didn't matter. She slammed her fist against the door until the skin split.

  "Simone? What's wrong?" Aidan asked.

  He wore a pair of jeans slung low on his hips to show off the V of his abs, the first tufting hint of pubic hair. Bare feet. His hair brushed his shoulders in tangled
waves, and the scruff on his chin showed he hadn't shaved in a few days. He was so beautiful it made her heart hurt.

  He reached for her, drew her inside. He put his arms around her, one big hand cupping the back of her head. For only a few seconds Simone allowed herself to relax into his embrace before she pushed away, shaking her head. She tipped her face to him, well aware of how horrible she must look, how her makeup must be smeared. Skin pale with fury and despair.

  "I need you," she said simply.

  He knew what she meant, just as she'd known he would. The look in his eyes shifted from concern to that dark spark that had made her fall in love with him so many years ago. She didn't feel that way about him anymore, but it didn't matter. Love had burned her up and left behind nothing but ash.

  Simone didn't want love. She wanted something else from him, and it wasn't a hug. Without another word, she moved past him, into the living room. She didn't bother looking around--she knew the layout of this room well enough. She knew the straight-backed, cushionless chair that looked so benign in the corner. She pulled it into the center of the room. She reached to unhook the halter of her dress, letting it fall down to expose her bare skin. She shivered at the sight of Aidan's tongue sliding across his bottom lip. She turned to show him the entirety of her naked back.

  "Simone," Aidan whispered. "Are you sure this is what you want?"

  In answer, she turned around to grip the back of the chair. Legs slightly spread, the way he'd always liked to see her, so that he could slide his hands under her skirt and get to her pussy. Her split knuckles ached as she squeezed the smooth wood. She waited.

  For a few terrible moments, she was terrified he would reject her, too. But then the warmth of Aidan's hand stroked down Simone's back. He traced the curve of her shoulder blades. The knobs of her spine. She was too thin for him now, she knew that. He'd always liked women with more curves. It wouldn't matter.

  His hand moved lower to cup her ass. She breathed, closing her eyes. His fingers moved lower, under the hem of her dress to pull it up to her hips. She wanted to smile at the sound of his breath at the sight of her sheer panties, the lacy garter belt and stockings. She wanted to spread herself open for him and give it all away.

  "You're shaking," Aidan said in a low voice. His hand cupped her ass again. Then up and over her back to curve onto her shoulder, fingers digging but not hard enough.

  Simone tried to answer him, but all that came out was a sigh.

  Aidan leaned closer, his breath hot against her ear and the side of her neck. He nuzzled her for a moment. Simone shivered again.

  "Tell me what you need," Aidan said.

  "I need," she said, "to hurt."

  For a moment he leaned against her, forehead pressed to her shoulder. He kissed her there, then pressed his teeth to her skin. Not biting, though the promise of it was there. She couldn't stop herself from letting out a small, desperate moan that could've made her hate herself if her greed wasn't too busy swallowing up all the rest of her emotions.

  Good, she thought. Block it all out.

  "You want me to hurt you."

  "Yes, Aidan."

  It was the consent that got to him; she knew him as well as he did her.

  "Please," she added, knowing it was that extra, tiny bit of supplication that would tip him over the edge.

  She'd subbed to him before, of course, back in the early days when she'd confused her need for pain with a desire to submit. Before she'd learned how her body worked, how the stripes she loved on her back were not at all related to humiliation or subjugation. When she'd figured out that if she went to her knees it would always, always be because she wanted to be there, and never because someone had demanded it of her. That inherent lack of submission inside her had been what split she and Aidan apart, but she had loved him dearly once and still did, in some ways always would. She knew what flipped his switch. She knew what to give him.

  "Please," she breathed, closing her eyes. Widening her stance. Offering her ass and bare back to him.

  She gave him what he liked and craved so he'd do the same for her, because she wanted him to want this as much as she did. She needed him to want it. To get off on it. She needed to know that his cock rose for her, because of her.

  Simone needed to be desired.

  She waited, willingly blind, for him to bind her hands to the back of the chair. When the soft press of the familiar silk scarves brushed her skin, Simone twitched, but didn't move. She hated being tied but she would suffer that so she could suffer what she wanted from him. After a moment though, the scarves withdrew.

  Simone opened her eyes. "Aidan . . ."

  "No." He shook his head and leaned to breathe into her ear. "You don't need this. And I don't need it. You'll stay where I put you, won't you? Because I said so."

  "Yes."

  A mingled expression of pride and desire crossed his features. "You were always so fucking good at that. Weren't you?"

  Simone had no answer for that, and besides, he hadn't asked the question in order to get a reply. Aidan's look of desire became harder. More intense. His eyes narrowed as he stepped back to take in the sight of her. His cock was hard, jutting against the front of his jeans. She wanted to pull open the button and zipper and set him free, but she didn't move.

  "I'm not wearing a belt," he said in an undertone, almost musing.

  At the thought of it, the supple leather of his belt coming down on her skin, Simone's nipples tightened. He'd used his belt on her a few times. The leather had left welts, and a few times, when she'd urged him to keep going, bruises. But the belt was made for another purpose, unlike the thin, braided leather crop that existed solely for creating pain.

  Simone preferred the crop.

  She didn't ask him for it, but when Aidan went to the cabinet in the corner of his living room, Simone let out a long, slow sigh. She closed her eyes again, jumping slightly at the click of the cabinet doors closing.

  "We'll start with three," Aidan said quietly.

  She wanted more than that. Three hundred might not be enough. But without protest, Simone merely braced herself, offering Aidan her body.

  The whistle of the crop through the air tensed every single muscle--she couldn't help it. No matter how much she wanted this, how often she'd allowed it, there was still always that first few seconds before the first blow when her mind overruled everything else and forced her body to react in anticipation of the agony to come.

  The anticipation of the suffering is always worse than the suffering itself.

  "Please," she breathed again, even though she knew that at this point, Aidan's hesitation had nothing to do with reluctance and everything to do with drawing out the suspense.

  The first line of fire lit across her back high up, near the shoulder blades. He hadn't demanded that she count, or give the dreaded "Sir," after each one, and she realized that Aidan was compromising, too. This thought warmed her inside almost as much as that first, stinging sweetness.

  The pain bloomed. Hot, then almost icy as her body reacted to the pain. She breathed with it. In, out. She opened herself to it. Embraced it.

  The next came a few seconds later, perfectly aligned below the first. Then finally, the third, and Aidan gave her time to catch her breath.

  "More?"

  "More," Simone replied.

  She lost herself in every stroke of agony. Sobbing with it, she bent her head and gave up to it. And Aidan went on and on. Every so often he'd slide his fingers between her legs from behind, dipping into her heat. Once he pushed inside her, curling upward, and Simone cried out, hoarsely, her hips bucking. Another time he tweaked her clit roughly between his thumb and forefinger, bringing her to the edge and then easing off before she could come.

  He beat her steadily and finger fucked her with equal relentlessness, until the lines between pain and pleasure blurred and there was nothing but constant sensation. Every time she eased close to the edge, either of her endurance to the agony or the ecstasy, Aidan exp
ertly eased off until Simone began to beg.

  She heard her own voice, rising in supplication. A plea. And there was no shame in this, not the way it had been with Elliott, or at least she refused to feel it. Later, she might cringe and blush at the memory of how she pleaded with Aidan to finish her off, to let her come or to bring blood. But she didn't think so. This was different.

  "You are so fucking beautiful," he murmured into her ear as his fingers fucked deep into her.

  Her cunt was so wet there was no resistance. When he circled her clit, tugging it suddenly, Simone cried out, a harsh and shuddering burst of syllables that tried to sound like his name and only became a long, low sound of need.

  "Do you want my cock?"

  Simone tried to say yes, but that single word would not force itself from her lips. Aidan's crop came down again on her back. Then his fingers inside her, moving. Thumb pressing her clit.

  He bit her neck before saying, "Simone. Do you want me to let you come?"

  That was easier to answer, with a single, sobbing noise of assent. Aidan's hands moved over her. His mouth found hers, tongue stabbing into her. Then, softer. Stroking in time to the motion of his fingers on her needy, greedy cunt.

  At last, she went up, up, and over. Stars in a night sky. Flames. Simone exploded into pleasure.

  The pain had been better.

  "You were incredible. My god, Simone. You were amazing," Aidan whispered in the dark. The bed shifted under his weight as he settled beside her. There was only the soft sound of him breathing when she didn't reply. And then, with a hesitancy she'd never heard from him, Aidan said, "It wasn't too much, was it? I didn't hurt you too much?"

  There it was. The reason she'd left him in the first place. He'd never been able to hurt her too much.

  She had, however, been laid low by agony. Her back hurt from the attentions of Aidan's riding crop, but that pain would fade. There was a deeper pain inside her, the aching grind of need and desire and love, and the searing ice of Elliott's rejection. That had shredded her heart worse than any belt or crop had ever cut her skin.