I can feel the rapid flutter of Sara’s pulse as she stares up at me, and I see she doesn’t believe me—not completely, at least. She thinks I’m mad, or at best, misinformed. Her doubt enrages me further, and I force myself to release her wrist before I crush her fragile bones.
She immediately backs away, and I know she senses the violence pulsing under my skin. When I first learned the truth of what happened, I couldn’t punish the NATO soldiers or the operatives involved—the cover-up was remarkably fast and thorough—so I took out my fury on the terrorist cell that fed them the false information, followed by anyone dumb enough to stand in my way.
My son’s death unleashed the monster within me, and it still roams free.
When there’s a meter of distance between us, Sara stops backing away and regards me warily. “Is that why…” She bites her lip. “Is that why you became a fugitive? Because of what happened back then?”
My hands clench into fists, and I turn away, returning to the table. I can’t discuss this for even a second longer. Each sentence is like a spray of acid over my heart. I’ve gotten to the point where I can go several hours without thinking about my family’s violent deaths, but talking about what happened brings back the devastation of that day—and the rage that consumed me.
If we stay on this topic, I might lose control and hurt Sara.
One movement at a time. One task at a time. I blank out my mind like I do when I’m on a job, and focus on what needs to be done. In this case, it’s clearing the table, putting the leftovers in the fridge, and stacking the dishes in the dishwasher. I focus on those mundane activities, and gradually, my boiling fury eases, as does the urge to do violence.
When I start the dishwasher and turn back toward Sara, I see her watching me warily. She looks like she’s about to bolt at any moment, and the fact that she hasn’t already means she understands her predicament.
If she runs right now, I won’t be gentle when I catch her.
“Let’s go upstairs,” I say and walk toward her. “It’s time to go to bed.”
* * *
Her hand is icy in my grasp as I lead her up the stairs, her beautiful face pale. If I didn’t feel so raw inside, I’d reassure her, tell her I won’t hurt her tonight either, but I don’t want to make promises I may not be able to keep.
The monster is too close to the surface, too out of control.
“Take off your clothes,” I order, releasing her hand when we get to her bedroom. She’s wearing skinny jeans and a loose ivory sweater, and though she looks phenomenal in the simple outfit, I want it gone.
I want there to be no barriers between us.
Instead of obeying, Sara backs away. “Please…” She stops halfway between me and the bed. “Please don’t do this. I’m sorry about what happened to your family, and if George was in any way responsible—”
“He was.” My tone is cutting. “It took years, but I got the names of every soldier and intelligence officer involved in the massacre. There’s no mistake, Sara; my list came directly from your very own CIA.”
She looks stunned. “You got it from the CIA? But… how? I thought you said they were involved, that George was one of them.”
“There are many divisions and factions within the organization. One hand doesn’t always know or care what the other one is doing. I know an arms dealer who has a contact there, and he—or rather, his wife—provided the list. But that’s neither here nor there.” I cross my arms in front of my chest. “Take off your clothes.”
Her eyes dart to the bed, then to the door behind me.
“Don’t. You don’t want to test me tonight, trust me.”
Her gaze returns to my face, and I can feel her desperation. “Please, Peter. Please don’t do this. What happened to your family was awful, but this won’t bring them back. I’m sorry about them, I truly am, but I had nothing to do with—”
“This is not about that.” I uncross my arms. “What I want from you has nothing to do with what happened.” Except even as I say it, I know it’s a lie. My actions are not those of a man courting a woman; they’re of a predator stalking its prey. If she weren’t who she is—if she were just a random woman—I wouldn’t be forcing myself into her life like this.
My desire for her would’ve been gentle and restrained instead of dangerously obsessive.
Sara gives me a disbelieving look, and I realize she understands that too. I’m not fooling anyone. What’s happening between us has everything to do with the dark past we share.
So be it.
I step toward her. “Remove your clothes, Sara. I won’t ask again.”
She backs away again, then stops, likely realizing she’s getting closer to the bed. Even with the thick sweater concealing her curves, I can see her narrow chest heaving as her hands clench and unclench convulsively at her sides.
“All right. If that’s how you want it…” I start toward her, but she raises her arms, palms facing me.
“Wait!” Her hands shake as she reaches for her sweater. “I’ll do it.”
I stop and watch as she pulls the sweater off over her head. Underneath, she’s wearing a tight blue tank top that bares her slender shoulders and highlights the soft curves of her breasts. They’re not the biggest I’ve seen, but they suit her ballerina-like frame, and my cock hardens as I recall how those pretty breasts felt resting on my arm last night.
Soon, I’ll know how they feel in my hands—and how they taste.
“Go ahead,” I say when Sara hesitates again, her gaze darting past me to the door. “Tank top, then jeans.”
Her hands shake as she obeys, pulling the top off over her head before reaching for the zipper of her jeans. Under the tank top, she’s wearing a utilitarian white bra, and I have to force myself to remain still as she pushes her jeans down her legs, revealing light blue panties. Though I felt her bare skin against mine last night, and saw her undressed several times on the cameras, this is my first time seeing her naked up close, and my heart rate jacks up as I hungrily take in every graceful line and curve of her body.
She’s only about average height, but her legs are long, with the lean, shapely muscles of a dancer. Her belly is flat and toned, her slim waist flares into gently feminine hips, and her skin is smooth and pale all over, with not a tan mark in sight.
She’s beautiful, this new obsession of mine. Beautiful and scared.
“Now the rest,” I say roughly when she kicks off the jeans and stands there trembling, clad in only her bra and panties. I know I’m being cruel, but the raw, aching wound she exposed sucks out whatever little decency and compassion I possess, leaving only lust edged with the irrational need to punish.
I may not want to hurt her, but at this moment, I need to see her suffer.
She reaches for her bra hook in the back, unsnapping it with jerky motions, and I suck in a sharp breath, the pain in my chest drowned by a wave of even more intense desire. I saw her breasts last night, so I know they’re gorgeous, but the sight of her taut pink nipples and soft white flesh still punches me like a fist. My heart pounds in a fast, rough rhythm, and it’s all I can do to stay in place and not reach for her as she takes off her panties. Her pussy is smooth and hairless—she either waxes regularly or had her pubic hair lasered at some point—and my mouth waters as I imagine dragging my tongue through those delicate folds.
I can’t wait to taste her and make her come.
As I’m picturing that, Sara straightens and defiantly raises her chin. “Happy now?” Though her cheeks are bright red, she’s making no attempt to cover her body, her hands clenched into small fists at her sides.
Perversely, her little show of bravery softens the dark lust beating at me, and my mouth curves in amusement.
“Not yet, but I will be soon,” I say, taking off my own clothes. My movements are swift and economical, designed to accomplish the task as quickly as possible, but her face still flames brighter, her chest rising and falling as she stares at me.
“Come,”
I say, walking over to her when I’m fully naked. “I know you like to shower before bed.”
She blinks, her eyes flying up to my face, and I realize she was staring at my cock—which is so hard it’s curving up to my navel.
“You can touch it in the shower if you’d like,” I say, my smile widening at her obvious embarrassment. “Come, ptichka. You’ll enjoy this.”
Clasping her wrist, I lead her to the bathroom.
Chapter 22
Sara
I try to maintain my composure—or at least the appearance of it—as Peter drags me to the bathroom, his long fingers wrapped firmly around my wrist. This is definitely not how I imagined this night going when I was walking up the stairs. Despite the lingering darkness in his eyes, my tormentor now seems to be in a light, almost playful mood—a stark contrast to the terrifying rage I glimpsed on his face earlier.
It’s as if my forced little striptease calmed whatever demons those horrifying pictures had unleashed.
Nausea crawls through me again as I recall the images, the death and devastation depicted in such gruesome detail. I only looked at them for a few seconds, but I know I’ll never be able to forget them. I can’t imagine being there in person to take those pictures, much less knowing that it’s my family lying there—that the decomposing corpses used to be people I love. The mere thought fills me with such agony that for one heartbreaking moment, I understand what drives my attacker.
I don’t excuse it, but I understand it, and pity battles with terror in my chest.
If Peter believes my husband was responsible for those deaths, he had no choice but to come after him. That much is obvious to me. Even before he went rogue, the Russian’s profession would’ve exposed him to the darkest parts of humanity, taught him to embrace violence as a solution—and that’s not even taking into account whatever it was that turned him into a killer before age twelve. A man like that wouldn’t turn the other cheek; an eye for an eye would be more his speed. He wouldn’t care how many innocents he hurt in his quest for vengeance, and he certainly wouldn’t blink at torturing an enemy’s wife to get to him.
If George had any involvement in what happened, I’m lucky to be alive.
Stopping in front of the glass shower stall, my captor releases my wrist, steps inside, and turns on the water. As he plays with the faucet, trying to find the right temperature setting, I glance at the bathroom door. He’s wet and distracted, so I’m almost certain I can make it down the stairs and to my car before he catches me. But then what? Do I drive naked to a random hotel and hope he doesn’t find me tonight? Run straight to the FBI and beg them to hide me?
Before I can start that internal debate again, Peter steps out of the shower, water droplets glistening on his powerful chest. “Come in,” he says, reaching for my arm, and I almost stumble as he pulls me into the stall.
“Careful,” he murmurs, steadying me, and I look up to find him watching me with a mix of hunger and dark amusement. “It’s slippery in here.”
At his innuendo, the flush that hasn’t quite left my face blazes back to life. I hate it that he knows about my body’s reaction to him—that just moments earlier, he caught me eyeing his erection like a teenage girl seeing her first porn. Granted, he could star in porn with a cock like that, but that’s not the point. It shouldn’t matter to me that he’s a gorgeous male animal; his powerful body is something for me to fear, not desire.
He’s a dangerous, possibly mad murderer, and I should regard him as such.
And I do—rationally, at least. However, as he angles the shower toward me, letting the warm water spray hit my back, I realize I’m not nearly as terrified as I was last night—though I should be, after seeing those pictures. If Peter believes what he’s told me, then he has every reason to hate me, and whatever attraction he feels toward me is likely of the toxic variety. I don’t know why he didn’t rape me last night, but I’m almost certain he’ll do it tonight. The thought should fill me with dread—and it does—yet the visceral panic I felt in that hotel room is absent. It’s as if sleeping in his arms desensitized me to the sheer wrongness of what he’s doing to me, to the violation that is his presence in my house and my shower.
For the second time in as many days, we’re naked together, and I don’t find it nearly as disturbing as I should.
“Close your eyes,” Peter says, picking up my shampoo bottle, and I obey, letting him pour the soapy liquid into my hair. Despite his earlier volatile mood, his strong fingers are gentle on my skull as he massages in the shampoo, and I realize he’s pampering me again, further disarming me with his bizarrely caring ministrations. I have an incongruous desire to arch my head back, butting against his hands like a cat demanding a petting, but I remain still, not wanting him to know that I enjoy any part of what he’s doing to me.
Whatever my tormentor’s game is, I refuse to play along.
My determination lasts until he begins massaging my neck, skillfully working out the knots at the base of my skull. I didn’t even realize how much tension I carried there until it melted away, the heat of the water combining with his touch to make me feel warm and relaxed in a way I haven’t experienced in a very long time.
I try to recall if George has ever washed my hair like this and draw a blank. I can’t even remember him showering with me outside of a couple of times early in our relationship, when we were still relatively adventurous in bed. By the time we’d been dating for a year, our sex life had become routine, and George rarely touched me in ways that couldn’t directly get me off—and toward the end, he rarely touched me, period.
Over the past couple of days, I’ve had more physical intimacy with my husband’s killer than with my husband during most of our marriage.
When my hair is clean, Peter guides my head under the spray, rinsing out the shampoo, and then applies conditioner to my strands. As he does this, he steps closer, his chest brushing against mine for a second, and my nipples tighten under the hot spray, my sex growing soft and slick as I feel the smooth head of his hard cock against my stomach.
He steps back a moment later, but it’s too late. The warm, relaxed feeling transitions into arousal so quickly I have no chance to guard against it. Though he’s barely touched me, I’m left breathless and trembling, aching for him. It’s a purely physical reaction, I know, yet it fills me with shame. I shouldn’t want him or this forced intimacy; nothing about this should appeal to me on any level.
Biting the inside of my cheek to distract myself with pain, I open my eyes and see him pouring body wash into his palm.
“Let me do it,” I say tightly, reaching to take the body wash from him, but he shakes his head, a sensual smile curving his lips as he moves the bottle out of my reach.
“Not yet, ptichka. You have to wait your turn.”
Stepping behind me, he starts washing my back, and even through the heat of the water, his touch burns me, each stroke of his rough hands intensifying the flames of arousal in my core. I try to focus on something else, anything else, but my heart is racing too fast, my body burning with equal parts shame and desire.
And fear. Though muted for the moment, it’s an insidious presence in the back of my mind. I haven’t forgotten what the man touching me has done or what he’s capable of. Perhaps some other woman in my situation would fight instead of letting him do this, but I don’t want him to truly hurt me. Yesterday, he subdued me with pathetic ease, and I know the outcome would be the same today. Except he might not stop once he has me stretched out underneath him.
He might give in to the darkness I glimpsed in his eyes tonight, and the game, whatever it is, would end in some horrible way.
So I stand still and stare straight ahead, watching the water droplets roll down the steam-fogged glass wall as his soapy hands slide over my back, my shoulders, my arms… my sides. It’s torture of a different kind, and as his hands move to the front, spreading soap over my quivering stomach before sliding up my ribcage, I can’t take it anymore.
“Stop,” I whisper breathlessly, my nails digging into my thighs as his fingers brush the underside of my breasts. “Please, Peter, stop.”
To my shock, he listens, lowering his hands to my hipbones. “Why?” he murmurs, drawing me against him. His chest molds against my back as his erection presses into my ass. “Because you hate it?” He dips his head, his stubble rasping against my temple as he traces the outer rim of my ear with his tongue. “Or because you love it?”
Either. Both. I can’t think clearly enough to make up my mind. My eyes drift shut, and goosebumps pebble my skin as his tongue dips into the hollow behind my ear, turning my insides to liquid mush. I want to push him away, but I don’t dare move in case I do something stupid, like tipping my head back toward the tantalizing heat of that wicked mouth.
“What is it you’re afraid of, ptichka?” he continues in a soft, dark voice. “Pain?” He bites my earlobe gently. “Or pleasure?” His right hand inches diagonally along my stomach, moving toward the aching nook between my legs with insidious slowness. He’s giving me every chance to stop him, but I can’t—not even when I realize his destination. All I can do is take quick, shallow breaths as his callus-roughened fingers breach the top of my slit and leisurely part my folds, exposing the sensitive flesh within.
“No answer?” His breath is warm on my temple. “I guess I’ll have to find out for myself.”
The tip of his finger circles my clit, and my breath stutters in my chest, my mind going strangely blank. It’s as if every nerve ending in my body has come to life all at once. I’m hyperaware of his big, hard body pressing against my back and his stubble rasping across my ear, of his large hand resting low on my belly and the hot water spraying down on us. And that finger, that rough yet gentle finger. It’s barely touching me, yet my whole body feels like a coiled spring, each muscle rigid with anticipation.
Dimly, I register a strange sound, and realize it’s coming from me. It’s a moan, mixed with a kind of gasping whimper. It fills me with shame, but the embarrassment only intensifies my arousal, all my senses centering on the pulsing ache in the bundle of nerves he’s so cruelly teasing. I can feel the slickness between my thighs, and as his finger presses harder on the exquisitely sensitive flesh, the ache transforms into an unbearable tension, one that grows and intensifies with every second. It’s both pleasure and agony, and it’s so acute I’m vibrating with it, waves of heat rolling over my skin. I try to hold it off, to stop the tension from cresting, but it’s as impossible as holding back the tide.
Falling For The Forbidden Page 101
