Make Me: Twelve Tales of Dark Desire

by Aleatha Romig

  “You put a lot of faith in me.” Her fingers hovered over his throat.

  “If you stay close to me, Charlee, my faith will stay close, too.”

  Everything inside her melted as she molded her body around his and touched a fingertip to the hollow at the base of his neck. His eyes didn’t shift from hers, his muscles didn’t tense, and a smile lifted one side of his mouth.

  Oh, thank God. Kissing his chin, the corners of his mouth, and lingering on his lips, she wedged her hand between their chests, smoothing her palm over his breastbone and absorbing his warmth. “Good?”

  “Now I am.”

  She went back to his mouth for a deeper kiss. He laughed against her lips and pulled back until his head bumped the wall behind him. “We need to talk.”

  Ugh. “Okay.”

  With an arm around her back, he laced their free hands together on the seat beside them. Moments passed as he watched his thumb bump over her knuckles, his eyes unfocused. Then he looked at her. “Please don’t be offended by anything I say or ask. I’m making no judgments. I just want the full picture so I can try to help, okay?”

  She nodded, hoping he was ready to hear the answers.

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  ‡

  Charlee choked on the foreboding atmosphere, waiting for Jay to begin his questioning.

  “I’m surprised and relieved that you’re willing to be intimate with me after…what you survived.”

  She tensed against him. Where anyone else might’ve feared to step, he went rushing in.

  He watched her closely, caution gripping his voice. “Your sessions, your openness, whatever it is you’re doing, it works. I should take lessons from you.”

  The sudden image of him dominating her in a dungeon sent bolts of excitement through her body. “You shouldn’t be surprised. I don’t know what you survived, but I recognized the pain eating at you the night we met. I suspect your abuser wasn’t so different from mine. Yet, here you are, willing to be intimate.”

  Without so much as a nonverbal acknowledgement, he held her through a comfortable silence. Eventually, he stirred, kissing her bottom lip. “I know it’s unfair to ask you to answer my questions and not answer yours. For now, let’s stay focused on you, on what happened between us, okay?”

  She nodded. “For now.”

  “I’m trying to wrap my head around your sessions. It would make more sense if you were the one with the whip. A submissive position seems like the last thing you’d want.”

  His gaze turned introspective and she kept quiet to see what he’d come up with.

  “I think you need the pain,” he murmured.

  Her throat tightened. Of course, he was right, but hearing it voiced made her want to shove him. “No. That’s not—”

  “No? Charlee, the harder I pounded you, the wetter you got.” His timbre remained soft despite the punch of his words.

  “The pain helps me focus. It’s just…”

  “It’s nothing to be ashamed of. And as soon as we both grasp what it means, and accept it, we can figure out how to make it work. Help me understand. Tell me why you aren’t doing the dominating to take back what Roy took from you?”

  “I don’t know. It’s not like I have a handbook telling me what to do. I just go with what feels right for me. And it may seem like I’m yielding, but I’m not. I can stop it when I want. If I topped you—”

  His eyes narrowed.

  “You would have the control. You could say stop, and I would have to concede.”

  “Did this kind of thing appeal to you before you met Roy?”

  “I wouldn’t know. I was sixteen when he got me the first time.”

  His body turned to stone beneath her and his hands balled into fists.

  “No punching the bathroom wall.” She tapped his tense lips until they slacked.

  “How did he get you?”

  “Craig had a gambling addiction. Owed a lot of money to a lot of people. Most of his debt was owed to Roy Oxford.”

  “And you didn’t have a mom.”

  “Nope.”

  He closed his eyes and opened them just as slowly. “You and I have lived equally lonely lives. I wish we would’ve had each other growing up.”

  A light, hazy feeling drifted through her. He would’ve protected her, cherished her…loved her when no one else did.

  “What happened?”

  The dreamy sensation evaporated, leaving the heavy burden of reality. “One morning, Craig woke me, told me I wasn’t going to school. We were going on a trip.” She looked at the door. “I had no idea I wouldn’t be returning to Phoenix. Though, thinking back on it, I’m not sure Craig did either.”

  Jay’s fingers bit into her hip.

  She let her hair fall forward on her shoulders, hiding her face. She had been so gullible then. “We drove eleven hours to San Francisco. Straight to Roy’s penthouse. When we arrived, he made me change clothes in the car. Gave me a short black dress to wear and led me to the sixtieth floor.” And still she hadn’t questioned Craig’s intentions.

  Jay pushed her hair from her face, and turned her chin to see her eyes. “Go on.”

  “There were five men gathered around a poker table in Roy’s game room. Wealthy, if their suits and piles of chips were anything to go by. I knew Craig owed Roy money. I didn’t know how much, but I thought he’d win back his debt.” She sighed at her naivety. “I later figured out I was there as collateral in case he didn’t.”

  “To barter you?”

  “For one night. Craig was a selfish prick and an absent father, but I don’t think he intended to leave me there permanently.”

  “I want to kill him, Charlee.”

  A small smile shook the corner of her mouth. “Roy beat you to it.”

  His eyes widened.

  “Nothing worked out the way Craig planned. He certainly hadn’t expected Roy’s…reaction to me.”

  Red splotched his cheeks and the torment in his eyes blistered in her chest. She tucked her chin and let her hair cover her face again.

  He gathered it with one hand at her neck and used it to tilt her head back. “Stop hiding from me. I want to hear all of it.”

  The concern in his soft expression and his mere proximity bolstered her.

  “The moment I arrived, Roy watched me…in the oily way he does. Eyes sliding up and down. Smile oozing across the table. I wasn’t used to that kind of attention. I was inexperienced, completely unaware of what it meant. I couldn’t have guessed at the things he was thinking about doing to me. Over the course of the night, his glances grew more intense, more possessive. I should’ve figured it out and run.”

  His eyes, glassy under the fluorescent lights, cleaved straight through her heart. “You were a child, had zero power to change the outcome. You did as your father told you, trusted him the way every child trusts her parent for protection.”

  She nodded. “Then three women sashayed in. They were beautiful, with boobs out to here, and dressed in undergarments. They flocked around Roy, so confident in their bodies, and very acquainted with his.” She blew out a breath. “Christ, I was so young. The way they touched him and kissed him, I was both mesmerized and sickened. Yet, he never took his eyes off me. He eventually waved them away and called me over to sit on his lap.”

  The sound of wood cracking rent the air. “Motherfucker.” The cabinet handle broke off in his hand and he tossed it into the sink. After a few calming breaths, he asked, slowly, “What did he do?”

  Shaking her head, she stared at a rip in the wallpaper over his shoulder. “As soon as he pulled me into his lap, I knew. Even as stupid as I was, I knew Roy had decided to keep me, to do whatever he wanted to me.” He’d demonstrated it, right then and there, under the table, touching her in ways no one had before. And she had been too damn frozen in fear to fight him. She’d frozen like that for two fucking years.

  Jay’s body shook. “And your piece of shit father?”

  “He didn’t notice. He was too
busy losing his card game. Within a couple hours, he’d lost our house and the car we drove there in. And still, I thought he’d win everything back. When Roy asked everyone to leave and it was just Craig and I left, he told Craig to wager me. If Craig won, he’d walk away with everything and his debt would be cleared. If he lost…”

  Jay’s chest heaved, his arm holding her to him.

  “I understand why Roy did it. He’s the big scary boss man no one wants to fuck with. He was flaunting his power over Craig. And what he wants…”

  “He gets.” His voice was quiet, inconsolable.

  Her throat swelled. “Craig didn’t even think about it. Didn’t even negotiate the terms. Maybe he assumed it was one night. Maybe he thought he was going to win, and it didn’t matter.”

  “And the stupid fucker lost everything, including his daughter and his life.”

  “When they walked him out, he didn’t say good-bye. Didn’t look at me. Probably too afraid to draw Roy’s attention.”

  He cupped her face and kissed her lips. “It’s unfathomable. You are so precious, how could anyone walk away from you?”

  She rubbed a finger over the deep lines fanning out from the corners of his eyes. Roy shared Jay’s sentiment, but Roy’s was a sick selfish kind of obsession. “So that’s it. Took me two years to escape. Met you four years after that.”

  “Charlee.” He shook his head. “We need to talk about those two years, and whatever happened in your second kidnapping.”

  Full disclosure. She’d vowed not to hide from it. “Ask me then.”

  “You were a virgin?” The low dangerous level of his tone said he already knew the answer.

  She nodded. “That night, I learned that sex didn’t require my permission. He took it, regardless of how hard I fought. Anal, vaginal, oral. In that order. Most of the scars you saw were inflicted in the first few hours.”

  His body vibrated beneath her, rotating the air with the violence of his breath.

  “It’s in the past, Jay.” She smoothed her hand over his jaw. “The only things he got from me were what he took from me. Even the orgasms.” The last word was a whisper.

  Heat reddened his face behind hard eyes. “Tell me about that.” He seemed to be hanging onto his anger by a fragile tether.

  “Jay, I don’t think—”

  “Tell me, goddammit.”

  A swallow scorched down her raw throat. “When I wouldn’t come or feel anything when he fucked me, he hit me harder, fucked me harder.” The words clawed at her throat as she forced them out. “It made him so mad when I hid inside myself. He wanted to possess me in every way and had found a way to draw me out. He used my body against me, made me feel, and forced me to orgasm when I tried to hide from his touch.” Her mouth went dry. “He’d had plenty of practice over the first two years and learned how to control my body better than I could.”

  For a long moment, the only sound in the room was the grinding of his teeth. “And you can’t come now?”

  “I can. On my own, when I concentrate on remembered pain. Or in my sessions, when I have the physical pain to focus on.”

  “Because you’ve been conditioned to associate pleasure with pain.”

  What did he think of her? She trembled. No one would want such a damaged, ruined girl. He could do so much better. “Yeah.”

  “What kind of pain do you need?”

  Was he considering doing this for her? “A backhand across the face. A choking restraint. Dry penetration. Those are mild forms, but they might work.”

  “Mild?” he croaked, shoving a hand through his hair. “Christ, Charlee.” He stared at her. “Maybe when you’re with me, you could try to just think about the pain like you do when you’re alone.”

  He wanted honesty. “Do you want me thinking about Roy when you’re fucking me?”

  He flinched like she’d punched him, and she realized she’d just implied she had to think of another man to get off while with him.

  “Jay, I didn’t mean you don’t turn me on, because I’ve never felt as good as I do with you. But when I recall pain, I instantly think of—”

  “I know, Charlee. I don’t like it, but I understand.” He hugged her, resting his lips on her forehead. “We’ll figure out another way.”

  In the warmth of his embrace and the stillness of the confined room, her swirling emotions abated. When she leaned back to look at him, his face was clouded in thought.

  “What is it?”

  His eyes cleared and found hers. “Does Roy have other women he dominates or enslaves?”

  She shook her head. “He’s tried with others, but he told me I was the only one it worked out with.”

  The emotion rolling off him was stifling. He lifted her hand to his lips, kissed her wrist, and his other hand clenched her waist. “Maybe Roy saw something in you. Something a sadist cannot resist possessing. And if I were honest, Charlee, I have an overwhelming need to possess you, too. What’s that make me?”

  “Someone who will hold me so close Roy will never be able to wrench me away.”

  He squeezed her to him. “Damn straight.”

  “Good. We’ll figure out the rest, okay?” Her stomach growled. “We should eat.” She sagged against him, finally giving into the weariness of the long day. “Then I’m going to face plant somewhere.”

  He kissed her nose, chuckling as he hoisted her to her feet. She noticed his hands remained on her hips, supporting her, making sure she wouldn’t fall. She had a feeling he’d never let her fall.

  Chapter Fifty

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  Jay carried a sleeping Charlee through the spacious living room and toward his wing of the band’s Los Feliz home. They had both fallen asleep on the jet after dinner, and she conked out again on the way from the airport. The fact that she didn’t wake when he lifted her from the car was a testament to how long the day had been.

  And what a fucking day. He woke that morning with the same ache he always had, Charlee’s death at the forefront of his mind. Then there was his drug-induced meltdown after discovering her alive but in bed with another man. And the shooting. The dead man. The fans and paparazzi. And Roy. Concluding with the most intimate moment of his life while flying across the country. Through it all, he’d only used blow twice. Hadn’t even crossed his mind in hours. Why would it? Everything he wanted was alive and in his arms.

  “Night, lover boy.” Laz’s teasing voice ricocheted through the twenty foot ceilings, followed by the squeak of leather as Rio and Wil threw themselves onto the couch.

  Jay didn’t slow his strides through the room. Neither did Nathan’s footfalls trailing behind him.

  Laz flicked the controls that sent the exterior glass doors whirring into action. The panels glided in their tracks, vanishing the wall of the U-shaped estate and extending the indoor space to the aqua blue of the pool, the lounging deck, and the twinkling lights of their L.A. view.

  The yawning vista usually invigorated Jay with a sense of autonomy. But holding Charlee in his arms, the panorama came with susceptibility. Could someone see in from the surrounding hillsides? Were the perimeter walls high enough? Should they keep the patio doors closed and reinforce the one-way glass? “Tony, give me a security update.”

  She slowed her clipped pace ahead of him until he caught up. “I doubled the exterior patrol. Two men at the gates. Four more positioned throughout the property. I also contracted a third party—a company I’ve vetted and used before—to monitor the cameras while Colson and I sleep. The rest of the team will arrive from New York tomorrow, mid-morning.”

  Nathan kept the pace at his back but hadn’t said a word since they entered the property. Jay knew that in his stoicism, he was scoping and analyzing.

  They stopped at the double doors to Jay’s suite of rooms. Tony swiped her card key and the lock clicked. As was the protocol, she walked through first, leaving him at the threshold while she swept his sitting area, bedroom, bathroom, and closets.

  Jay didn’t think the sweep was n
ecessary, but since his were the only rooms that didn’t have surveillance, Tony argued for the additional security search. A debate he’d given up on a long time ago.

  Thank God he’d been so adamant about maintaining his privacy. After Charlee’s experience with round-the-clock videoing, he doubted she’d appreciate it in their bedroom.

  Their bedroom. A lazy sigh of contentment stretched through him. He turned to Nathan, who expectedly chose to stay with Charlee rather than follow Tony through her sweep.

  Jay shifted her tiny frame higher up his torso. “I’ll have Tony go through the employment paperwork with you tomorrow…assuming you’ve agreed to join our team.”

  Hands in his pockets, Nathan made a show of scanning the rare Macassar Ebony floors, the diagonal lines of the soaring ceilings, and the expansive open-air rooms behind him. “Depends on the pay.”

  “You’re so full of shit. You’ll guard her whether I pay you or not.”

  The grin Nathan flashed fell away as soon as it appeared. “To avoid a conflict of interest, you understand part of my job is protecting her from my employer.”

  The sweet aroma of her hair infused Jay’s deep breath. “Understood.” And expected.

  He hugged her close. They hadn’t severed physical contact since their liaison in the airplane lavatory. It wasn’t her body he was clinging to as much as it was the energy orbiting her. Their attraction, their bond, was an electromagnetic force. If it lost its charge, if she turned away even for a moment, would they lose the progress they’d made? Fuck, he knew it was all in his head, this idea that some magical force field they created warded off his triggers. But something was holding him together, and the way her hand curled around the back of his neck proved, even in sleep, she clung to it, too.

  The door opened and Tony emerged. “Clear.” She nodded at Charlee. “Everything she needs is already put away in your closet and bathroom. You should give Faye a raise for her quick turnaround on this assignment.”

  While Tony managed the security team, Faye managed the band, the household, and everything else. “I’m giving you both raises. I’ll fund it personally if the guys complain.”