by Nikki Sloane
“Alice.” I said her name like a safe word, and it had a similar effect. He paused.
His lips moved against my skin as he spoke. “What about her?”
I had a million questions about why their relationship was the way it was, but it was doubtful he’d tell me. None of the Hales seemed to think much about each other’s feelings, but that wasn’t how I operated. She’d been aloof and direct, but nice to me in her own way. “I don’t want to hurt her.”
His hands started again, abandoning my breasts and inching downward. “The only person who can hurt Alice . . . is Alice.” His tone was ironic. “Believe me, I’ve tried. She’s unbreakable.”
Was this why they’d fallen out of love? Had Macalister tried to conquer her and failed? I didn’t get any more time to think about it because his hands spilled over my stomach and then the knots at my wrists, gliding lower.
The muscles in my belly clenched at his touch. My breath went ragged when he sucked on a tender spot just below my ear. I didn’t want his fingers to move any lower, but goosebumps marched up my legs.
He teased me. His palms slid over and between my thighs while avoiding the most intimate spot. My chest was tight with anxiety and anticipation, and he dragged the moment out for a lifetime. Long enough for my traitorous body to settle back against his and subtly encourage.
His voice was seductively evil. “It’s all right to want it,” he whispered. “I won’t tell anyone.”
Oh, fuck. I hated him. I couldn’t stand how he twisted me up to the point of ripping me apart or how—
“Oh,” I gasped, a mixture of horror and pleasure.
His fingers brushed through where I was hot and damp and throbbing in a way that made me uncomfortable. The tie seemed to grow tighter around my wrists, but maybe that was because every muscle in me had tensed.
His fingers were tentative at first but grew bolder when a panicked whimper eked from my throat. It was clear he enjoyed what he was doing. He made a thick groan of satisfaction, and his erection began to swell behind the fly of his pants. I felt it harden against my hip, and once again, I had two opposing emotions at the same time.
First was fear. He was a powerful man, and my hands were bound. I wondered if there would always be a hint of danger tied to this event, or if it would go away as I grew more experienced. Instinctively, I couldn’t trust any man with a hard-on.
The second emotion was pride, and it was fucking pathetic. Touching me had turned Macalister on, but so what? I hadn’t done something special or unique that any other woman wasn’t capable of. So, why did I feel flattered that he found me arousing?
The pads of his fingers rolled a slow circle over my clit, and another panicked moan welled up from deep in my stomach. I used my bound hands to grab his wrist to try to stop him, but there was no power in my attempt.
It was all for show.
My sex-starved body was greedy. It would humiliatingly accept pleasure from any hand right now.
The stubble dotting his jaw was rough against the side of my neck as he kissed and nipped at me. And his hands. Those fucking hands rubbed against me, making it so damn hard to stay quiet. I didn’t want him to know it felt good, which was pointless. He seemed to know everything.
He ground his palm against my center, and tremors worked up my legs, making it hard to stand. I sagged back against him, concentrating on not letting a moan pour from my mouth, but then abruptly the hands were gone.
I swayed as he bent and retrieved the suit coat from the ground and brushed the dirt and leaves from it. It was cool without him against me, and the breeze blew, which helped to cut through the haze of unwanted desire he’d worked up in me.
Was that it?
No. He walked around to face me, taking in my undoubtably flushed cheeks and heaving chest, and gave me a look that said we’d only just begun. He used his free hand to grab one of the tails of the tie and, like a leash, he pulled me along toward the base of the fountain. As if he were my master and I were his pleasure slave.
It was erotic and obscene.
He laid his coat down open on the bench, and my heart thudded as I recalled what was supposed to happen next. Since my hands were tied, I couldn’t resist when he scooped me up in his arms and lowered me onto my back, down on the suit coat.
The cement was rough and gritty against my bare legs, and as we closed in on the part I most dreaded, I lowered my bound hands to cover my nakedness. As if it would give me protection. I pretended that when he got to my hands shielding my most intimate part, he’d stop, even though I knew he wouldn’t. Not unless I said to.
This was my feeble attempt to not just give myself over so willingly.
Macalister put one hand and one knee on the bench and hovered over me. His gaze raked down my body, tracing the swell of my breasts and the flare of my hips and the junction of my thighs that was hidden beneath my hands.
“I couldn’t see beyond that ridiculous green hair you used to have.” He leaned down and brushed his lips over mine. “But you’re stunning.”
I turned my head away from him, not wanting his kiss or the reminder of how much control I’d given him.
But he grasped my chin and turned me back to meet his gaze, and irritation flashed in his icy eyes. “I gave you a compliment.”
My voice was empty. “Thank you.”
He stared at me like a puzzle he couldn’t solve. He could only see things from his perspective. He probably thought he’d transformed me like an ugly duckling, and I should be grateful. But was the opposite true?
I lay perfectly still as his mouth roamed over my skin. He tasted my lips again before carving a path down my body. Anticipation needled at me as his tongue swirled over my nipple and drew wet tracks from breast to breast.
Since we were beneath the fountain, whenever the wind blew, water would faintly mist over us. It sheened my skin and gave me a chill, and I told myself it was the cause of the shiver that shook my shoulders. It couldn’t be his hot mouth biting and sucking and devouring.
When he’d had his fill, Macalister snaked down to kneel beside the bench and between my legs. He pushed my outside knee off the stone and onto the ground to give him more room, and I began to quake. This hadn’t been so hard with the initiation. I’d been caught off guard, and Royce had started, and—
None of the other men had said they were obsessed with me.
His hands stroked up and down my thighs, followed by his lips. He kissed the length of my calf, the inside of my knee. Each one was an electric jolt, both pleasant and unpleasant. I stared up at the sky, full of sparkling stars and a bright moon, and chased my ragged breath.
When his hands scooped under my legs and he pulled me closer to him, positioning me right at the edge of the bench, I wasn’t sure where to put my foot that had been resting on the stone. He straightened for a moment, dropped a kiss against my ankle, and set it over his shoulder.
His breath was warm against my skin in juxtaposition to the cool, misty breeze, and then suddenly there was fire. It scored along the insides of my thighs as he dug his sharp fingers in and raked them down. I hissed at the discomfort and lifted my head to glare at him—
Big mistake. He watched me with longing as he pressed his lips to the red lines blooming on my skin. The track marks he’d created and said were necessary to intensify my orgasm. It was as if he wanted to soothe the pain away. I couldn’t watch. My head thumped back against the unforgiving stone, and I swallowed huge gulps of air.
He moved closer to my hands, and my heart beat furiously. Blood roared through me, fueled with anticipation and unwanted need. Could he feel every tremble in me? Did he think he was the cause?
I held my body uncomfortably tight when his mouth arrived at my hands blocking him from his destination. He didn’t push them away. Instead he continued to kiss, outlining each finger. It simulated what he wanted to do. His head between my thighs, his mouth at my center, his palms smoothing seductively over my legs.
By making Royc
e his father’s proxy the night of the initiation, at least I’d spared him from having to watch what was about to happen. My left hand was on top of my right, and Macalister ignored the ring there the same way he ignored the one he wore on his own hand.
He peeled my left hand back and laced his fingers with mine. It was disorienting and intimate, but I couldn’t focus on it. There was still my right hand covering myself from him, but he was only a breath away.
Everything froze like an ice storm, a moment trapped under glass.
An alarm sounded in my mind, reminding me to keep fighting, and it came from me between panted breaths. “It’s been . . . more than . . . two minutes.”
His eyes were so hooded, so drunk off desire, he didn’t understand what I was talking about at first. But a smug smile burned across his lips, like a banker excited to tell a rude customer their account was overdrawn.
“It has.” His voice was rich and dark. “You owe me interest, though. One minute for each day you denied me.”
SIXTEEN
I FLINCHED AND TRIED TO SCOOT AWAY, but Macalister’s grasp on my hips stopped me.
“No,” I said.
“Or I give you an orgasm,” he added. “Whichever comes first.”
I’d hoped to outlast him. Two minutes I could endure, but it had been two months since the initiation, and there was no way I’d survive an hour of his torment. “I didn’t agree to—”
A trill erupted from the phone he had tucked in his pocket, shattering the ice that had trapped me. He unlaced our fingers and sat back on his heels as the phone was answered and brought to his ear.
“What?” he barked.
He’d been furious to be disturbed, but as he listened to the other side of the conversation, his expression changed.
His eyes widened, then narrowed.
His posture stiffened. The muscle running along his jaw flexed.
Whatever he was hearing, it was serious and urgent. Hope sparked inside me. Was I about to get a reprieve?
“How interesting.” Macalister’s tone was sharp as a dagger. “I appreciate you letting me know.” His gaze swept down over my naked body, my bound hands clasped between my legs, and he seemed to be weighing his options as if deciding which he wanted to deal with first—the new information or the trembling girl in front of him.
“No,” he said. “We need to consider how to respond. Find Richard and bring him to my office.”
The phone call ended as abruptly as it had started.
He stared down at me with a hard look, full of disappointment, and it was clear he hated the words coming out of his mouth. “We’ll have to continue this another time.”
“There’s nothing to continue.” My heartrate flew as I scrambled toward escape. “I gave you your two minutes.” Counting the phone call, I’d given him even more.
His face turned so ugly, I shivered. He grabbed the knot where he’d bound my hands and jerked to get my attention. “You made me wait, and therefore you owe me interest.”
I shook my head. “I never agreed to that. Untie me. We’re finished.”
“We’re finished when I say we are.”
Strong, rough hands lifted, and I was pulled down into Macalister’s lap so I was straddling him as he sat back on his heels. He ducked his head into the circle created by my bound arms, and my eyes went painfully wide.
This position was terribly dangerous.
First, because my naked body was positioned over his significant erection and I could feel every inch of him through his pants. Second, escape was virtually impossible, from both his grasp and his bottomless eyes. And third, because while he’d kissed his way down my body, he’d undone the buttons of his shirt. It hung open at his sides, exposing his toned chest and taut stomach.
His hands were splayed on my back, and he urged me forward before I could stop him. His kiss landed on my lips at the same moment my bare skin pressed to his, and between my legs, there was the subtle jerk of his cock. He liked the way I felt against him, my breasts flattened to the faint dusting of hair on his warm chest.
“No. Stop.” I jerked away and struggled to get out of his lap, but his arms tightened around me. It didn’t seem to be to restrain me so much as it was to try to get me to calm down.
“You promised me,” I reminded. “I’m saying ‘stop.’ Let me go.”
There was a long, scary second where I believed he considered ignoring me, but then his mouth brushed over the shell of my ear. “All right. I’ll release you as soon as you kiss me.”
What? No. I shook my head.
“Then we’ll stay as we are until I have what I want.” He shifted me in his arms, reminding me of all the indecent places we were connected. “It’s a simple kiss.”
“Nothing with you is simple,” I hissed.
He drew back so I could see him. He liked hearing what I’d said, judging by his expression. It was pure arrogance. I wanted out, to be free from under his command and away from the Minotaur’s ravenous eyes. I had to be practical. This wasn’t nearly as bad as the alternative and the fastest way. I shut off my brain, leaned forward, and flattened my mouth to his before he could react.
I hated him.
He pushed, and pushed, and as his kiss seared across my lips, I wondered how much longer it would be before he wore me down. Before he broke me. He’d already turned my body against me. His tongue swept into my mouth and coaxed me to join him, and although I refused, the sensation of it wasn’t . . . unpleasant.
He clearly enjoyed it, and like a true Olympian, Macalister didn’t give a fuck about how wrong it was.
Finally, he released me from his thorough kiss, lifted my arms over his head, and set about undoing the tie.
“We can take as much time as you’d like,” he said softly, “but be aware you’re putting off the inevitable.” His eyes darkened as they filled with power. “I’ve negotiated billion-dollar mergers and destroyed every company that tried to take what’s mine, Marist. People far more powerful than you have surrendered to me.” He lifted an eyebrow in a soft taunt. “Do you believe you can refuse me forever?”
No, I didn’t.
But I sure as hell was going to try.
Macalister tried to help me get dressed, but I scooped up his suit coat, shoved it at him, and ordered him to go. He didn’t like being told what to do, but he must have sensed I was on the edge of a total breakdown, and emotions made him uncomfortable. It was better for both of us if he disappeared.
I clutched my dress over my body and stood stock-still as he went, waiting until I couldn’t hear his footfalls anymore before returning to life. Perhaps ‘life’ wasn’t the right word. I didn’t feel alive. I was numb, an empty vessel as I pulled on my clothes and trudged through the maze, avoiding using the dishonest door I now knew existed.
When I neared the house, I looked up at Royce’s window and saw the light on. Was he in there? Oh, my God. He had a view of the maze from above. Had he seen what his father had done? My dinner roiled in my stomach and threatened to come up. The shame was overwhelming. It made my joints hurt, my bones ache.
The house was quiet as I came inside. Only a step on the back staircase creaked as I made my way up them. It was the longer route to get to my room, but I wanted to avoid running into Macalister.
And I didn’t run into him. It was the youngest of the Hale men who I encountered in the dark hallway as he slipped out of Alice’s room. Vance’s startled expression was guilty for a moment, before it filtered out and he returned to normal. We gave each other a hard, evaluating stare.
“Hey, Marist.” He forced casualness into his voice. “I was helping Alice with something. You okay?”
I couldn’t get the chill of his father off me. Maybe I’d never be warm again. But I fed Vance the lie automatically. “I’m fine.”
We both began moving toward our rooms at the other end of the long hallway.
“Must have been some fight.”
“What?” I asked.
He look
ed at me skeptically. “I assumed that what’s happened since Royce lost his shit.”
Nervousness quicken my breath. “What do you mean?”
“Oh. Uh . . . I guess I’ll show you.”
Down we went, past my room and his, to the closed door of Royce’s. Vance didn’t knock. He gripped the handle, turned, and pushed the door open. I made a horrible, choked sound of surprise, and my hand came up to cover my mouth.
The room was a disaster.
Furniture lay on its side, lamps were broken. The black coffee table looked like it had been flipped over and gouged a chunk out of the wall when it had fallen. The mirror that had once hung above the dresser was shattered, and a hundred tiny reflections of my stunned face stared back at me, more pieces scattered across the carpet.
“He was upset.” Vance’s statement was simplistic, but his voice had gravity that carried the seriousness. “He didn’t exactly know how to deal with it.”
My heart slowed, petrifying painfully. “Where is he?”
“He called for a car a little while ago. I asked Tate to check on him, and he texted back that he was already with Royce.”
My eyes stung as they filled with tears, but I blinked them back. “Is he okay?”
Vance couldn’t have looked more surprised if he’d tried. “Yeah, he’ll be fine. He’ll probably need a day or two to get over himself, but then I’m sure he’ll apologize.”
I didn’t understand. “Apologize?”
“For whatever he did that made you guys fight.” He crossed his thick arms and leaned against the wall beside the door, setting his full attention on me. “Look, I’m sure he wasn’t your first choice, and at times my brother can be a real asshole, but I’m pretty sure he cares about you. Like, a lot.” His boyishly handsome face was uncharacteristically serious and genuine. “I don’t know if that’s ever happened before.”
I’d thought it was impossible to feel any worse, but I’d been wrong. I couldn’t bear to look at him as he pleaded his big brother’s case. I traced the scrolling pattern in the hallway carpet and tried to hold myself together.
