by Naomi West
“Last time?” he repeated to the empty kitchen, hoping the spoken words would somehow give him a burst of inspiration, a piece of divine revelation like some angel's song from on high.
Then, Zed nodded as he drank down a swallow of beer. He knew what he needed to do, finally.
“Like last time?” he asked the empty kitchen again, taking another swig. “Just like last time.”
# # #
Abby
Who knew your wedding day could be so damned stressful? She'd been in a chair, first getting her hair done, then her makeup, for what felt like hours. Meanwhile, Jackie, her maid of honor, was running around like a poor chicken with her head cut off trying to get the rest of the bridal party in order.
Outside, in the hotel's ballroom, the famous and classy hobnobbed with the college friends and industry insiders Abby had managed to hang onto throughout her life. Natalia Winters had insisted she invite all her friends, so they could see in person how lovely and strong she'd become in the intervening years, since she'd left Hollywood for the business world.
Grudgingly, Abby had agreed to the expanded list, and had increased the opulence of the whole event. It was a day of celebration for not just them, but her and Ethan's families as well, she reminded herself.
Now, as she paced back and forth in her wedding gown, walking the perimeter of the bridal suite, she grew increasingly unsure of all her decisions. Not just about food choices, or music, or any of those other silly things. But, she hated to admit, she wondered whether this even the right decision in the first place.
Jackie came bursting into the room like a bull in a china shop, throwing the door wide without even knocking. “Champagne!” she shouted, as she stormed in in her purple dress, desperately searching the suite.
Visions of a dry wedding reception floated in her mind. How would they toast? How would they do anything? “Champagne?” Abby asked in a panicked voice. “They're out of champagne?”
“No!” Jackie said, exasperated. “For me! Your mother is driving me up the fucking wall!”
Abby collapsed back into her chair, the dress bunching up about her legs as she nearly swooned in relief. “Thank Christ, I almost had a meltdown.”
“Spend some more time with Mommy Dearest and you probably will,” Jackie snarked, as she finally found the ice bucket full of melted water and a nearly-full bottle of bubbly.
Abby rolled her eyes. “She's a handful, I know.”
“That's putting it mildly,” her maid-of-honor-slash-executive-assistant said, as she poured two glasses of the good stuff. “Here,” she said, as she handed one of the flutes to Abby, who promptly threw it back.
“Thanks,” Abby said, holding her glass out for more.
“Liquid courage?” Jackie asked, as she poured a bit more into the glass.
“Nerves. Just my nerves.”
“It's still not too late,” Jackie said. “We can hop in the elevator and be out to my car in no time flat. I promise you, I won't think less of you.”
“For the last time,” Abby said, pausing to take a more modest sip than before. “No, Jackie.”
“Look,” Jackie said, setting aside the glass. “You keep saying it, and I keep hearing it. But you're not convincing yourself, or me. You love Zed, and I know it.”
“Jackie,” she said, a warning note in her voice.
Her assistant ignored the warning. “When have you ever been so nervous about something that felt right to you?” Jackie asked. “Huh? When was the last time your confidence in your choice was so shaken that you had to drink to go through with it?”
Abby didn't say anything. She couldn't. She genuinely had no response, because Jackie was right.
But, then, she was saved by a knock at the suite door.
Jackie started to cross to get it, but Abby stopped her. “Probably just my mother,” Abby growled. She threw the door open, and her jaw dropped.
She barely had time to register who it was standing at the door before she felt a sharp stab in her thigh, through her dress. She looked down at the syringe in the man's hand, then looked back up at him.
“You. Zed?”
“You're coming with me,” he growled to her.
In a flash, Abby was transported back to the day she'd first met Zed Hesse. It was suddenly just like it was yesterday, where he was stuffing her into the passenger side of her Escalade and kidnapping her. As the sedative—her sedative, she realized—began to work through her veins, she shook her head to try and clear her suddenly fuzzy thoughts.
It was no use, though. Between the quick glass of champagne she'd just downed and the sedatives in her thigh, it was like her skull was stuffed with cotton and her brain was made of cotton candy.
“Jackie,” Abby turned to her assistant. “You remember Zed Hesse, don't you?”
Chapter Thirty-Six
Abby
Jackie's head jerked back and forth between them, her eyes like saucers. She trembled, a little like a Chihuahua. “What the hell are you doing, Zed?” she asked, her voice shaking.
“Keep calm,” Abby soothed, the sedative apparently being just what she needed to soothe her frazzled nerves.
Why she hadn't thought of it in the first place, she had no idea. But, damn girl, was that a great cocktail with the champagne, or what?
“I'm really sorry,” Zed said to Jackie, as he grabbed hold of Abby and pulled her from the room, wedding dress train flying out behind her as he led her barefoot down the thickly carpeted halls. “This is just something I have to do!”
Jackie came out of the bridal suite after them, stopping at the open doorway “Abby!” she shouted.
“Go for help!” Abby called back, almost as if it was a formality, but not even bothering to fight Zed as he dragged her to the elevator that would take them to the parking garage below.
Besides, she was feeling pretty good at the moment. All the stress from the last few months, with the wedding and the new job, had completely evaporated from her shoulders when the sweet little cocktail entered her circulation. She no longer cared one way or another what happened to her, although, she was kind of grateful that Zed had finally swooped back into her life.
“I just didn't know how to explain it to you otherwise,” he said, as he dragged her into the elevator and hit the button for the parking garage. “No other way I could think of that you'd understand how serious I was.”
Her eyelids suddenly very heavy, she fluttered her eyes in an almost vain attempt to keep them open. She looked around, bleary-eyed, at the inside of the elevator as it lowered them down into the depths of the earth, and her eyes finally settling on the form of her handsome tormentor.
The doors buzzed open and Zed grabbed her in his bear-trap-strong grip, pulling her out into the garage. He dragged her, not quite kicking and screaming, to his car, an older Honda Accord. He stuffed her into the passenger seat, just like he had that day a little over a year ago, then went around and hopped in behind the wheel.
He pulled out with a squeal of tires, then flew out of the garage as fast as he safely could.
She slumped in the passenger seat, realizing just how arrogant she suddenly didn't feel. Gone was her sense of knowing what was best all the time for everyone, for even herself. So what if she'd thought Ethan was going to be perfect for her and that he'd be able to give her a good life? What fun would it have been?
Abby knew she'd never be able to escape Zed Hesse, no matter what she did. She could run to the ends of the earth, all the way to Kathmandu or some other ridiculous place, and he'd still show up looking for her. They were connected on some deep level, one deeper than she had ever considered possible.
Besides, why would she want to?
# # #
Zed
He drove without purpose. He hoped the constant, unceasing movement of the car would somehow magically impart some sort of deep, mystic understanding of the universe, and of his actions. But, he was out of luck, at least on that front.
As he drove a
round the city, Zed realized he hadn't really thought this plan all the way through. He'd acted on impulse this time, just like he had before with Pharma-Vitae. And, a year of prison notwithstanding, that had worked out surprisingly well. Hadn't it?
He shook his head.
This time things were different. His reasons for acting weren't vindictive. They were pure. At least, he hoped Abby and the cops would see it that way. After all, he had kidnapped her.
Abby's head lolled to the side, and she groaned a little.
Shit. The sedative would be wearing off soon, and Zed didn't have much of a follow-up plan. He didn't have any more syringes, and she might fight him to take her back to her wedding.
God, what the fuck was he doing? Clearly, she loved Ethan. Look how beautiful she'd made herself for their big day? She was wearing beautiful, expensive gown, her hair was all done, with a crown of flowers woven into her blonde tresses, and her makeup was virginally radiant. On the one hand, he felt bad for breaking the wedding up like this. On the other, though, he knew he could change her mind.
Deep down, he wished this had been their wedding, not hers and Ethan's. He wished, more than anything, that Abby had been going to walk down the aisle to his waiting hand.
Then, it hit him. “Shit,” Zed groaned to the car. Abby just groaned wordlessly back.
Kai. He hadn't even considered how this would affect his brother, or his girlfriend. He was pretty sure Kara hadn't intended him to do this. Of course, it wasn't like he or Abby had ever revealed the whole, unvarnished story to everyone. That had been part of the reason why he'd plead guilty. He knew Abby had no desire to be forced to testify against him, and there was no reason why their personal stories needed to be thrust into the limelight like that.
If this somehow made national news, he and his brother would be thrust right back into the spotlight. And, if things didn't go well, this wasn't exactly the same as exposing a massive drug fraud case. He doubted he'd garner as much sympathy for this stupid move.
He didn't know what he was thinking. But, at least this time, no one else's life was on the line besides his. This was his stupid decision to make, and no one else’s. But, when everything was said and done, at least one thing would be true. He could at least finally unburden himself to her and force her to listen to the thoughts that had kept him alive in that jail cell from one day to the next.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Zed
Abby was beginning to come out of her stupor when he pulled up in front of the house. Before she could completely come to, though, he'd already slipped into the house and opened the garage door, then pulled the car in next to her Escalade.
“Did you break into my house earlier?” she asked, as he lead her inside by the arm, his hand still clamped down like a vice.
He ignored her. He had, of course, to get her sedative she still kept in the nightstand. But he still ignored her. There were more important things going on. He dragged her into the middle of the living room with one hand, and grabbed one of the chair from the dining room, the one that they'd used as her timeout chair so long ago. He put the chair in front of the couch and ordered her to stand in front of it. “Strip,” he said, as soon as he was in position, his voice full of the command and authority he knew she remembered.
She looked at him, her eyes blinking. Finally, she seemed to register what was going on, and her eyes dropped to the rug in front of her. She reached behind her back and unzipped her wedding dress.
His eyes swept down over her body, taking all of her in as she dropped her white gown to the floor. She was breathtaking in her matching lacy white lingerie, and Zed had suppress a needful groan as he looked on her with longing.
She looked up at him and locked her eyes with his, keeping his gaze on her like she had engaged some sort of magnetic bonding between them, as she slipped her panties down over her hips, letting them slide to the floor.
Zed nodded to her bra. “That too,” he said.
She turned away a little, hiding what he imagined were shame-filled eyes. But, she reached behind her back and unclasped her bra, then shrugged out of it, letting it drop from her body one strap at a time.
He picked up the roll of duct tape he'd found in the mudroom, just where she'd kept it the last time he'd been in her home. He walked around behind her, took both hands, and pulled them to her back. “Hold them there,” he ordered, then began to tape her wrists together.
Because of the way he had her arms pinned back, her chest heaved with each breath, her breasts rising and falling almost hypnotically. It was like waves crashing on the ocean.
He tore another small piece of tape and put it over her lips. “Sit,” he said, gesturing to the time out chair.
She gracefully sat in the chair, her eyes fastened to his.
He took a seat on the couch in front of her, their eyes still glued together. “Abby,” he began. “I need you to sit there, and I need you to listen to me. This is important.”
With her eyes still locked on his, though, she just slowly shook her head. She rose from the timeout chair, her eyes never leaving his face as she crossed the short distance to him, her hips swaying with every step. She stopped just in front of him, and he unconsciously moved farther back in to his seat.
He gazed up into her eyes, into the wanton lust there, but also the love. She looked so beautiful, with the downy blonde thatch between her legs, the light pink of her nipples, her flat stomach, and the delicate structure of her hip bone.
She didn't blink as she put first one knee up on the couch cushion just next to his thigh, then the other.
Zed was speechless as she began to settle onto his lap, her back still arched as she presented herself to him, her master.
# # #
Abby
Deep in her heart of hearts, Abby knew this was what she wanted—no, what she needed. She needed to belong to Zed in this way, mind, heart, body, and soul. Anything less, and she'd never be a complete woman. She would always feel like she was missing a limb, like a piece of herself was lost wandering in the world somewhere without her. She knew from the look in his eyes, from the sound of his voice, that Zed understood her need, and felt the same way.
She realized that Ethan, on the other hand, had just been a rebound. He was sweet, and kind, and a little boring, but he'd never make her feel this way. He'd never bruise her flesh, leave welts on her back, or force his cock down her throat as she gagged for more. Even his bedroom talk was pretty tame.
Abby Winters needed more. She needed a man strong enough to make her submit. Sometimes willingly, sometimes unwillingly.
And, as Zed's fingers dug into her cheeks so hard she'd have bruises for days, she knew she'd made the right choice. As she felt her master's manhood rising from between his legs, rising very much to the occasion of her straddling his lap, and she knew she'd made the right choice.
Zed dipped his head to her chest as she pushed a nipple into his mouth. He bit down hard, and she felt like she was about explode from the sweetly sharp pain that flooded her body.
She screamed into the duct tape, pushing more of herself into his mouth and more of her ass into his hands.
He gripped her tighter and spread her cheeks lewdly as she moved herself on his lap, grinding her wetness into his slacks. Zed sucked her nipple hard, paused, and flicked his tongue over it. He snaked a hand up her front, cupping a breast in his rugged, calloused hand, teasing her with his palm.
She groaned around the gag, pleading for him to cover more of her.
But his hand didn't stop there. It moved up to her throat, encircling it tightly.
She closed her eyes, loving the feeling of him around her neck, of how in control he seemed, and how out of control she felt. Nothing seemed to matter as he held her like this, as he continued to alternately flick his tongue on her nipple one moment, then bite it painfully the next.
Zed released her throat, and his hand tore the tape from her lips.
“Ah!” she screamed, pressing
her sex deeper into his lap.
“Hands stay bound,” he growled.
“Yes, sir,” she said, her voice instantly sounding like it had a year ago. Complete submission. Complete lust. Complete need. Now, complete love.
He pulled her lips down to his and kissed her intensely.
She sucked his tongue into her mouth, just like she knew her master liked, worrying at it lightly with her teeth until he pulled back.
He put his hands back under her ass and lifted her from his lap, quickly dropping her on the couch in a heap.
Her arms twisted up a little uncomfortable behind her, but somehow it all seemed more erotic as she was forced to watch him undress. She desperately wanted to reach out to him, to help him disrobe, if only to speed him along, but she couldn't with her hands tied behind her back. It was like she was back in that timeout chair all that time ago, desperately wanting to join the world, but unable to because of Zed's desires to show her her place. So, instead, she bit her lip and she watched as he quickly stripped naked.
