Twisted: A Dark Romance (Barrowlands Book 1)

by Esme Devlin

  There is an undertone to his voice that denotes rage simmering just beneath the surface. It’s as if the surrounding atmosphere has shifted, and what started as an innocent bedtime talk between lovers has subtly moved to something more sinister.

  His finger slides over my chin and down my neck, tracing a line to the place my breasts meet. The pressure increases the farther down he goes, and the action makes me feel on edge.

  Now, more than ever, the bed feels like a cage.

  And to think, I just invited him in.

  I inch away from him, that instinct slowly returning. The instinct to run… to get out of his way. He feels it, because his finger slips from my chest and he doesn’t make an effort to reach any farther toward me.

  “Oh, sweet girl, I think we are quite beyond that stage now, don’t you?”

  I shake my head. It is dark in here, due to the curtains, but the fire is still lit and he will see the shadows well enough.

  He reaches out and grabs my wrist, jerking it roughly toward him. I leave my wrist with him and drag the rest of my body as far away as possible.

  “You know what this does to me, and yet you do it anyway,” he says. “One would think you want me to chase you.”

  I can’t even tell if it’s a suggestion or anger I hear in his voice—but both are equally troubling. There is absolutely no way I’m ready to go back there with him. I’m still sore. Everywhere.

  I’ll keep him talking.

  I’ll try to keep him talking.

  “If this is nothing, why did you save me? If you feel nothing, why would you kill those men?”

  His grip on my wrist relaxes just a fraction. “Who said I feel nothing? You are obsessed with twisting my words. I said you will never feel anything real for me, that doesn’t necessarily need to work both ways.”

  I swallow, trying to compose myself and slow my racing heart. “So what do you feel for me?”

  “A complicated question,” he says.

  “You are good with words,” I tell him.

  He laughs cruelly. “When I saw them in your room… your face pressed up against his revolting cock… I felt as though I’d rather burn the whole damn building to the ground—with you, me, and everyone else in it—than let a single one of them put his hands on you.”

  I’m silent for a moment.

  We both are.

  The events of the night circle around my brain, replaying again and again.

  Then I realize. “You weren’t in the room when he was doing that.”

  He misses a beat while the question hangs between us, then drops my wrist and slumps back down on the pillows.

  Now I’m the one sitting up on my elbow. “I will have my answer,” I snipe, mocking the phrase he uses so often on me.

  “You gave me a statement, silly girl, not a question.”

  “How did you know?” My voice is ice cold when I ask him.

  He sits up so quickly I flinch, the action causing me to lose the balance my elbow provided.

  “I watch you,” he snaps. “I watch you all the time. Is that what you wanted so desperately to hear?”

  Now it’s not just my voice that is ice cold, it’s the blood pumping around my body. I knew some nights he stayed. Some nights he watched me. But I don’t think that’s what he means. “You watch me?”

  He hangs his head, letting out a sigh. “I have cameras connected to the reliable generator. I’m… addicted.”

  I hold my breath and let it out slowly, turning my face away from him. I need a minute to process this. I have too much to process, and this is just adding to it. He was…

  He leans over and grabs my chin, forcing me to look at him.

  It’s not even him, though. It’s that fucking mask.

  “Do not think to judge me,” he snaps. “I will not have that. I am judge here, not you. Judge. Jury. Executioner. I watch who I want to watch.”

  I try to force my head away from him, and when he doesn’t let up, I pull back and slide my chin right out of his hand. Maybe I could have processed being watched, but the way he’s reacting is giving me little time for rational thought.

  My action only gives me a temporary reprieve. Within seconds his hand is back, and this time he takes my neck and forces me down on the bed. My hands wrap around his wrist.

  “What are you thinking about?” He says it like an accusation.

  “No one has ever asked me that,” I snap, mimicking him. “No one asks me anything, apparently.”

  “Oh, my poor little Sapphire. It must be so awful for you. My heart bleeds,” he says, mocking me.

  He has me pinned down on the bed, and everything about it angers me. He can’t even see how frustrating this is.

  I just wanted a second to think.

  Just a second to myself.

  Something inside me snaps.

  “Fuck you.” I spit the words at him, unable to control myself. “Seriously, take yourself to fuck.”

  “I think I was just there. Shall we go again?”

  This man infuriates me. He has an answer for everything. “I hate you.”

  He laughs. “No, you don’t. And even if you do, your hatred is misplaced. I may appear lacking in sympathy, but I’m finding it hard to comprehend what could possibly be so awful about your situation. I treat you like a goddamn queen.”

  A queen?

  He is warped.

  I’m laughing in anger now. Laughing. That’s the only thing left in me. “You are mad,” I tell him, cackling like I’m halfway to insanity myself. “You are truly delusional. I feel sorry for you.”

  The last one was intended to hurt. It was unnecessary and spiteful, but I’m finding it hard to summon a fuck to give.

  This isn’t how it’s supposed to be.

  I just gave him… I just gave him everything.

  He might think he took it. Hell, there was a moment where I thought he took it. But in hindsight, he didn’t take. I gave him it freely. I gave him something I’d never given anyone.

  And this is what it has resulted in.

  Why the hell did I expect anything different?

  “You can lie to yourself,” he says. “But you cannot lie to me, sweet girl. I watched you. I watched you mope around while you thought I was gone. I watched your head pop up when the door to your room opened, and I watched your little face drop when you realized it was Andrei and not me. It should be me who feels sorry for you, but unfortunately sympathy is not an emotion that registers. Look at what I’ve done to you,” he says, laughing cruelly.

  It’s only then that I realize what he’s doing. He’s taking my spite and throwing it back in my face.

  “Look at what I’ve turned you into.” He laughs again, and it hurts.

  “A lost puppy, pining for the master who does nothing but kick it.”

  “Stop it,” I beg him, my voice breaking.

  “What you feel is not even real—as I’ve explained—and yet you play the part so convincingly.”

  My eyes fill with tears, and I try desperately to keep them in. To hold it all together. “Stop it,” I whisper, trying to sniff them away.

  “What does it feel like to be so powerless that you don’t even have control over your own emotions? Is that insanity, do you think? And yet you feel sorry for me! Such a warped sense of reality you have. Such a twisted little mind.”

  “Please, Baron. Please stop it.”

  He sighs and releases his hold on my neck, his fingers instantly turning gentle as he withdraws.

  He lies back down and pulls me into him, wrapping an arm around me.

  He’s still tugging.

  Trying to get me closer.

  Trying to press my body up against his.

  I can’t fight the tears back anymore, but I can fight him.

  I wanted him to hold me. I wanted him to lie in bed next to me and stroke my hair until I fell asleep. I needed him. Not anymore. It’s too late for that.

  Now I can’t stomach the thought of him touching me. Trying to co
mfort me when he was the one who just cracked me in half.

  “Get off me.” I spit the words out, shoving him away.

  “No.”

  His arm tightens around my waist.

  “Get off!”

  He chuckles this time.

  “I’d tell you to make me, but we both know you don’t even want me to get off you. It just makes you feel better about giving in if you think you put up a fight. You’re fooling no one, silly girl.”

  I have one arm free, my left one. I could hammer it down on his chest, and he would only laugh at me. If he didn’t have that fucking mask on, I would poke him clean in the eye.

  If he didn’t have the mask on…

  My free hand jerks up.

  My fingers trace the side of his cold metal face.

  Before I can get any sort of hold on it, he’s up off the bed like a bullet from a gun.

  “Biiiiiiiiiig fucking mistake.”

  In all the time I’ve known him, he’s spoken to me like that precisely zero times.

  My heart jumps into my mouth while my stomach simultaneously sinks.

  I back away from the edge of the bed he just got out of.

  My second mistake.

  His arms reach around my neck from behind.

  He’s behind me.

  He pulls me out, and there is absolutely nothing I can do to resist his strength.

  My bottom lip trembles.

  The tiny hairs on my body stand up to his attention.

  “I-I-I’m sorry.” I choke the words out just as he jerks me off the bed. He probably didn’t even hear me. He’s dragging me across the floor.

  “Sorry? Sorry!” He laughs, and that is so much worse than the previous tone he used. “That does not work with me.”

  “I didn’t—”

  “Shh,” he says, hushing me. I’m half on the floor, half in his arms, and he sits down behind me so I’m leaning back on his chest, his grip around my neck not letting up for a second. “It’s quite all right. Of course you’d be ungrateful! And why wouldn’t you be? There is such a difference between showing and experiencing. I have been careless and forgotten that in my obsession with you.”

  I blink my eyes closed and tears spill out, running down my cheeks. “What are you talking about?”

  I wish the man would just say what he means. I could scream.

  “Why would you feel beholden to me when you have never experienced my wrath? I’ve never hurt you—I cannot hurt you. That is my weakness. But I will teach you. That I can do.”

  He’s up again, pulling me with him. I’m trembling. My legs aren’t strong enough to take my own weight, but it doesn’t stop him. He continues on anyway, dragging me back to the end of the bed.

  He hauls me up to my feet, and I lash out against him. I’m not even thinking anymore. This is just sheer instinct taking over. I can’t flee so I’m fighting.

  And like every other time, it is useless.

  “Don’t fight this,” he warns.

  Fuck him.

  He pushes me up against the bedpost using the wall that is his body.

  I push and scream and try to bite.

  He just lets out a huff of air and brings his hand to my neck.

  “This will only take a second,” he says. “Faster if you’re still.”

  And then he does what I fear the most.

  He squeezes.

  To think it was barely an hour ago that I enjoyed this.

  What the fuck is wrong with me?

  Eyes wide, everything but my hands freezes. My hands latch on to his wrist, trying desperately to get him off me while the familiar feeling of suffocation and panic spreads through my body.

  He takes his belt off quickly with his free hand, and as soon as it’s loose, he releases the pressure on my neck, just as he promised.

  I gasp for air, but he doesn’t give me a second to recover. He pulls my arms up above my head and wraps the belt around once, twice, thrice. Four times. Then he buckles it together.

  I’m still fighting for air, coughing and spluttering, when he takes a step back.

  “I hate you for what you tried to do,” he says. “But I admit, there is a small part of me that is pleased about the consequences.”

  With that, he turns on his heels and swaggers over to the far corner of the room. It’s dark over there, the light from the fire not stretching far enough, and I can’t see what he’s doing. It can’t be anything good, of that I’m quite sure.

  He returns with something in his hand that sends my heart hammering even harder.

  “W-w-what is that?” I stutter.

  “This?” He laughs. “Your very own one bar prison. I had it made especially for you. I really dislike virgins, did you know that? Surprising, isn’t it? Everyone loves a virgin. Not me, though. It’s not the lack of experience—I like that. I love that about you. It’s not that no man has ever been there—that’s something I will cherish until the grave. It’s the fucking restraint it takes. I spend every waking moment with you restraining myself.”

  I’m barely even taking his words in. I’m staring at what he has in his hands.

  “You’re crossing the line,” I tell him, my voice shaking.

  He laughs at that. “What line? I fucking created the line when I made love to you. Oh, how badly I wanted to ruin you. I told myself, no. Not you. Never you. But how could a man like me make love to a little thing like you? I couldn’t. Too difficult. But I could get you ready, so I wouldn’t have to restrain myself.” He laughs with glee and glances down to the pole in his hands.

  “Don’t,” I beg him.

  He takes a step toward me and cups my cheek in his hand, his thumb rubbing over the wet tears. “Twisted, perhaps, but a kindness. At least that’s what I told myself when I had it made. But it was unnecessary, wasn’t it? I did it! I did it for you, sweet girl. Did I hurt you? Only a little. You’ll never comprehend how hard that was for me. I drew a line and I didn’t cross it, even though I wanted to. But you? You destroyed the line.”

  I shake my head, and it makes him drop his hand. He catches my breast on the way down and strokes it, rubbing over my nipple with his thumb. I don’t know whether to flinch away from him or respond.

  If I respond, maybe he won’t do this?

  But I don’t get the chance to make a rational decision about it. A sigh escapes my lips as he rubs my nipple between his fingers.

  “There she is,” he says, and I hate him for it. I hate myself. “So beautiful. So perfect!”

  His hand trails lower down to my stomach and he rubs over it again and again, his breath hot and heavy. “So empty,” he says, his tone laced with pity. But I’m not hungry. If anything, I’m well fed here. “We’ll fix that, don’t fret.”

  My mouth drops open as I realize he’s talking about the lack of a child, not the lack of food, and he laughs again while his hand continues lower.

  I know what comes next.

  His fingers slide between my closed legs easily. “So…”

  Wet. So wet. I hang my head. “That’s you, not me.”

  He laughs, pushing his body even harder against mine. The carved post digs into the skin on my back and it hurts. “Does it matter? I think not. Not for my purposes.”

  He shifts his position, standing directly in front of me now. “Stand on my feet. Tips of your toes, please. That’ll make it easier for you.”

  I exhale a breath, exasperated with him. “What?”

  But just as the word comes out, my mind is fitting the pieces together, and I begin frantically shaking my head.

  Baron huffs, clearly growing impatient with me. “Do it, or I’ll bend you over my knee and stuff it in your tight little asshole. Trust me when I tell you, you are not even close to being ready for that.”

  I’m in shock.

  I think.

  He’s said much worse to me before now. He’s threatened me with all sorts of things. But he’s never done any of them. He’s always restrained himself.

  Unt
il now.

  The leash is well and truly off now.

  I burst into tears as I step up onto his boots. It gives me an extra inch at least, and when I stand up on my toes it only adds to it. I can bend my elbows now, rather than being stretched out like the string of a bow.

  My nose is running and my cheeks are just getting wetter and wetter. I can’t even control it. I’m well beyond trying to control it. I try to breathe and it comes out as heavy sobs.

  “Oh, such dramatics!” he says, laughing.

  He just makes it worse. He always has to twist the knife.

  “I promise it is smaller than me. Considerably smaller,” he adds.

  That doesn’t make me feel any better when the shaft of the pole slides inside me. It’s cold and hard. There is practically no resistance now, not after he came inside me, but that doesn’t stop the ache. The feeling of fullness.

  He goes in at an angle because even with the added height, there’s not enough room between the floor and his target. Then at the last moment, he lifts me slightly and straightens the thing, letting the base of it rest on the floor.

  I hold my breath. I can’t get over how foreign this feels.

  “Step down,” he says.

  I shake my head frantically. “No.”

  “Oh, but you must,” he whispers softly.

  “I can’t,” I beg him. “It’s too much. I swear it’s too much.”

  He sighs. “Well… I can’t very well adjust it with you standing on me, can I, silly girl?”

  I swallow, trying to control myself.

  The moment I step off him, I feel it pressing against my cervix.

  I want to scream.

  I want to run.

  I understand now exactly what he meant when he called it a prison. Even if my hands weren’t strapped to the bed, I wouldn’t be able to get off it. Not without him lifting me.

  He’s still staring, watching my reactions. “Please,” I breathe. “Please fix it.”

  With another sigh, he crouches down and the thing twists inside me. He gives me nowhere near an inch, and I’m still on the tips of my toes.

  “More.”

  He stands. “No.”