by Hannah Ford
“And you were…?”
“Ignored.” He leaned down and brushed his lips over the hollow of my throat. Goosebumps bloomed over my body. “My father made it very clear that the only value I had was to protect Conner. And if I didn’t, there were consequences.”
“What kind of consequences?”
“The kind you don’t want to know about.”
I closed my eyes. “Yes, I do.”
“Whatever you’re imagining, princess, it was worse.” He gave a rueful laugh as he continued to unbutton my shirt, until finally, it was completely open, exposing my red satin push-up bra and the swell of the top of my breasts. His hands slipped inside, his fingers skating over the small of my back. “It’s why I’m so fucked up, angel. It’s why I need to punish you.”
The pain in his eyes made my chest catch.
I could see how difficult this was for him, that even though his voice sounded strong, almost glib at certain times, he was tortured by talking about this.
“It wasn’t your fault,” I said. “Whatever happened to you. Just like what you said about my parents’ accident.” He turned away from me slightly, averting his eyes, but I took my hands off the counter and pulled his chin back, made him look at me, then kissed him on the mouth, my tongue tracing his lips, exploring.
Hungrily, he began to kiss me back, slowly taking control of the kiss. Talking about these things had awakened something in him, that feral part of him that needed to dominate.
He reached up and grabbed the nape of my neck.
“No.” I pulled back and shook my head. “I want you,” I whispered. “I want you, but I ….” My body was pulsing, the desire to fall to my knees intense and overwhelming. But I wanted to know him more, wanted to keep him talking about these things.
“Can we go into the bedroom?” I said, hoping that some distance, some normalcy, would make him more willing to talk. And yet at the same time, I knew that him dominating me, touching me, was in some way helping him to talk. It was a fine line, one that needed to be handled delicately.
“Please?” I whispered, tracing his cheek with my finger.
Landon sighed, then moaned in frustration, a guttural sound that started deep in his throat. For a moment, I thought he was going to refuse, thought he was going to turn me over and fuck me right here against the bathroom sink. But then he picked me up and took me to the bedroom.
One look at the bed made me realize it wasn’t going to work – it had a slatted bedframe (perfect for handcuffs) and two nightstands on each side that stared back at me innocently, but were probably filled with things like ropes and clamps and blindfolds.
So I led him downstairs, to where the fire was still roaring in the fireplace, crackling and snapping.
Landon dumped another log on top, and I shivered.
“You’re still cold.” His lips formed a thin line of disapproval, and I knew he was still thinking about how he shouldn’t have let me out.
“I’m fine.”
“Come.” He led me to the couch and we laid down, and he reached behind him and pulled a blanket down over us. The couch was oversized and soft, with just enough room for both of us to lie comfortably.
We laid there for a moment.
My shirt was still open, our chests pressed together.
Landon pulled back and looked at me.
“Do you really think that’s why I let you punish me?” I asked. “Because I want to blame myself for my parents?”
He paused.
“It’s fine,” I coaxed. “I want you to be honest with me.”
“I think that there are things that happen to us, things we bury, that make us want to do things we normally wouldn’t do.” As he spoke, he tugged my shirt off gently, pulling it slowly down over my shoulders.
“God, you are beautiful,” he murmured, and then he kissed me, his tongue tasting every part of my mouth, coaxing my lips open.
When he finally pulled back, I was breathless, hungry for more, the tornado of my own desire starting to overtake me. But I wasn’t ready to give myself to him, not yet.
There was one thing I needed to know.
One more thing I needed to ask him.
“What were you going to say upstairs?” I asked boldly. “Earlier, when we were in…” Somehow torture room didn’t seem appropriate to say out loud. “…that room.”
“When?” His hands cupped my breasts through my bra, his thumbs brushing over the raised peaks of my nipples.
“When you said you thought you were falling… and then you trailed off.”
Landon’s body stiffened. “It was nothing.” He started to move off the couch, but I grabbed his arm, pulling him back toward me. He stopped, but didn’t lie back down.
“Landon.”
“What do you want from me?” he asked.
“For you to let me in,” I whispered.
His breathing deepened, and I let go of his arm. My grip was useless anyway, it wasn’t like I was keeping him there – he was much stronger than I was.
But when he turned to look at me, I pulled him back down onto the couch.
Then I reached behind me and unhooked my bra, letting my breasts bob free.
“Jesus Christ, Aven,” he moaned, drinking me in with his eyes. “You are so god damn beautiful.”
I arched my back, offering myself to him, and he sucked a nipple into his mouth, the warm cave of his mouth sucking and licking, his tongue tracing around my nipple while his hand hefted my other breast.
The warmth that had been pulsing between my thighs burst into red-hot flames.
He kissed and sucked, moving back and forth between each breast, his movements becoming more intense.
I opened my eyes and watched his lips, watched the sensitive tissue of my nipple being sucked into his mouth, watching it pull. I groaned and my noise egged him on.
The visual of him with my tit in his my mouth was almost enough to send me over the edge.
I placed my hand on his stomach, lingering on the defined ridge of his abs, trailing over his six-pack before sliding down further, over his pubic hair to his hard cock.
My hand curved around the hard steel of his shaft, and I squeezed.
“Aven,” he moaned. “Jesus.”
He reached for my wrist, wanting to control, but I wanted him to let go, at least a little bit.
“No.” I shook my head. “No. Let me.” I began to stroke him slowly, and he groaned. I removed my hand, my eyes locking on his as I licked my palm, getting it slick, and then slid it back down to his dick.
I slid it up and down his shaft slowly, over the head and then back down.
“You’re driving me crazy, angel,” he murmured against my neck, his breath hot on my skin.
“Tell me what you were going to say,” I said, coaxing it out of him as I stroked him up and down.
He moaned, a guttural sound from deep in his throat, and then his hand was on my stomach, moving down into my pants, under my panties, his fingers finding my folds and sliding up inside of my pussy.
I gasped at the intrusion.
“Still so tight,” he murmured.
I swallowed, trying to hold onto my own desire, to not let it overcome me. But he was a force, in all ways.
We fell into a rhythm, stroking each other, my hand around his cock, his fingers buried in my pussy.
“Tell me,” I whispered and I kissed him, sucking his lower lip between mine. He responded by deepening our kiss, his tongue tracing over my lips before plunging into my mouth, warm and wet and good.
I summoned every ounce of my self-control and pulled back.
“Tell me,” I said. “Tell me what you were going to say, and I’ll let you do whatever you want to me.”
His fingers moved deeper inside of me, pushing almost all the way in, his thumb strumming my clit.
“Please,” I said. “Please, I need to know.”
He kissed me again, and when he pulled back and looked at me, he used his free hand to brush my h
air off my face as we continued to stroke each other. Staring at him was electric, the force between us so strong I couldn’t fathom how it couldn’t be real.
“Say it,” I whispered. “Please, Landon, I need to hear you say it.”
“I’m falling in love with you,” he said, and his fingers plunged even deeper inside of my pussy.
I cried out as he began to finger fuck me, his movements becoming more and more intense, hungrier, more frantic.
“I’m falling in love with you too,” I said, and that set him off even more.
We were stroking frantically now, hungry for each other to come.
“Is this what you wanted?” he growled. “For me to fuck you with my fingers until you screamed?”
“Yes.”
“Say you’re mine.”
“I’m yours, sir.”
His cock pulsed in my hand and then exploded, without warning, all over my fingers, sticky cum coating my skin. I pulled my hand out and licked him off my fingers.
“Jesus,” he growled, and then he was off the couch, yanking off my pants and panties, shucking his own pants until he was naked.
His cock was still hard, and getting harder, as if he still needed me.
He flipped me over on the couch, hard, my ass in the air.
He grabbed me by the back of my knees, and forced my legs up until I was kneeling on the couch, sideways, my head facing toward the arm.
He grabbed my panties and used them to tie wrists together, so tie that I knew there would be marks.
“You love this, don’t you, baby?”
“Yes, sir.”
His hand spanked my ass, hard. “Yes, sir, what?”
“Yes, sir, I love this.” I licked my lip, wondering if he wanted more. “I love being used by you.”
He made a sound of approval, and then spread me from behind. His mouth was down there then, tasting me, licking, spreading my folds, his tongue lapping the button of my clit. “God, you taste good,” he murmured, and then he was eating me deeper, harder. He moaned, and the vibrations almost sent me rocketing over the edge into orgasm.
“Please,” I begged. “Please, Landon.”
“Please, what?”
But I didn’t answer fast enough, and he slapped my ass again, open-palmed and hard. Pain blazed through me and my cheeks flamed.
“Please, I want to come,” I pleaded.
“Not until I fuck you, baby. I’m going to fuck you hard. And rough. And I’m going to spank you while I do it.”
I moaned and wriggled around on the couch.
His hand grabbed the nape of my neck, under my hair, and pushed me down, my cheek pressing painfully against the arm of the couch.
And then he slid his hard dock into my pussy in one smooth stroke, filling me.
“Fuck, that little cunt is tight even when you’re soaking wet,” he groaned.
Pain pulsed through my body in short little spurts – pain from where he’d hit me, pain from the thickness of his cock stretching my tight pussy.
“Landon,” I moaned.
His hand was still on the back of my neck, and he held me down tightly against the couch as he began to fuck me, really fuck me, hard and fast and rough. His cock was rock hard even though he’d just come, and he barreled it into me, pulling all the way out and then pushing all the way back in, forcing me to get used to him all over again with every thrust.
He fucked me hard, my nipples brushing against the fabric of the couch, and then, right before I was going to lose it, right before I was going to come, he pulled out and flipped me over, laying his body down on top of mine as he slid back into me.
“Aven,” he murmured. “God, Aven.”
And then he was staring into my eyes, the two of us coming at the same time, the pulses of my pussy clenching and pulling at him, taking him inside of me, feeling him fill me with his seed.
The whole time his gorgeous blue eyes were locked on mine, and when we’d both been sated, he stayed inside of me, stroking my hair and murmuring my name, until we both fell asleep.
We slept until 2 in the morning, when we woke, starving.
Landon made scrambled eggs, maple bacon and sourdough toast, and we ate it on the floor in front of the fire. The snow had stopped, and now everything outside was still. It was the way I felt too – like something had changed between the two of us, like something had finally stilled.
“Is it okay?” Landon asked.
I nodded, trying not to look like a pig as I shoveled food into my mouth. I’d loved watching him cook, the deft way he moved around the kitchen, the confidence with which he did everything leaving me in awe of him. “Can’t you tell by the way I’m shoving food into my mouth?”
He smiled, a rare sight, and I loved it. “I’m glad you like it.”
I forced myself to slow down, chewed and swallowed. “I want you to take me back to New York in the morning.” I held my breath, waiting for his I told you so, but he just stared at me.
“You sure?”
“Yes.” I nodded and popped the last bite of sourdough toast he’d into my mouth. “Violet is….” I was going to say safe, but I changed my mind. “Violet has made her decision, and it’s time for me to get back to my life.”
Landon nodded. He looked like he was going to say something, but instead, he took a piece of his own toast off his plate and slid it onto mine. “Don’t say I never gave you anything.”
“I’m not sure how gallant that is of you,” I said, rolling my eyes. “Seeing as how you have half the loaf on your plate.”
“Five slices isn’t half a loaf,” he said seriously. “I would have assumed someone with such a a high GPA would have known something that. Didn’t they teach math where you went to school?”
“How much is half a loaf then, Mr. CEO?”
“Eight slices, if you’re talking about a standard loaf.”
“That sounds like bullshit,” I said. “Unless… wait, is this one of those questions they ask in job interviews to try to throw you off? Like when they say, ‘if you were a road sign, what would you be and why?’”
“Is that what you think I ask in interviews?”
“Yes, definitely,” I said. I could just imagine him sitting behind some huge desk, intimidating in his perfect suit, asking some poor scared interviewee how many slices were in a loaf of bread. I pulled my shoulders back and did an impression of his voice. “Ms. Courtland, how many pieces of bread are in a loaf? Taking into consideration it’s made in the USA, with standard density flour and –”
He reached for me, grabbed my foot and began to tickle me, but I moved out of his grasp.
I loved that he was being silly, and I giggled and snatched a piece of bacon off his plate. He growled and grabbed me again, nuzzled my neck.
“Don’t mess with my bacon, Aven,” he said. “Or there will be consequences.”
“Oh, yeah?” I said. I reached over and took another piece off his plate, then stood up and began taunting him with it. “Come and get it.”
He reached me before I got to the kitchen island, but I popped the bacon into my mouth before he could get it.
“Delicious,” I declared.
He grabbed me around the waist, laughing.
“This was fun,” I said. “I like seeing you like this.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know, not all buttoned-up. Relaxed.”
It was as if hearing me say it made him realize it was true. And suddenly, the air between us changed. It went from light and silly stupid to suddenly tense and heavy.
Landon’s jaw clenched into that familiar line, and before I could say anything else, he’d released my waist.
“It’s late,” he said. “It’s time to go to bed.”
“But we slept all night,” I protested, not willing to let this go yet, this easiness that had developed between us.
“You’ll need your rest for the trip tomorrow.”
“It’s a two hour drive,” I said, rolling my eyes.
But he was already gathering up our plates and putting them in the sink.
He led me up to the bedroom we’d been in earlier, but he didn’t stay. Instead, he told me had to work, shut the door, and disappeared.
In the morning, Landon’s mood was the same.
He wordlessly handed me a shiny silver tumbler of coffee as he locked up the house.
There was still no sign of Conner and Violet, and neither Landon nor I mentioned them as we drove back through Vermont to New York. As we made our way through Connecticut, the snow began to melt, the trees becoming further and further apart as nature turned to pavement.
Landon was silent, driving quickly but carefully, making sure to stay just at the speed limit.
The satellite radio was turned to the finance channel, and the anchor prattled on about the markets and the price of oil.
I needed to check my email, but my phone still wasn’t working for anything except calls and texts to Violet and Emma.
I wanted to ask Landon about it, but he was back in billionaire mode, all signs of the easy demeanor he’d had last night gone.
Even his clothes were different, his jeans now replaced by a pair of black slacks and a black button-up shirt. He wore black Italian leather shoes on his feet and a shiny black diamond-encrusted watch on his wrist.
As we got closer to the city, he still hadn’t said a word, and I began to feel panic bubbling inside of me.
Was this it?
We’d made a deal – a deal that if I did everything he said, he would take me to find my sister.
And now that deal was over.
But did that mean we were as well?
When we pulled up in front of my apartment, Landon guided the car into park.
He opened the door and came around to my side, opened the door for me. The city sounds assaulted my senses, feeling like an intrusion after the stillness we’d had in Vermont.
I stepped out of the car.
“Thanks for the ride,” I said. “And, um, for everything.”
He nodded.
“Landon,” I said. “So, what … I mean, what now?” I hated myself for asking it, but I had to.
