by Nashoda Rose
For once, I was a little unclear as to what was going to happen. I was pretty confident of an outcome before I took a path and if the path changed, I was ready for it. But with London, there was risk because if she insisted I untie her, I had no choice but to do it.
Always follow through with what you say. I was confident that she’d never walk away from me, but I was pushing her. I was taking her fear and putting it in the forefront of her mind.
Then I was cocky enough to say, “Tell me you want to be free. Tell me, London and I will let you go. But if I let you go, it isn’t just from the wire, it’s from me.”
She stilled and so did I waiting for her answer and then she said, “I want to be free.” Her eyes closed and she repeated. “I want to be free.”
My Everything
“I WANT TO be free.” I swallowed.
I knew with everything inside me that the second I said the words, there’d be no going back. Not with Kai. He may exude easy charm, but there was nothing in him that would yield. I’d never be able to walk away from him until he let me. He’d own every piece of me. But he made it my choice and that made it even more powerful.
And he knew that.
I took a deep breath and said, “I want to be free of them.”
He slowly grinned and the tightly coiled tension in my body sprung. My fingers uncurled from the backs of his hands.
“My braveheart,” he breathed.
He’d never kissed me before and I knew he was finally going to as he hovered over me, his lips an inch away from mine. I was desperate, starved to taste him for the first time.
“Do you want me to kiss you, London?”
I nodded, licking my lips with anticipation. The wire, the inability to get away, the fear associated with helplessness, all forgotten.
He kissed the corner of my mouth then trailed a path to my ear and sucked on the lobe. “I kiss you, there is no going back. No changing your mind.” He shifted and I could feel his hard cock against my inner thigh. “You’ll never be able to leave me, London.”
Breathless, I said, “Is that a threat?”
He chuckled. The gravelly sound sank into me and goose bumps rose. “I don’t need threats. Just truths.”
His hand shifted into my hair to the back of my neck and fisted. “But with me, you’ll have to be stronger than you’ve ever been. I’ll do things you won’t like and ask of you what you can’t understand, but you need to trust every word that passes my lips.”
Could I do that? Could I trust Kai so implicitly?
He’d never lied to me. He’d always told me the type of man he was right from the beginning. He’d given me choices. He’d given me the most important thing back—myself.
But I knew the answer. I knew without a doubt that being with Kai was dangerous, but it was also the safest place I could be. And the only place I wanted to be.
I arched toward him. “Kiss me, Kai.”
His grip tightened on my hair, and then he groaned before his mouth came down on mine.
It was owning.
It was a judgment.
It was the final knot binding us together.
Our mouths melding became a permanent tether that neither of us could break.
“Fuck, London.” He pulled back a second to look at me as if making certain it was real, and then our mouths crashed again, his tongue caressing, tasting, taking. I met his urgency with my own, pulling on the wire that kept me from wrapping my arms around him and bringing him closer.
There was no sweetness as he kissed me, but it was slow and determined, as if he was making certain I understood what all this meant. My body ached and soared, quivers of desire racing through me as I forgot about the wire around my wrists and gave in to him. Gave in to what I needed from Kai.
Everything.
He pulled back as his fingers went to the buttons on my shirt. I wanted him to rip it open, watch as the buttons popped off, and then have his hands on my breasts, but Kai wouldn’t do that.
Despite the fire burning in his eyes, he took his time and meticulously undid each little white button. His fingers trailing down between my breasts as he did it.
He smiled and paused. “What do you feel, London?” His fingers moved away from my skin and he merely held the next button between his fingers, not undoing it.
“Desire,” I whispered, breathless.
“Specifically, please.”
Jesus. I pulled again on the wire, a reminder that I was helpless, yet it was also a reminder that I wasn’t. I’d chosen this.
I’d given him my everything.
“Heat. I feel heat all through my body.”
“Mmm. What else?”
“A tightness in my chest like… I can’t breathe unless you touch me again.” He still refused to touch me so I continued, “And tingles between my legs… a vibration of electricity. And wet. I feel wet.”
He smirked. “Oh, there is no question you’re wet, baby.” He undid another button, but this time, he avoided touching my skin before he pushed the material away from my body.
“And a little scared.” He nodded as if that was what he’d been waiting to hear.
“Why?”
I thought about it. I was tied up in a bed with a man on top of me and I was completely helpless like I’d been for years, but it was a different kind of fear.
“Because I trust you so much. It’s terrifying.”
He let go of my shirt and lowered his body until his lips lightly brushed against mine. “I’ll never hurt you. But, baby, you know that already.”
His mouth lowered to mine and he kissed me again. It was urgent. Bruising. Harsh. His one hand pulled on my hair while the other slowly glided down my body to between my legs.
“Oh, God.” Arching my back, I broke from the kiss when his heated palm cupped me. He didn’t move his hand, merely rested it there. Claiming. Owning.
“Please,” I begged.
He trailed kisses down my neck to the crease between my breasts. He was slow and casual about it, taking his time as his heated breath and moist lips tasted and explored until he finally reached my nipple and drew it into his mouth.
He was gentle at first, the velvet surface of his tongue playing with it back and forth. I wiggled my pelvis trying to get him to move his hand that still cupped me. But his patience was resilient as he just held his hand on my sex with the slightest pressure, causing the anticipation to build.
My nipple slipped from his mouth. Then, he sat up and traced the red surface with his finger while his other hand inside my panties twitched and sent a wave of desire through me.
“Kai. Please.”
He unraveled me. Everything he’d done by bringing me here, the ice water, the belt, even tying me up, it was all to bring me to this point. There was no turning back for me now. I wanted only him.
“Pull on the wire, London.”
“Huh?”
He climbed off me and lay on his side beside me. “I want you to feel the restraints.”
“I do. I feel them.”
“I need to know he is out of you.”
What he was asking… I’d done everything he asked of me, but what I’d been through would never truly die. It was part of me and with Kai’s help, I’d fought back. Now, he wanted me to feel like I had so many times before during those years with Alfonzo and Jacob?
“Fight, London.”
“Kai. Why? I don’t understand?” Why was he making me do this?
“You said you trusted me.” I nodded. “Then I need you to fight. Feel helpless and vulnerable and scared.”
“I don’t want to.” I didn’t want that overwhelming panic that suffocated my lungs and gripped my chest so hard that it felt as if a vise was being tightened around me.
“Of course you don’t. But you need to.” He leaned over me, briefly kissed my quivering lips then got up from the bed.
My heart drummed against my rib cage as I watched him walk to the other side of the room completely naked. His cock
hard and erect against his muscled abdomen.
He sat in the chair, leaned back, his thighs parted and his eyes dark and intense as he waited for me to decide what to do.
Kai was an enigma, but there was one trait I knew for certain about him and that was he’d never give in. Never yield if he wanted something. God, he’d searched for me for two years and I was betting he’d have done it for twenty more if he had to.
That was the type of man he was and I did trust him.
So I fought.
I yanked on the wire and I winced as it cut into my wrists. I twisted and turned, the sheet beneath me now wrapping around my legs as I struggled against the bonds, the fear creeping into me as the memory of being on the cot, Alfonzo on top of me, my wrists tied just like this but with the heavy cold weight of manacles.
Panic heightened as the memory grew stronger and I thrashed on the bed. Kai sitting on the chair was forgotten as I struggled to get free.
I couldn’t get away.
Trapped.
He was going to leave me here for days.
No.
No.
I screamed as I yanked and pulled as the memories invaded like a black suffocating fog.
“No. No.”
With everything I had, I yanked on the wire.
The knot he’d tied in the wire released and my arms shot forward from the momentum as I sprung free.
I lay still for a second, breathing ragged, my wrists still tied together but free from the headboard.
Free.
A cool wave of relief poured over me as the panic washed away. I was heaving in breaths of air from my struggle, but the terror was gone. It was as if the sudden release had re-written the memory. I’d escaped. I’d escaped when for years I couldn’t.
“Yes.” Kai’s voice was a deep resonating sound that was like a blanket of warmth.
“You put a knot that would eventually release if I fought hard enough? You wanted me to break free?”
“Yes.”
“You wanted me to feel the fear and escape it myself.” It wasn’t a question because that was exactly what he wanted.
“You won’t always be able to break free, London. That’s reality. But if you can’t, know that I’ll always come for you. Don’t ever forget that. You need to know that.”
My breath left me as I stared at him, taking in what he said. “I do know.” I had no doubt Kai would walk through an inferno in order to get to me. God, he had. “But you’re not God, Kai. Even if you think you are.”
He raised his brows. “True. But I’m the closest you’ll ever get to the big man.” I smiled and he said, “Come here.”
My legs still trembling, I crawled off the bed and walked over to him. He reached out and undid the wire still around my wrists. Red lines embedded in my skin and he brought my wrist to his mouth, kissing the inflamed skin then repeated with the other one.
My eyes flicked to his cock that was still hard and I wanted to sink to my knees and take him in my mouth. I never thought I’d willingly want to do that again, but the need to taste him on the tip of my tongue, to wrap my lips around the hard velvet surface, to give him pleasure pulsed through me.
I decided right then to break one of his rules and it was without fear. Without uncertainty.
I slipped to my knees on the floor between his legs, my hands on his muscled, naked thighs.
His voice was a low growl as he harshly grabbed my chin and forced me to look at him. “I never want you on your knees again.”
I met his fierce scowl, but it was the hint of fear in his eyes that had me softening my initial retort. “You want to give me choices?”
“Yes.”
“Then this is my choice. I want your cock in my mouth. I want to hear you groan with pleasure.”
“Then we’ll move to the bed. I don’t want you on your knees on the floor.”
It was then I realized that maybe this wasn’t just about me. This was about him. He couldn’t handle seeing me on my knees. I wasn’t sure if it was a reminder of Mexico or something else, but whatever it was he was fighting it every second I remained on my knees.
“Maybe it’s time to re-write that memory, too, Kai?” His eyes widened as a flicker of surprise hit his face. “And you won’t always get what you want. At least with me.”
Then he shook his head back and forth as a twitch of a smile formed while he released my arms. “Mmm, perhaps. But I will certainly try.”
Then he picked me up, carried me to the bed and tossed me down. He came after me and settled himself against the headboard.
I crawled between his legs and slid my hands over his knees, up his thighs to his hips.
I watched his expression as my hand lowered to his cock, wrapping around the base of it. He stopped breathing. I trailed my tongue over the tip and his eyes shifted from mine to my mouth and his cock in my hand.
I tightened my grip and before I lowered my mouth to him I said, “You’re my everything.”
Hope Destroys
I LAY IN bed with London curled into me, her cheek resting on my chest, palm on my abdomen covering one of my scars. The most recent, the one in Mexico where I’d been shot, changing the course of London’s life.
A stray bullet that cost her more than it did me.
‘You’re my everything.’
Her words from last night weren’t lost on me, but at the time, they’d been pushed aside as she sucked on my cock until I had to flip her over and thrust inside her.
We had to talk. She had to know what we were facing because I had no plan. I didn’t know the outcome of what would happen to us.
Her hand slid over my abdomen to a jagged scar left by an iron rod, a red-hot iron rod. She traced it with her finger and I felt the wetness of a teardrop soak into my skin as her cheek rested on my chest.
“What happened, Kai?”
It was time. She needed to know everything before I left. “That was an iron rod when I was twelve.” Her hand froze on top of the scar and I heard her sharp inhale. “My mother sent us to a place when we were young after my father died. She called it ‘the farm.’ A place where you’re taught to survive and if you fail, you’re dead. Different ages, males, females, it didn’t matter. We were there to learn how to kill. But we also had to learn how to write and speak effectively. We learned the ways of the world. Although, their idea of the ways of the world were somewhat distorted.” I paused. “If you made it to eighteen, you were sent on assignments.”
“How old were you when you went there, Kai?”
“I was seven, my sister five.”
She gasped, then after a minute said, “You have a sister?”
I stiffened as a wave of pain gripped me. I’d blocked her out for so long, the farm did that, but over the last few years with the emotions creeping back in, so had my sister, Chess. “She’s in France. Mother had her imprisoned.”
“But why would your mother do that? Why would she send her kids to a place like that and why imprison your sister?”
I curled my fingers around hers resting on my chest. “My mother is a bitch and she wanted control of Vault.” I explained to her about Vault, the board members, what they did, what they stood for then and now.
“Where are the kids now?”
“Some became operatives, others have been killed. Some never made it out of the farm. Kids disappeared in the night and new ones appeared all the time. You never slept well, fearing you’d be next. Disappearing was never good, because we knew those who disappeared weren’t coming back and were probably dead.”
“Handlers looked after us. Conditioned us, I guess you could say. Pain was a daily ritual. After a while, you grew accustomed to it. Immune. Numb. It’s the fear that eats away at you and they were good at making you fear them.”
Resting my hand on the small of her back, I softly drew paths going nowhere, meaningless paths. “But it wasn’t fear for me. It was fear for my sister.” She stiffened. “They knew it, too, and used it against us. It’s
when I learned that what they wanted was to break me to the point where I didn’t care about anyone.”
She remained quiet, but her tears said it all. I wasn’t telling her so she’d pity me or feel sorry for me. That was the last thing I wanted. I needed her to know, so if Vault ever took her, she’d understand what type of people they were.
“It’s why they start us so young, fewer attachments, easier to break and condition us. But my sister… she kept breaking rules. Kept trying to help other kids. When she was about fourteen, she helped a kid escape. I don’t know how she did it, but she was taken away and none of us saw her for a long time. That’s when we were moved to another place. I guess they were afraid the kid who escaped would tell the authorities.”
“Oh, God, Kai.”
“When she came back… I don’t know why, but she looked okay and she began to learn how to fight like the rest of us. She was compliant. But a few years ago, she went on a mission and didn’t come back.” I sighed, closing my eyes for a second as I thought about her. “They found her. Brought her back and she’s been imprisoned ever since.”
“You don’t escape them, London. You do what you have to in order to survive. You learn to play their game by your rules.”
“Like now.”
“Yeah, baby. Like now. You’re an attachment and they would end it if they knew you were with me.” I cupped her chin and tilted her face to look at me. “If they get to you….” Fuck. I didn’t know if I’d be able to save her. Maybe I had lied to her because Vault was the one place I may never be able to save her from.
“How…? God, Kai, how could your mother do that?”
“I may have her tainted blood running through me, but she isn’t a mother. I call her that because it’s my game. My card to play, so she feels comfort in thinking I’m her loyal son.”
“Are you? Loyal?” she asked quietly.
“I have a house they don’t know about and I have the daughter of the man who supplies them with a drug hidden in it.”
I ran my hand down her spine until it rested on the cusp of her ass. “London, hope is dangerous there. They know how to erase every part of you until you’re nothing. And now… the drug your father made for them will only make it easier because they will use men already trained to kill.” I paused. “Like Georgie’s brother.”
