“I'm warning you.”
I'm already doing the Incredible Hulk thing with the insatiable thirst to plunge inside Harl still eating me up. But I get what Rowan's up to here. She's no fucking fool and she knows me almost as well as Strike, even better when it comes to certain of my needs. She's pushing me to release my obvious frustration into her. We're all living on the edge of the chasm with all the shit going down.
“It ain't gonna happen, Ro. I told you. Not ever again.”
“Fine. So we're gonna sit quietly and wait for bankruptcy to take us down?”
“We aren't waiting for anything. We're gonna find out who the fucker poaching our business is and take him apart but if I had to spend every last million on 'rescuing' Harley I'd do it. And I don't wanna hear squat against my choice.”
When Rowan's left to go to her own apartment for the vampiric daytime sleep, my first thought is to find Harl. She's not in her room, the one she made her own living here before. I get a pole up again with the hope she may be in mine but the bed is smooth. That leaves Fatou's private quarters which I'd never bust in on and the red room. The door's locked when I try the handle. So I call her name, without response.
“Answer me Harley, Baby. I need to hold you but if you want me to leave you alone, I'll do whatever you tell me.”
When I hear the repressed squeal, barely audible inside the room I know she's had another change of heart.
“Harley you don't have to be afraid of all this. I don't have to hurt you. I don't even want to. I don't ever have to tie you up or spank one of those beautiful round cheeks. I promise I will never ever hurt you or allow anyone else to.”
Another tiny repressed moan.
I was back to building this shaky stepbrother house of cards all over. Fuck it, I was tired and she could stew on her mother's ridiculous claims for what was left of the night surrounded by the tools of pleasure.
I'm a little concerned as I hurl myself into the silk sheets that remind me of Harley's satiny soft skin. What if some of the equipment she's locked herself up with reminds her of that night in the basement? But she's a big girl, if she wants a safe harbor she knows where I am.
The way I feel about her has taught me that I'm not the same sicko as my father. All these years I've been haunted by the fear that I'd turn out like him. Searching out young girls to dominate in the worst way and incapable of any real love. But I'm not like that. The love I have for her is real and what I want to do to her gorgeous body is a reflection of that. My years of dominating the submissives at the club were an expression of the fact that I couldn't have the girl I wanted, needed, yearned for. It was my dumbass method of getting her out of my mind.
It's not even an hour later that I'm torn out of a zombie sleep by the screeching siren.
What the fuck. A sound I've never heard even in New York City. I locate it coming from Harley's bedroom, it's the alarm on her ankle bracelet's GPS box. She's broken her fucking curfew.
Harlow
My heart was ripped exactly in two at the sound of the elevator door opening directly into the penthouse. He was right there at my entrance, savoring the moment of anticipation. We clutched at each other a little tighter, fingertips pressing hungrily into flesh, eager to drop over the edge of the chasm into bliss. Then that ping of warning, announcing the arrival of a third person threw us into confusion.
Guilt took over for an instant and I tore myself away. I squirmed and shuttled out from underneath Cole's powerful body, in my dazed state heading into the kitchen. Then realizing it offered no place to hide, completely open to the living room, I dashed on straight toward the elevator that had spilled its cargo and was closing its door. Duh. I remembered I couldn't leave the apartment's boundaries by so much as one step, so I hurtled back down the hallway and through the first door I saw partly open.
I pushed it shut and leaned in. Breathing hard against the black wood from the excitement still coursing through every cell. I couldn't deny my feelings anymore. It was not only the pulse of longing igniting my blood, I needed Cole with every sense. He had to belong to me. There was no other way I could live my life.
“Oh god, what have I done? I'm nothing but a-”
The gnarly hand that slammed across my mouth smelt of something putrid. Like it was rotting. Definitely not Cole's strong wide palm. I saw red and kicked back at the body pressing into me from behind, crushing me against the wood door until my skin pinched with pain. My blows missed their mark though and thrashed at thin air.
“Nothing but a what?” A vile psycho voice made my heart dive into my throat. Then a tight black band was wrapped around my mouth so I couldn't answer. I slapped out and he swore as I scratched the back of his hand. Silenced, first my arms were dragged behind me and bound, then my eyes were blindfolded, plunging me into my personal blackness.
Fuck, in my bewilderment, I'd made a dash not into Cole's bedroom but straight into his play room. All the tools of the trade were lined up on the wall, right at my stepfather's scuzzy fingertips.
“Nothing but a little slut?” he said, as he turned me around from the door toward him and pulled open the coat, gasping with triumphant glee at my unexpected nakedness underneath. “Nothing but a little whore, dressing up or should we say undressing, for your own brother.”
He tugged on each nipple until I screamed a silent howl under the gag. Unable to make them stand up for him, he tweaked and twisted even harder then placed a clamp on each one. The piercing pain echoed through my body and made my knees shudder with shock.
“You like that don't you baby, my slutty little girl?” His dirty groan showed he was enjoying himself making me convulse and it scared me. My body was shaking with icy shivers all the way down which he took to be some kind of excitement. “I know you like it rough and hard. Don't worry darlin', you're gonna get it.”
I bucked and kicked out at him, again missing any hit seeing as I couldn't see a thing. Still I wasn't going to give in easily this time. I would fight him no matter what violence he inflicted in return. He would soon discover I did not enjoy his filthy caress.
“Yow, she's got some fire in her now. Just how I like it. I'm gonna love restraining your will, baby girl.”
I kicked out again, the only weapon I had against him and caught one in the shin that made him stifle a yelp.
“You little bitch.”
The slap he delivered to my breasts with one of the paddles from the wall made me drop to my knees with the burning fire licking my skin. He pushed me over and without my hands to steady myself, my face planted into the hard floor. Leaving my ass lifted up in the air, he tore down my underwear and exposed me to him completely. I was helpless, tied and bound. The air crackled cold on my still glistening slit as the paddle swished to land on my uplifted cheek. One side then the other, he spanked my butt until his fury burnt off and left as a scar on my body.
“You learned who's boss yet, slutty baby?” He bent down to croak into my ear.
I remained on my knees, holding in the whimpers while Michael rasped heavily beside me. I heard Rowan leave and when Cole knocked at the door, I willed him with all my soul to come into the room. Of course he wouldn’t because he had too much respect for my wishes.
I'd behaved like such an idiot, reeling him in then tossing him back he must have felt like a squid. Because of my actions he thought I was hopelessly conflicted about us. All because of the ridiculous way I've been acting, not only tonight but ever since we came together again.
He knew right away that I was afraid of the overwhelm of feeling I have for him. The fear that he may vanish again, leaving me with nowhere to put all that emotion made me run and hide. Cole knew all that and was giving me the space to come to him like a tortured animal, only when I was ready.
“Okay, Harl, I'll see you in the morning, babe. You know where I am if you need anything. Anything at all, I'm all yours. I'm all in, baby.”
“Make any sound and it'll be the same but worse. You hear?” Michael spat in a whi
sper right up into my ear drum.
A cold prod at my pussy threatened me and that would be enough to silence me but Michael couldn't resist. He pulled the trigger and a buzz of electric shock powered through my nerve endings making me crumple to the floor in a shiver of detestable pulsations.
Then the gorgeous man on the other side of the door started opening his heart as he'd never done. Telling me his secret inner fears.
“I'm nothing like my asshole father. If that's what scares you, you gotta trust me, Harl. I will always care for you like the angelic princess you are.”
Oh my god if only he knew. I was positive with all my body and soul he was the furthest thing from the monster inflicting another shot of current through my tunnel. Michael snickered with quiet glee as he watched me tremor and gyrate for another electric buzz.
My heart sank all the way to my feet when Cole left me with more words of loving endearment and headed down the hall to his own room. Why, oh why did he have to listen to idiot me? If only he'd decided to force me as he had at Illicit and again earlier tonight, I would have been free of the demon. Now I may not survive the night.
Chapter TWELVE
My step dad hauled me to my feet. At least the blindfold didn't allow him to see the tears leaking from my eyes because of the intense sting blasting into the raw skin on my buttocks. Please. Leave me alone.
I knew I had to get through this by myself. Steel my body against the pain and humiliation and just survive. A woman who faces her fears and doesn't let herself sink under them can get through anything. And even come out stronger.
“Time to go home at last,” my step father sneered into my ear.
First he placed a tiny clamp with a needle sharp pinch onto my ravaged clit. When I whimpered behind the gag he told me to suck it up.
“Get used to it. There's gonna be a lot of playtime for you when you get to jail,” he snarled. “But not before I've used you all up.”
He yanked up my underwear over my hips and opened the door to drag me from the play room. I guess he pulled me to the elevator, then remembered that he'd have to negotiate the doormen with a bound and gagged semi-naked, very unwilling girl as his hostage.
When he pulled on my arm, forcing me toward the door, my heart thrilled. As soon as I stepped outside that service door my alarm bracelet would go off. The cops had been adamantly clear that one step outside, even to the service stairs or elevator would trigger an instant alarm. They'd have to come looking for me. I'd be arrested again but I'd be free of my tormentor.
Michael threw the service door open and maybe I was expecting a five alarm fire type noise but as the door swung shut behind us, there was still no sound.
“Fuck.” Michael cursed when he discovered the stairwell had a second door headed down that required a key code.
The only way was up. And suddenly I was trying to climb stairs with a limping madman tugging one arm ferociously, with no balance and no eyesight. I tripped and stumbled into the gunshot wound Rowan had fired into his leg and that made him madder at every step.
He yanked my arm almost out of its shoulder socket, dragging me up the steep cement stairs, although that was nothing in comparison to the pain in my nipples and clit. In a rage of impatience at our progress, he tugged the blindfold from my eyes and around my hands so we could make it up the flights of stairs to the roof.
A blast of cold air as the wind that high up knocked into us. Now what?
“You keep your mouth shut while we wait until your big bro leaves for his filthy business. then you and me, we'll go out nice and calm like happy families, you get me?”
I nodded agreement. At least up here he wasn't going to lay his disgusting hands on my body. But the man was seriously insane. He pulled me to the edge of the roof and insisted I look down. The flash of sick pleasure across his features was more sickening than the long drop.
The pain in my sensitive points continued to twang through my body but I knew I had to focus on keeping alert for my chance. It was now clear that Michael had some bizarre vendetta against his son and that he'd never stop trying to capture me. Maybe Michael was like a child, wanting anything that the older sibling had. I'm like a toy soldier they both claim is the only one they want.
“Let her go.”
Michael whipped around at the sound of Cole's voice. He was still clutching hold of me and we both teetered precariously off balance, way too close to the edge of the drop for my liking.
“Get out of here, Cole.”
“Let go of Harley.”
“Or what, son? Or what?”
I couldn't see Cole anywhere on the rooftop. But from the direction of his quiet rage I detected the long thin black barrel of a gun.
“You think you're so much better than me but you're exactly the same,” Michael screamed into the wind.
“No, I used to think that and it scared the shit out of me. Fear of your sickness surfacing in me prevented me staying with any woman, even one I was in love with. I'm so sorry Harley for leaving you like that. I couldn't take the chance of hurting you.”
“It's okay, I get it now.”
“Isn't it sweet how you two think you're gonna get a happy ending?”
“We can have the talk when you let her go. Harley isn't your pawn to hurt me with.”
“Isn't she?”
Michael twisted my arm so that I toppled unsteady and screamed, as the ground forty stories below suddenly seemed to fly up toward me. My heart was bashing through my lungs and the air vanished. I couldn't breathe. It took a huge effort to pull a tiny suck of oxygen in.
“You hurt her and you got no more shield.” Cole shouted. “Then it'll just be me and you. No way you can win.”
He was keeping his voice incredibly stable but I could tell he was as enraged and terrified as I was.
“You won't do anything to me. You're too much of a pussy boy, we both know that.”
I don't know what happened, call it dizzy from the high rise, but my mind flared. No one calls my man a pussy. I flicked my left foot up behind me and slammed the sharp edge of my square heel into Michael's shin. Finally, I caught a good shot and he yelped in pain. The shock made him let go of my arm for an instant and the shot rung out over the rooftop.
From that instant, everything I looked at became diamond clear. Time slowed down so it was almost a freeze frame and I had the chance to examine at the screen of my life before me and come to my decision.
The future looked like this: Michael would continue to dedicate his life to hurting Cole. Whether damaging his business or abusing the woman he cares for, Cole's father wanted sick vengeance. I couldn't let him hurt the most wonderful caring man I know. He deserved so much better.
Cole rose from behind a vent, looking like the man who saved the world and holding the biggest damn gun I've ever seen.
I could tell that Cole's shot was perfectly placed not to kill my mom's husband, when he easily could have. The bullet entered his chest above the heart and he'd recover. Cole did that for me. I know that. Because I begged him not to hurt our father and because he wants me to think of him as a man, not a hired killer.
But Cole would be the one to be punished in all this. Michael would make sure his son gets jail for shooting him. I knew only too well the penalty for attempted murder. Cole couldn't go to jail for my sake.
He met my eyes and locked on with his rangefinder precision. They were so full of love and passion for me that my heart swelled huge in my chest. He'd do anything at all to take care of me and make me happy. We'd always be bonded because we'd do anything to protect each other. Whatever it took. And now we had the chance to cement our love.
With my eyes glued to his and a smile that told him everything, I stretched out the point of my foot and pushed Michael over the edge. He was still falling when the police came dashing through the door onto the roof.
As they came hurtling at me, guns drawn, admonishing me not to move, my eyes remained buried in Cole's. We communicated everything that need
ed to be said. He was already moving forward to protect me from the cops when he was halted by my gaze.
I didn't just kill a man so that Cole could end up in jail. To make what I did to save him worthwhile, he had to slip back down the stairs to the penthouse before the cops noticed he was there.
Chapter THIRTEEN
Of course Cole was waiting for me when the cops released me. I had no more doubts. The bondage ties the cops found on the roof, along with me having been gagged and clamped when they showed up, were more than enough to convince them I was struggling with my stepfather in self defense.
I came out through the doors, freed from that living hell known as justice and there he was. Bigger than everyone, bigger than life itself. We smiled shyly at each other and didn't hug, didn't kiss, didn't even shake hands. Just turned around and walked out of there.
“Are you okay?” He gritted out as we passed the crews of cameras.
“Fine. Are you?”
He laughed then, as though he didn't much care about himself. He probably never had time, being so focused on protecting me.
“Fancy a drink?” I added.
He looked down at me to see if I was in shock or something, then laughed.
“Babe, it's not even eleven AM.”
“I know a bar close by that serves a wicked Caesar.”
We were seated in a booth in the almost empty space, waiting for the lunch rush from the banker boys, before Cole clued in. I knew he got it when his face came alive with that smile that could light up Times Square.
“This is the bar where we found each other again,” he said. “Harl, you have a wicked glint in your eye.”
“Hmm. You see, the police were kind enough to do a rush DNA test on the skin they found under my fingernails where I scratched Michael. Turns out we aren't related at all. Not. Even. Close. But it sure helped my story about his extended stalking of me.
They believe Michael is the culprit that attacked various young girls in the neighborhood over the last few years, all looking rather similar to me. And that was backed up when they discovered the test paperwork at my mom's house.”
Club ILLICIT 3: Billionaire Bonded Romance Page 6
