Condemned Complete Series: A Dark Romance

by Gemma James

  “I realize that.”

  “No, you don’t.” Sighing, I ran a hand through my hair and pulled at the strands until my scalp burned. “You should’ve told me. You should’ve fucking told me.”

  I tossed a few bills onto the table to cover the dinner I wouldn’t eat, and then I rushed from the restaurant like the coward I was. But the question remained; if she had told me, would it have changed my mind about taking Alex?

  7. FIRST TIME

  Alex

  I wanted to die.

  I didn’t know how long he’d left me suspended, but it was messing with my head. I’d lost all sense of time and direction. My body was numb, almost weightless, except for the burn that circled my wrists. That pain didn’t go away, no matter how much I tried to block it out. At some point, I started counting…at some point I’d also given up. By the time 7,200 seconds passed, I was about to go out of my mind. The time after that was endless. My voice had gone hoarse long ago from screaming his name.

  He never came, and I began to panic. Maybe the past eight years had made him snap and tormenting me this way was his only source of relief. Images popped into my mind, scenarios of him beaten in prison, or worse. The helplessness he must have experienced, just as I was now. I tried to wrap my mind around eight years, but I could hardly wrap my mind around the few hours since he’d slammed the door shut, once again leaving me in darkness. A sick feeling formed in my gut.

  God, he must really hate me. My actions, born of cowardice and shame, had labeled him a rapist. In that moment, as I stood on tiptoes in a most punishing way, I hated myself more than he did. I deserved this.

  The turn of a knob ricocheted, ringing through my ears, and a sliver of light beamed toward me an instant before it was extinguished. Impossibly, the blackness became even more suffocating. I heard him coming near, though he barely made a sound.

  His touch landed on my shoulder, and I wondered how he found me so easily. His fingers were warm and soft, starkly different from the chill I couldn’t escape. My teeth chattered as his caress fluttered across my breasts, and my moan rent the air like a sword, tearing the quiet in two.

  Clothing swished, and his arm brushed mine as he moved to stand behind me. His breath hit my ear before his words did. “All those years I was in prison, did you even think of me once?”

  Twisting my aching wrists, I shuffled my feet, but my limbs refused to stop quaking. “Please let me down.”

  “Answer the question.”

  “I wrote you letters,” I blurted, then drew in a quick breath. In the wee hours of the morning when sleep eluded me, I’d bared my soul to him on paper. All the guilt I’d carried, how I felt about him. I’d also laid out every last detail of the secrets I kept locked away.

  “I never got any letters.”

  “I never sent them.” Why had I opened my mouth about the letters? If he ever found them…oh God.

  “Then why write them?”

  “Because I…”

  “Spit it out, Alex.”

  “I missed you.”

  “You missed me?” He fisted my hair. “You do realize how ridiculous that sounds, right? You sent me away.”

  “I know.” I grimaced as his tug on my hair increased.

  “What part of me did you miss? The guy you couldn’t resist gawking at, or the guy who actually gave a shit about you?”

  Past tense. He didn’t care about me anymore. I couldn’t blame him, but the knowledge hurt something fierce, threatened to chew a hole in my heart. “I just missed you, Rafe.”

  “Did you write about all the dirty things you wished I’d do to you?”

  “No.”

  “Liar,” he murmured into my ear. “Tell me about your fantasies.”

  I tried shaking my head, mortified, but his fist in my hair immobilized me.

  “If you don’t start talking, you’re staying down here until morning.” His hand dropped, and I sensed him retreating.

  “Don’t go!” I cried. “I’ll tell you.”

  “I know you will. You haven’t changed. I knew eight years ago I could probably do anything I wanted, but I knew better.”

  “And now?” I asked, hesitance creeping into my tone.

  “Now I’m black on the inside. I just don’t give a fuck anymore.”

  “I don’t believe that. I still remember who you are, even if you don’t.”

  “Would the man you remember have strung you up on your toes?”

  Definitely not.

  “Didn’t think so,” he said, as if he’d heard my thoughts. “So talk. Tell me all of your dirty secrets.”

  Oh God. The way he breathed those words into my ear was enough to unravel me. “I’ve thought about you making love to me.”

  “Do I seem like a making-love kind of guy?”

  “No.” He seemed like a fuck-you-until-you-split-in-two kind of guy. The kind of guy who’d bring new meaning to the word passionate.

  “C’mon, Alex. Last chance to spill before I walk through that door alone.”

  “I’ve thought about you going down on me.”

  He rimmed my earlobe with his tongue, invoking a jittery sigh. “Did you get yourself off thinking about my tongue on your pussy?” He closed a hand around my throat, arched my neck, and darted his tongue inside my ear in an erotic demonstration of what he could do with his hot mouth on other areas of my body.

  “You’re an ass,” I said, though the breathless quality of my voice took the sting out of the words.

  “I want to fuck yours.”

  I couldn’t help but tremble. The idea wasn’t pleasant, but at the same time, the thought of Rafe sliding inside my tight, forbidden hole…there was something tantalizing about it.

  His harsh laughter brought me back to the here and now. “Fuck, you’re getting hot thinking about it, aren’t you?”

  “No.” I shook my head, as if the denial alone wasn’t good enough, as if he could see me anyway in the darkness.

  “I’m calling bullshit. You want me to fuck your ass.”

  “I’ve never…done it before.” Anal sex was the one area where I was still a virgin, untainted by Zach’s brutal obsession. The thought of Rafe penetrating the last place left untouched turned me on in ways I couldn’t explain, yet it also terrified me.

  “I can be your first.” He wedged a finger between my lips. “I bet you’ve dreamed of my dick in your mouth too. Do you like sucking cock?”

  I closed my lips and sucked, unable to stop myself. His finger tasted of salt and something that was undeniably him. The way he stroked my tongue made me ache to have something much bigger in my mouth. I’d never wanted it before, had often endured Zach’s forceful intrusion while giving it my all just so he’d finish that much faster. But Rafe…putting my mouth on him would be different.

  He withdrew his finger and traced a wet path down my throat. “I’m going to release you, and you’re going to obey every fucking demand, do you understand me?”

  “Yes,” I said, biting back a moan.

  He set me free from the shackles, and my arms fell to my sides, as if weighed down by cement blocks. Not allowing me a chance to stretch my protesting limbs, he pulled me though the blackness, as if a sudden charge of urgency drove him, and my heart thrummed an erratic beat as he pushed me up the stairs, fingers pressing into hips with a touch that was so not gentle. His hands on me, gouging with pain and power, flooded my pussy with heat and dampness. My breaths came rapidly, a wheezing sound more in tune with fear than with want, but wanted him, I did.

  We entered the living room, and his hands rose to my waist as his mouth closed over my neck, sucking and nipping as he walked me forward, one step at a time. I dropped my head against his shoulder and moaned, eyelids drooping. Parting my lips, I thought I spoke his name, but if I did, it was lost to our heavy breathing.

  He halted at the edge of the room and pulled down a stepladder. “Climb up,” he said with a groan. His hard-on jabbed my spine, and his large hands wrapped around my sides
as he guided me up the steep passage. He switched on a light, and I saw the top consisted of a loft bedroom with a slanted ceiling. Double skylights undoubtedly gave the illusion of space during the day, though the king size bed took up most of the room. It was cozy and inviting, and I wanted to sink into the mattress and find out if it was as soft as it looked, preferably while his naked body blanketed mine.

  He whirled me around, and I met his gaze, plummeting into impossibly green depths shadowed by lashes longer and thicker than mine. Those eyes radiated manic obsession, devouring me with a feverous edge. He pounced without warning, muscles bunching as he hoisted me up by the neck. I kicked my feet helplessly as he strode across the room and slammed me onto the bed. This was about more than sex. He wanted to hurt me—I felt it in my bones where his hands had left their imprints.

  Gasping, I propped up on elbows and watched him warily, my shaking knees falling to the sides. He stalked me slowly, shedding his clothes with each step closer, and his fierce expression said I belonged to him. I shouldn’t feel excitement, shouldn’t feel warmth pooling between my legs, but that was me—the fucked up girl who got off when she shouldn’t.

  “Turn over,” he growled. “On your hands and knees.”

  I rolled to my stomach, pushed onto all fours, and the mattress lowered when he climbed behind me. He wrapped his large hands around my hips and dragged me backward until my bottom pressed into his lap, my thighs spread as far as they would go. A rough hand shoved my cheek to the mattress, and my strangled moan tore through the air as his erection teased the opening of my sex.

  “Are you on birth control?”

  The question evoked a deep ache in my heart. I’d been on some form of contraception since I was fifteen. “I just had an injection a couple of weeks ago.”

  “Are you clean?”

  “Are you?” I countered.

  “I’ve been in prison for eight years. What do you think?”

  I didn’t answer, as I didn’t like to think of Rafe in prison.

  “I asked you a question,” he bit out in that unnerving tone I was beginning to recognize. “Are you clean?”

  I’d only been with one man, and considering Zach’s obsession with me, I doubted I had to worry about STDs. I wished Zach had turned his focus onto someone else, as horrible and selfish as that sounded. “I’m clean.”

  He curled his fingers into my hips and nudged me. “Do you want this?”

  God yes.

  I let out a pleading moan. I shouldn’t want him this way. It was twisted and wrong, but just the thought that he’d do it anyway if I fought him made me even hotter. I hated my body; it had it all backwards. Sex shouldn’t be about power and control.

  His hands closed around my wrists and yanked them to the mattress, next to my spread thighs, and I’d never felt so helpless and exposed—not in a way that was so exhilarating.

  “I won’t be gentle.”

  My whole body shuddered. “I don’t expect you to be.”

  “Good, ‘cause I’m not stopping.” Something ominous laced his words.

  “You’re going to hurt me, aren’t you?” Another shiver went through me, and I couldn’t decide if I was excited or horrified. Zach had hurt me so many times that it had become second nature, but Rafe wasn’t my psychotic step-brother. Rafe was the guy I’d obsessed over for years, and now he had me pinned down and spread, easy prey, and I worried he was about to figure out just how fucked up I was.

  “No orgasms allowed.”

  I groaned. “You’re crazy if you think I can hold back.” Every atom in my body zinged with the need for him to fill me.

  His fingers flexed around my wrists. “I think you’re gonna find a way, unless you really want to test me. I’m not fucking you for your pleasure, sweetheart. I’m fucking you because you’re my piece of ass.”

  That was all I’d ever be to him. A piece of ass, a thing he held in contempt for unforgivable sins. Lips trembling, eyes stinging with unshed tears, I tried to swallow the hurt, but this wasn’t how I’d imagined our first time.

  8. CHOKE

  Rafe

  I wasn’t a monster. If I told myself that enough times, maybe I’d believe it.

  She swiveled her head and looked at me, dark curls tumbling over her shoulder, and her jade eyes glimmered with unspoken hurt. She still didn’t understand that I hungered for her pain, her tears. I smacked her hard on the ass. “Keep your head down.”

  I slammed into her, and her spine arched under my onslaught of savage greed. My entire body ignited with the sensation of being joined. No latex barrier, just pure skin-to-skin contact. Shit, her pussy was ready for me. Tight, wet, hot. If I weren’t so on edge, I’d bury myself in her for hours. Finally, after so many fucking years of wanting this girl, I was inside her. The sense of power intoxicated me, as did the discovery that this was more than just sex. I could deny it all I wanted, but our chemistry didn’t lie. There was something irresistible about her. It was true when she was fifteen, when my values kept her safe from me. Now she was even more irresistible because she’d come of age, morphed into a woman I wanted to consume, and I was more than justified in taking her.

  Swiveling my hips, I shoved deeper and thrilled at the way her body sheathed my cock like a glove. We slid together in sweat and need, and I pressed my thumbs into her wrists where her pulse galloped in tune to my thrusts. The sounds she made, so guttural they vibrated straight to my dick—fuck they sent me flying. I plunged harder, faster, and squeezed her wrists until my fingers whitened at the knuckles.

  “You’re hurting me,” she said, her voice wafting in the air like a tattered feather.

  I yanked her upright and wrapped an arm around her shoulders, one hand clamping her arm to trap her against me. The other gripped her throat, fingers on either side of her neck, forcing her head back. Her spine arched as I pumped.

  “You feel that? That’s my cock inside you.” I drove into her violently, increasing the pace, the pain. I wanted to hurt her, wanted her tears. Each thrust was an angry, unforgiving act of punishment—a way to hide what tortured me deep down; things I’d grappled with for eight years. I craved this girl yet hated her guts, all at the same time.

  “Please…” she whimpered.

  “Please what? You wanted me to fuck you, and now…I…am.” I bit back a grunt and flexed my fingers around her throat.

  “Rafe…oh God, Rafe! I’m gonna come,” she bit the words out through gritted teeth, and those blessed tears I craved slipped from her eyes.

  I licked each salty drop from her cheek and let her shame linger on my tongue. “You’re not coming,” I said, clutching her throat and angling her neck to the side. I sank my teeth into tender, creamy skin and clamped down harder when a screeching cry tore from her lips. My dick celebrated that wail.

  “That’s right, sweetheart. Cry for me. Fight me.”

  “Can’t…stop…it.” Her voice lilted into a continuous moan that wrecked me as her pussy clenched.

  She wasn’t fighting, wasn’t struggling or begging. She was fucking getting off.

  Oh fuck no. She would struggle.

  I inhaled deeply, seeking absolute control because anything less was dangerous. It’d been too long since I’d experienced the addictive rush of adrenaline flooding my system, a high I only achieved by stealing someone’s breath and sanity, when I was God to them in those seconds when they straddled the line of life and death at my hands.

  I couldn’t screw this up because no matter what I told her, she meant too much. I wanted her struggle and her terror, but I didn’t want to kill her. I tightened my fingers around her throat, adding just enough pressure to restrict the blood flow to her brain.

  She writhed like a rabid animal, her fingernails digging into any part of me she could reach. Blood rushed my cock, and I’d never felt so hard, so insane and frantic as I rammed her from behind. Her body bowed backward, and I counted the seconds as I came. She relaxed in my arms as the last bit of pleasure shot from my dick. I wit
hdrew, heart pumping too fast, and laid her limp body onto the mattress.

  9. REGRET

  Alex

  Strong, muscular arms surrounded me as I gasped, and I clawed at my throat, fighting against the horrifying experience of not being able to breathe. Despite the disorientation and confusion, I sank deeper into his warmth, loving how his body folded around mine. I coughed and gasped some more, and little by little, clarity returned. Cold, harsh reality doused the warm and fuzzies.

  Rafe had tried to choke me.

  I struggled from his hold and made it to the edge of the bed before he trapped me in his arms again. “Where do you think you’re going?”

  “You fucking choked me!”

  “You fucking came.”

  “Are you trying to kill me? Do you hate me that much?”

  “I don’t hate you that much, Alex.” He moved one arm from my waist and wound a fist in my hair. “You need to remember I’m the one in control here. Just because you have a hot pussy doesn’t mean you can disobey me. When I say no orgasms, I mean no orgasms.”

  Intense hurt welled, unstoppable, and I let out a sob. More followed until I was bawling like a baby. He’d taken something from me—something I’d held onto for years. He’d taken my first time with him, had sullied the memory with his cruelty.

  That was something I’d never get back, and it hurt so incredibly bad because he didn’t seem fazed. I was just another piece of ass. Even worse, I was someone who deserved his contempt.

  I did deserve his hatred, but I didn’t deserve to die.

  “Stop crying, or I’ll put you back in the cellar.”

  “Why do you have to be such an asshole?”

  “Why did you have to send me to prison?” he shot back, adding another painful yank on my hair.

  “I didn’t want to. God, Rafe…I didn’t want to.”

  “I’m done tiptoeing around this. Either tell me why you did it, or I’ll choke you again.”

  Another sob escaped, and I tried to speak but the words wouldn’t come.