Chapter 7
DARIUS
Eleanor had lost her mind.
Her scream was the most hideous sound I'd ever heard. A high-pitched, hysterical sound—half scream, half-heartbroken sob. I couldn't stand it.
I wanted to hear her screams. I wanted to pull them from her lips one by one. But not like this, not the result of fear and hysteria. I wanted screams from pleasure and pain mixing in ways that she didn't know her body could handle.
Thank fuck I had rented out the entire floor. Not that I had planned on making her scream, I just didn't want others to be too close. Ironically enough, I was worried about other people making too much noise.
"Eleanor, stop screaming," I demanded.
She didn't stop; she didn't even look at me.
Her fingers clawed at the necklace, her purple nails scraping along the pale, delicate skin of her throat, leaving bright red scratches in her wake.
I grabbed her by the shoulders and slid her up the wall so she was back on her feet, hoping I could get through to her.
Her eyes were wide, her pupils barely pinpricks as she lost herself to pure panic. It happened when despair and stress battled in the body. When a person's mind knew that death was near, but their body wasn't ready to give in, and logic couldn't override the chemicals flooding their system.
She refused to accept it, even though she knew it was utterly futile.
A misfire of the fight-or-flight instinct. Too many signals overwhelming someone at once, so their body simply descended into chaos.
If she were a man, or really anyone else, I'd slap her across the face for a manual reset of her nerves. But I couldn't bring myself to do that to her.
If I were going to shock her senses, there were more entertaining ways to do it. Ways I shouldn't even be thinking about, but I couldn't seem to control my thoughts around this woman.
She inspired something in me that had lain dormant for too long.
"Eleanor," I demanded, my voice sharp enough to cut, though I doubted she could hear me through her own screaming.
Pretty, sparkling tears spilled down her beautiful face, a face twisted in rage and terror. Pink lines colored her delicate throat where her nails raked across it in a vain search for the clasp.
There was no clasp, at least not one she'd be able to find. The necklace could only be opened with the magnet tucked safely in my pocket. A perfect, elegant little shackle for my prisoner. A fashionable and expensive status symbol, a modern cage.
Or maybe it was more like a collar for my new pet.
To everyone else, it signified that she had someone who took care of her, someone of means, someone powerful. To her, it was a heavy reminder of who she belonged to, who controlled whether she lived or died.
But only if she didn't rip through her own neck first.
I grabbed her wrists when she scratched deep enough that a drop of blood welled just over where the necklace rested.
I couldn't let her hurt herself. I just couldn't.
She was my captive, which meant she was under my care, my protection, and I was the one who decided when she would feel pain, when her blood would spill, and how it would happen.
Grabbing her wrists, I pinned them to the wall above her head, forcing her to stop.
My body pressed against hers, trapping her against the wall, the pressure meant to ground her, to give her something solid to push against.
Her screams only got louder, her struggle against me more desperate.
Every straining effort, every single movement she made, rubbed her lithe body against my hard muscles, her hips grinding against my hardening cock.
If she kept this up, I was going to lose control, and under my protection or not, I was going to bend her over that leather couch and spank her perfect ass until it was as red as her face.
Then there was no telling what else I would do to her.
My mouth watered at the thought of having her bent over and exposed for me. I wanted to see if all of her skin flushed as prettily as her cheeks did.
I stared at the single drop of blood welling from the shallow scratch on her neck. When she thrashed her head back and forth, lilac locks flying everywhere, the drop spilled. It trailed down her neck then landed on one of the smaller diamonds, settling in the platinum setting.
The perfectly cut stone reflected the dark red color, creating tiny flashes of crimson and hot pink in the facets.
She made a simple, colorless diamond look like the most exquisite ruby the world had ever seen.
It was beautiful.
When I looked back up at her, she was still sobbing, tears streaking down her beautiful face, now flushed the same gorgeous red that was caught in the stone. Her lips were only inches from mine, and I ached to reach out and taste her pain.
"Please," she whimpered. "Please just let me go. I promise I won't tell anyone. I won't tell my mother where you took me. No one has to know. Just take the necklace off and let me go."
She begged so prettily, but even though her lips kept moving, I stopped listening. I was too fascinated by the deep crimson color in the stone and how it matched the dark red of her lips and the flushed pink of her cheeks.
"Please let me go." Her body trembled against mine, more hot tears streaming down her rosy cheeks.
Cheeks so hot, I would bet I could take a piece of ice from the bar and it'd melt if I trailed it over her face and down to her breasts.
She was an unsolved puzzle, a mixture of contradictions that I needed to set straight.
"I'll give you anything, just let me go," she cried again, her wrists pulling in my grasp.
Her thin bones felt so frail in my tightened grip, but they weren't. Just like the rest of her, she looked frail, but she fought. She was delicate but strong, demure but so damn sexy.
No.
I wasn't going to let her go, not even if her mother did exactly what she was supposed to. Not even if my cousins came down and demanded it themselves.
I'd never let this girl go.
The thought echoed in my mind, and I didn't know where it came from, but I knew it was true.
Not because she was part of this coercion, this little scheme to get her mother back in line. Not because she could be used as a pawn to keep her mother in line and from acting of her own accord again in the future.
No, I was going to keep her because I wanted her. There was no reason, no rhyme to it, but I desired her, so she was mine.
Mine to take, mine to keep, mine to take apart and put back together over and over until I figured out how she was real.
Without thinking, I slammed my mouth down on hers, needing to taste the desperation on her lips and see if she was as hungry as me.
Was she as conflicted as I was? Did she feel this infuriating pull, too?
I expected her to fight; I expected her to try to shove me away before melting into the kiss and giving in to whatever this was between us. Her hunger had to be as intense as mine, intense enough she would bend to it.
If I couldn't resist it, then what chance did she have? I tasted the bright salt of her tears, drank them down, and instead of tasting me, learning me, the little savage bit me.
A grunt of outrage ripped from my throat when her teeth sank into my bottom lip with a vengeance.
I wrenched back.
Her eyes widened as she stared at my lip, the place where she fought back. The sting was surprisingly sharp under my fingers, and the metallic taste of blood coated my tongue, stealing away the taste of her lips.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to…you just surprised me…" Her rambling trailed off as I lifted my fingers and we both saw the drop of blood she drew.
I swiped my tongue over the blood, letting the drop settle before kissing her again.
She drew first blood, but was she strong enough to claim her prize? Would she taste it on my kiss willingly, or would I have to force her to accept it?
This time, she realized I was kissing her and she remained still, her trembling body stiff as she tried to fight it. She held back for a good minute, so fucking strong, before she softened against me.
Her back arched as her fingers curled and her lips opened to mine. They may have been coated with the salt of her tears, but even that could not obscure lingering hints of warm coffee and vanilla lip gloss.
She tasted like everything I thought I didn't want, but I needed more.
Knowing that this was a mistake, I pulled back for just a second.
She wasn't a piece of ass that could be bought and paid for. She wasn't a girl who liked to live on the edge by sleeping with dangerous men.
Eleanor wasn't mine to claim.
She was a mission, a means to an end, not a woman meant to warm my bed.
But then she stared up at me with those stormy eyes, filled with all her complexity. Those puzzle pieces that didn't quite fit together yet, that I had to solve.
"Maya plennaya soloveyka," I muttered—my captive nightingale.
I stared down into her eyes, and she stared back at me defiantly.
There was a fire there, a strength that someone had almost snuffed out.
I ran my thumb over her lips before claiming her mouth again.
Her resistance returned, but she didn't dare sink her teeth into me again.
She wanted to play hard to get. It made sense. She had fought her mother's expectations for her. Fought the expectations of the life that she had been born into.
Fighting was all she knew.
I was going to teach her how to submit.
Her eyes may have said no, but her hips said what I wasn't going to give her mouth a chance to object to. I tightened my hands around her wrists. Her body lifted, her hips angling toward me, rubbing against me, begging for more.
This wasn't a smart thing to do. It wasn't a logical thing to do, but for the first time in my life, I didn't give a damn. I wouldn't run through the pros and cons. I wouldn't dissect this decision.
This little nightingale opened up something in me. She made me want to feel, so that was what I was going to do. And she was going to help.
I let go of her wrists just long enough to sweep her into my arms and carry her into the bedroom.