17. Eve
17
EVE
I return to the field early the next morning to find that the gray has gone.
Is this Dante’s doing?
Is he punishing me for speaking with Manuel yesterday?
Like every day since he stole me away, my heart is beating to two very different rhythms. I crave his touch, but I despise him as a man, as a criminal . He keeps me starved of affection, locks me away, fuels my deepest fantasies, and now it seems I’m hooked.
There’s a red apple swinging between my fingertips. I managed to sneak it out of the kitchen before I left. Disappointed not to see Tramposa, I take a couple of bites out of it myself as I follow the road that runs parallel to the field. Yesterday, I caught a glimpse of a building on the horizon, and I figured it must be a stable barn or some kind of outhouse. I’d wanted to take a closer look before that irritating American guy accused me of troublemaking and marched me back to the house. I’m curious as to how he came to be on this compound too, but intuition tells me I’ll get nothing from him. That man is as closed-off as Dante is.
Palm trees line my way, their great green leaves rustling overhead. Unfamiliar insects drum out their noisy chorus. It’s early, but the heat and humidity are stifling me already. I’m wearing the coolest dress I could find in my closet. It’s made of pure white silk with crossover straps, and it’s stupidly sexy like all the other clothes he’s bought me.
This is the furthest I’ve ever walked. The mysterious warehouses are now a dark silhouette behind me, but they’re no less bleak and unfriendly looking even at this distance. Every day I discover a new dimension to this place, and as the road gently curves, I spot the glinting asphalt of a private airstrip situated about half a mile away.
The stables are much grander than I expected. I pass by under an archway of cream stone and find myself in an immaculate horse barn. I count ten stalls in total, and most are occupied. Tramposa is one of them. He’s leaning his head over his stall door and flickering his ears back and forth in my direction. I make my way over and run my hand down his mane.
“Hey, good-lookin’,” I say with a smile, sliding my palm down the length of his nose.
“Say that to any other man and they’ll be trouble.”
Tramposa whickers in recognition as Dante hooks his elbows over the stable door beside me.
“You’re here!” I spin away from him in shock.
“So it would seem. ”
He’s wearing a black T-shirt and blue jeans that hang low off his hips, and there’s a five o’clock shadow grazing that uncompromising jaw of his. There’s no hint of an explanation for his two-day disappearance, but I stop caring when he turns his head my way and I see my lust mirrored back to me, tenfold, in his hard, brown eyes.
“I didn’t hear your jet land,” I mutter, offering up the remains of my apple to Tramposa who takes it greedily, plunging his muzzle into my outstretched palm. “When did you get back?”
“Early this morning.”
“And you didn’t think to come and find me?”
The corners of his mouth tilt at the accusation in my voice. “I had important business to attend to, and you, mi alma , are all pleasure.” His gaze drops to my chest, and a shiver of desire ripples through me.
“How was the trip?”
His expression changes. “Fuck the trip.”
Taking my arm, he pulls me into an empty stall next door and pins me against the wall. He doesn’t move to kiss me, though. Instead, he wraps his fingers around my throat, squeezing gently but with obvious intent, holding my whole damn life in his hands.
“Did he flirt with you?” he demands.
“Who?” I gasp out.
“That guard… Manuel .” His lips curl in distaste.
“He wasn’t flirting with me!”
A low growl escapes him. “I’ll slit his throat. Would you like to watch, my angel, and see what happens to strange men who talk to you behind my back? ”
I’m scared. The light has completely vanished from his eyes. “Dante, stop! You’re being unreasonable—”
“He disrespected me. I need to set an example.” His grip tightens. White spots start dancing in my vision. “Follow my rules too, Eve, or suffer the consequences.”
“So, I’m to live a life of quiet solitude?” I croak. “I’m not allowed to speak to anyone in this shitty place for fear of your total overreaction?” I try to wrench his fingers from my throat, but it’s no good. As soon as we touch, that pull of electricity fuses us together.
“Not unless I allow it.” He inches closer, the burning heat of his erection nudging against my stomach. “Get on your knees,” he orders suddenly. “I’m fucking your mouth today.”
“Screw you!” I twist my head away, but his words are like a lit match to my core again. The muscles in my legs are twitching already. I’m so close to doing what he’s demanding of me, and only my pride is yanking on the brakes.
“I don’t ask twice for anything, Eve.”
“And I don’t obey your every order like some damn prostitute!”
He glares at me, rage contorting his beautiful features. “Goddammit!” he roars, dropping his hand from my throat.
I can feel the frustration pulsing through his body. He wants to force me, but he can’t bring himself to do it. Have I spotted a dim light gleaming in the shadows?
“Give me something in return,” I whisper. “You take and take. You’ve robbed me of my freedom, my family, my homeland. Give me your promise that one day you’ll set me free, and I’ll drop to my knees right now.”
“Negotiating like a true whore.” His beautiful mouth twists with scorn. “You’re a walking contradiction, Eve. You surpass yourself every day.”
“You’re wrong. I’m negotiating like a woman trying to stay alive. What do you really want from me? You can’t love me. You’re not capable of it. In a few days or months, you’ll tire of this body. I can’t live my life waiting for that axe to fall. I’ll kill myself long before that happens.”
“I will never allow that! But you ask too much. I’ve told you what will happen if you return to America.”
“Then protect me like you’re protecting my parents.”
“You’re mine, Eve. You belong by my side. I will never let you go.”
I stare at him as the splinter of an idea takes hold. “You’re right,” I say, my head slumping forward in defeat. “I’m nothing but your whore now.” As I say it, I drop to my knees, the impact cushioned by the thick bed of straw.
I reach for his belt, untucking the thick brown leather from the buckle. He doesn’t move to stop me, and with his belt undone, I go to start on his zipper. I’m playing a dangerous game here, and it’s one that could so easily backfire…
All of a sudden, he’s jerking his hips away. “I take it back. You are no whore, Eve Miller, and I refuse to treat you as such.”
I suppress a small smile before glancing upward. His hands are resting on the wall above my head. It’s a stance of power, but it’s also one of concession. I can tell it’s taking every ounce of his strength to honor his words. Something’s shifted. I’m not just his possession anymore.
“Will you let me go?” I ask quietly.
“Never.”
The force of his word brings hopeless tears to my eyes. “ Please, Dante…”
There’s a long pause. “Perhaps a visit could be arranged in the future.”
My heart surges as I feel his hands under my arms, lifting me to my feet. It’s not what I’d hoped for, but it’s a start.
“Don’t think I’m blind to what you’ve just done,” he murmurs, taking my jaw roughly between his hands. “It’s been a long time since I let someone back me into a corner.”
“I would have let you fuck my mouth with or without your assurance.”
His eyes widen a fraction as I drop to my knees again, and tug down his zipper. Gripping the base of his huge cock, I take him deeply into my mouth before he has a chance to stop me.
“Jesus! Fuck!”
I must be doing something right because soon he’s groaning like he’s in pain. I slide him right to the back of my throat and start pumping my fist up and down his shaft. After a few moments, I risk another glance upward. He’s staring down at me with a mixture of rage and admiration on his face.
“You deceived me, my angel.”
I let him slip wetly from mouth. “No disrespect intended. If you let me visit America, I’ll do whatever you ask of me. I won’t fight you anymore.”
“ Whatever I ask?”
I chance a quick grin at him. “You’ll take it, regardless. You’ll find a way. I’m learning how to operate from the best, remember.”
He chuckles in approval. “Then slide my dick into your mouth again, mi alma. Tip that balance of power. I’ll be sure to take it back again in a few minutes. ”
I hesitate. “Am I doing it okay?”
The corners of his mouth twitch. “Yes, Eve. Just don’t fucking stop until I tell you to.”
I feel a heavy hand on the nape of my neck guiding me back to him. The head of his cock eases between my lips, and my tongue swirls around the welcome intruder. He curses in Spanish and starts to thrust into my mouth, hitting the back of my throat with a staccato of groans.
“Damn, that’s good. Keep those soft lips wrapped tight around me. Don’t let up for a second.”
I do exactly as he says, even when his fingers are digging painfully in my hair and my scalp is screaming in protest. My other hand is resting lightly on his waist, and I can feel his muscles straining for control. I want to savor his surrender. I want to bring him tumbling to his knees, as well.
A low rumble escapes his lips as the hand on the wall clenches into a fist. “Fuuuuuck.”
Moments later, thick ropes of cum are coating my throat and tongue. I swallow quickly as he drags me to my feet again and crushes my lips to his own.
“Did you like me fucking your mouth?” he says harshly, breaking away.
“Yes,” I whisper. “You’re my devil, Dante, and you’re tempting me into your darkness.”
“Then you’re an angel burning me up with your light. I want to stake a claim over every part of you. Your mouth, your cunt, your ass…” He pushes me against the wall and slides the palms of his hands up the back of my thighs, gathering up my dress and hooking his thumbs into the lace of my panties. “How many men have you be en with, beside me?”
“Two.” I throw my head back as he trails hot, wet kisses across my exposed throat, administering pleasure to the marks left by his fingertips.
“They’re dead already.”
He silences my protestations with a possessive kiss, and I feel my panties disintegrate in his hands. Will I ever own an item of clothing that this man doesn’t rip from my body?
“Turn around,” he orders. I feel my dress being pulled up further around my hips, exposing me from the waist down. “That’s quite a sight.” I hear him whistle, before he’s running his hand over my naked ass cheek. “Now put your hands on the wall in front of you.”
Dark delights inflame my senses. I press my palms into the rough stone, my body aching with need as he traces a finger from the middle of my spine, down through the crease of my ass before driving two fingers inside of me from behind. My sex convulses at this rough intrusion, and it’s coupled with his sharp intake of breath.
“So wet for me. I think we can work with this.”
He removes his fingers and retraces his path, pausing over the darkest, most forbidden of places and gently massaging my wetness into the soft skin there. I try to pull away, and he reprimands me with a sharp smack. “Don’t move unless I say so.”
“But I don’t—”
“Hush,” he chides. “I’m not planning on hurting you, but I will if you don’t listen to me.” His finger is becoming more insistent.
“But I’ve never—”
“Trust me. ”
I can’t. He’s too big, and I’m starting to panic. It feels so good, though. So damn illicit…
I find myself quickly adapting to this new sensation. At the same time, my body yields to him, and he slides his finger all the way into me. I cry out in surprise and pain, his short nail scratching at my tender insides.
“Accept it,” he snarls. “The pain will soon turn to pleasure.”
Is he fucking kidding me? The burn is so intense, it’s forcing tears to my eyes. But he’s right. The more he works me like this, the more my body seems to respond.
He reaches around with his other hand to circle my clit. Every nerve feels conquered and swollen, yet strangely satisfied. One finger becomes two—stretching, pleasing, delving into my wetness, and then reapplying—until I feel something larger pushing at me there.
“Dante, no!” I cry, panicking again. I try to twist away, but I’m being pinned into place by his hands and his cock.
“Relax,” he hisses, breaching my final resistance, working himself into me, inch by inch.
It’s more tearing, more burning… The pain is clawing at my insides and leaving bloody weals. I want to scream at him to stop, but then his fingers start circling my clit again, and I end up begging for everything instead.
“You feel too good, mi alma . Too fucking good.”
I can only concentrate on the pleasure of his fingers and the searing pain of his penetration, but even that is starting to subside. I’m spiraling higher and higher until all sense and reason goes to hell. Only then does he start to move, grinding into my ass with those long, slow, devastating strokes of his .
He quickly finds his release, his cock jerking and lengthening as we collapse against the wall together. My head is turned to the side, my cheek pressed tight against the cool stone. His forehead is digging into my shoulder, heating my bare skin with his ragged breath. He’s still lodged inside me—still as hard as stone.
“What a suitable place to break you in, my angel,” he muses, withdrawing slowly.
I spin around to glare at him. In the gloom of the stall, he looks so intimidating, so handsome, so damn seductive. But he’s my tempter. My bad influence. A man intent on pushing me right to my limits, over and over again.
“That was too much, Dante.”
“I give you nothing you can’t handle.” He crouches down in front of me to plant a lingering kiss at the apex of my thighs, inhaling deeply at the same time. “I owe you more pleasure. You have a body that demands to be worshipped.”
He hooks my leg over his shoulder, opening me up wide to him, and then creams a hard line with his tongue all the way from the base of my perineum up to the tip of my sex. I jump back as if branded, my shoulder blades smacking against the wall. I’m still aching and sensitive from my earlier orgasm, and he knows it.
“Hold still.” He places two firm hands on my hips and repeats his unforgiving action. “You taste divine, my angel,” he says with a growl, nipping and rotating, teasing and testing.
I dig my fingers into his silky black hair as he sets to work on my body, sliding a rough hand up my thigh and pushing two fingers back inside me as his mouth devours the tip of my sex, his tongue encircling that bundle of nerves with an ever- increasing pressure.
I can’t contain my cries. My back is arched away from the wall in ecstasy. He keeps me right on the brink for ages, knowing exactly when to ease off and when to bring me back to the edge, like the fucking sadist that he is. I keep holding my breath to intensify the pleasure more quickly, but like always he’s in total control.
“Let me come!” I scream, feeling the vibrations of his laughter against my pussy. The tops of my thighs are slick with my arousal. I grind myself into his face to find some relief, and just when I think I can’t stand it any longer, he curves his fingers and presses the detonation button inside of me.
“Dante!”
Fire and flame consume me. I cry out his name again as I fall apart right in front of him. My knees buckle. My mind goes blank. Only his firm grip on my hip keeps me from collapsing to the floor.
I shut my eyes tight to get a handle on the madness. All I can hear is the rush of blood in my ears. And just like that, I’m flat on my back on the straw, yanked down by the man who has caused this sensory explosion in me.
“You made me come just from watching you,” he snarls, grabbing my hand and pressing it against his erection. “Feel for yourself.”
There’s a warm stickiness beneath my fingertips. He answers my look of disbelief with a violent kiss, tearing my lip with his teeth in his haste to banish it. His dark stubble is like a razor blade slicing my skin, and I can’t get enough of the pain.
“You want me,” I gasp out, craving his confirmation suddenly .
“Always.” His voice is hoarse with lust. “No one will ever take you away from me, Eve. I’ll kill any bastard that tries.”
I wrap my arms around his neck and pull his mouth back down to mine. Our future is a slashed portrait…a fractured image. It’s something I can’t even comprehend. All I know is the present, and right now, the only thing I see is him.