45. Cassidy
There’s something in Ethan’s eyes I haven’t seen before, and it fucking terrifies me. I slap at his arms, dig my fingers into his wrists, but I might as well have been attacking a statue.
I can’t speak.
I can’t breathe.
My face feels hot and puffy, an awful, strangled wheezing sound the only thing that can get past his deadly grip.
Why is he doing this? What did I do to upset him?
My heart beats a furious tempo, my pulse throbbing angrily in my neck.
Tears dart down my cheeks as I gasp out, “Please!”
Ethan studies my mouth for a moment, and then releases me.
I stagger, my legs wobbling before they take my weight. I clap my hands over my throat, sucking in a ragged breath as I stare up at Ethan in shock.
“What the hell?”
Ethan’s sensuous mouth turns up into a cruel smile.
“Run.”
I blink at him. “What?”
“Run.”
The primal part of my brain takes over. Thankfully, I don’t make the same mistake every other girl in a horror movie does—I bolt straight for the penthouse’s elevator.
If Ethan didn’t move so damn fast, I’d have made it, too.
He slams both hands on the elevator door, caging me in with his body. I reach for the elevator’s button, fumbling against the slick metal door, but it’s just out of reach.
I scream.
Ethan laughs.
So I scream again.
“No one can hear you,” he rumbles into my ear as he slides an arm around my throat and pulls me away from the door. “You’re mine, toy.”
I struggle against him, kicking and clawing and biting, but he makes dragging off a girl against her will look easy.
“Since you want to leave so badly,” he growls in my ear, “let me show you a shortcut.”
Who the hell is this guy? Am I only just discovering that Ethan has a split personality or something?
A gust of wind snatches away my next scream as Ethan manhandles me onto the penthouse’s balcony. The city whirls prettily as I throw my head around to gape—not at the view, but the drop.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?”
I can’t speak, let alone scream. Fear knots in my throat, and panic fills my stomach with lead.
Ethan slings an arm around my waist, and then sets my ass down on the icy railing that runs the circumference of the balcony. When I shove at him to get free, he lets me slide a few inches out of his grip.
Empty air sucks at me.
I scream, clawing desperately to hold on to Ethan.
“One wrong move, and you’re free falling,” he says, almost calmly as he tightens his grip again. “Is it worth fighting for?”
“My life?” I yell hoarsely. “Yes!”
But that’s not what he’s asking, is it? I don’t know where the epiphany comes from, but I get it. I fucking get it.
Those dark urges? This has got to do with the belt. The ropes. The flogger.
It’s all about power exchange, isn’t it?
Control.
“I understand, okay?” I cling to him so tightly my arms shake. “Please, please just put me down.”
“What do you understand, toy?” He draws back and cups my face in his hands. I grab his gray button-down shirt, the silk bundling between desperate fingers. When a gust of wind yanks at my sweater-dress, I sling my legs around his waist for support.
He’s rock hard.
“Control,” I whimper in a panic. “They want to lose control, don’t they?”
He smiles, his hands sliding down my back until he’s grabbing my ass and squeezing. Pain flickers dully through me, but the rest of my body is soaked in so much adrenalin, I barely feel it.
“No, toy. They don’t want to lose control.” He cradles my back with one muscular arm, his other hand slipping between us. His knuckles graze my pussy as he yanks down the front of his suit pants.
Oh my God, now? Here? Is he fucking crazy? If I wasn’t so terrified of falling over the railing, I’d be clawing his eyes out.
Ethan’s cock presses against my pussy, and he lets out a pleased rumble when he discovers how wet I am.
I didn’t think it was possible to be aroused moments before death, but I guess fear is an aphrodisiac.
He thrusts into me. My fingernails claw into the back of his neck, and he groans as he burrows deeper inside me.
“You’re right,” I whisper into his ear. “They don’t want to lose control.”
He thrusts again, and I groan as my confused body responds to him like we’re lying on his bed, not suspended hundreds of feet above the tarmac.
“Then what do they want, toy?” Ivan murmurs as his fingers dimple my ass with his powerful grip. “Tell me what they need.” He nips at my ear, and adds in a throaty whisper, “What you need.”
He slams into me again, and I whimper in pain. Somehow deep down, I can’t believe he’d let me fall. But the fear is still there—terrifying, tantalizing, exhilarating.
“I need you—” My voice breaks with the force of his thrust, as he stretches my pussy around his girth. “I need you to take it from me.”
“That’s a good little fuck toy.”
The icy railing slides against my skin as he fucks me. I hold on as tight as I can, but it doesn’t feel tight enough. Not with the gaping air tugging at my clothes, not knowing that all he has to do is fumble, and I’m dead.
When I come, another gust of wind snatches my breathless scream, and then Ethan’s mouth. My body trembles and quakes against his, and I can’t even hold on to him anymore.
Suspended a fatal distance above the ground in Ethan’s strong arms, I unravel completely.
It’s the most frightening, and utterly satisfying thing I”ve ever experienced.
Ethan cradles me to his chest and carries me back inside the house, raining kisses over my cheek and neck, murmuring faint words of praise.
This is what he did at the Devil’s Den?
No wonder he’s so fucking rich.