Chapter 11
Chapter Eleven
RAZAR
I wasn’t positive how I had managed it, but I was experiencing both self-hatred and lust simultaneously, both completely revolving around the one constant in my life—Arabella.
The only person who mattered to me. The only woman I would ever love. Hell, the only individual I would ever love, if you could call the emotions I felt love. I wasn’t entirely possible how else to describe it that didn’t sound intensely obsessive. Although that may have been closer to the truth.
Which was why I felt an immense amount of disgust with myself for the bruises that I could see on her exposed wrists, her choice to wear a short-sleeve shirt after changing very intentional. She was forcing me to see it and deal with the reality of what had occurred.
As if I could ever forget.
If there was one thing I knew about Arabella, it was how stubborn she could be when she felt like she was being wronged in some fashion.
Or when she felt like someone was taking a decision away from her.
I had absolutely never intended her to find out the reason I was keeping a physical distance, because I knew that this would be the reaction.
She would want to prove me wrong, and believe me, my entire being was all too thrilled at the notion of giving her a chance.
Which was how I had ended up in the position we’d been in earlier, with her a story above the ground, pinned between myself and a wall as I practically fucking mauled her. All because she had offered me her mouth in a hesitant, almost curious kiss.
I was a bastard. I hadn’t been able to control myself.
I’d given in to my urge and need for her and ended up leaving bruises on her stunning, soft skin, all because I had let out a fraction of my strength instead of exercising my normal control.
I had made her come on my fingers, absorbing every moan of my name like a fucking addict, before licking her wet heat off my fingers.
I had done all of this and then hurt her goddamn feelings by practically forcing myself from her room when I should have instead been holding her close. Telling her how lucky I was and how beautiful she was.
I’d run. I had fucking run.
Now I was paying the price for being a coward, standing across from her in the emergency care center as she spoke to the medical team quietly, looking over the small girl we’d rescued.
The entire situation made me furious, but instead of focusing on the wrongs that had been inflicted on one of our kind or comforting Arabella, who was so clearly upset…
I was standing feet away from her, staring at her with what I’m positive was a pathetic expression.
My eyes flickered over the marks on her wrists again before I forced myself to look away.
I hated myself for loving that I’d marked her. I hated myself for not being able to love her how someone like Arabella deserved to be loved. A woman like her didn’t deserve bruises on her skin or to be roughly fucked like how I wanted to.
She did say she liked it. I frowned, wondering if maybe I was causing more damage by not trusting her words. Was it so impossible to believe that would be the case? I mean, it wasn’t that unusual for humans to like rough sex… maybe she really meant that. Maybe she liked the marks I left on her.
Or she was just trying to make you feel better.
I closed my eyes, having no idea on how to handle the thoughts running through my head, because up until this point, things had been rather simple.
I had obsessed over her, and she had stayed safe and happy, never commenting on the obvious connection between us.
Something had changed, though, because I could see the energy running under her skin, a determined and stubborn fire lit in her eyes, and I had a feeling my time for avoiding this conversation was quickly coming to an end.
So what had inspired it?
Also, if I was so tortured by the concept…
why couldn’t I stop imagining what she would look like wrapped up completely in my magic, my hand wrapped around her throat as I fucked her pinned up against that same wall?
I was so screwed. I loved the imagery of her out of reach from anyone else and completely in my grasp so that I could possessively claim her again and again.
“You have her scent all over you,” Cy commented quietly. He leaned against the wall next to me, looking both frustrated and smug, a combination I hadn’t been positive was possible.
“I was just in her room,” I leveled, knowing he wasn’t talking about that.
“No, you smell like her cum,” he mused unapologetically as my jaw clenched, not liking the idea of her being talked about like that.
Then again, whenever Arabella was even slightly turned on, it was the purest form of torture. It was like having the most delicious fucking food right in reach and never being able to sample it. It didn’t make you desire it any less—in fact, you found yourself wanting it more. Obsessing over it…
“Those bruises from you?” His words brought me from my thoughts.
“Unfortunately,” I grit out. “We didn’t—”
“Oh, I’m aware,” Cy leveled. “She’s pissed right now. If Arabella was well-fucked, she would be sleeping.”
I smirked at that, because he was right. His smile grew antagonistically, making me wonder where his thoughts were tonight, because usually he wasn’t one to fuck around.
“I mean, there is a possibility you are just that bad—”
“Fuck you,” I growled out, glad to see him at least making jokes, considering earlier. How many kills had it taken to get there? A fair amount.
I let out an exhale. “Fuck, I don’t know what to do. She knows. She knows why I’m holding back.” I didn’t have to emphasize that she was smart enough to put together that my way of thinking wasn’t singular amongst our team.
How had we lived in this perfectly crafted shell for so long? It seemed almost impossible that only now was it all coming crashing down.
Cy inhaled sharply. “There is nothing to do. There isn’t a way to fix this.”
I didn’t believe that was true. I had no doubt the universe despised me, but to curse me to love a woman that I could never fully have? Without exception? No, that would just be so goddamn wrong.
I knew this bond between us wasn’t imagined, and each year I grew more possessive over the ownership I felt towards it.
I wanted her completely at my mercy, in my bed, while feeling my magic running across her soft skin as I placed her exactly how I wanted.
I needed her complete surrender. I needed everything from her, including any possible fear she had.
I had literally fucking got off on the fact that she had felt a barely-there twinge of what nearly tasted like fear about my shoulder injury.
I didn’t think it was possible to inspire true terror in her, but everything in my being craved it.
Who was fucked up enough that they craved their potential mate’s fear?
I frowned at the other oddity that had occurred, my fingers running up my shoulder to where my injury had healed almost immediately after my time with Arabella.
It would have healed fast regardless, but it was as if it had completely disappeared.
I could only assume it was because my magic had fed off the slight concern she had felt for us, thinking it was fear?
That was the only thing that made sense.
“What’s going on with her?” Zain appeared next to me, any semblance of his normal cockiness gone as he looked at her with confusion and concern.
It didn’t surprise me that everyone could tell something was up, considering she was not only extremely tense but also because her scent was all over me.
I was the only one who had yet to shower and change, because I didn’t want to lose out on being able to feel her all around me.
Hell, I could even still smell her wet heat on my fingers, and my mouth practically watered, wishing that I could taste her again.
Wishing that I could lay her out on one of these medical beds and fuck her hard and raw as she came around me…
My head pulsed with the exhaustion of trying to hold onto my control. I felt like the small break in my self-control was growing larger by the moment, the flood waters seeping through and foreshadowing the disaster of me giving into the intense need I had for Arabella.
“She’s pissed because Razar made it all too clear on why he had been holding back on expressing his…”—Saint tilted his head, looking bored— “affections.”
Is that what we were calling them now? I frowned at the bastard, his frame settled into the chair next to me and Cy, watching Arabella with interest.
I had no idea what his issue was tonight, but something about what happened at the MAM base really upset him. I wanted to claim it was the fact that we’d discovered they were torturing children, but I wasn’t positive it was that.
Honestly, I didn’t even bother asking with Saint—if he wanted his opinion known, he wouldn’t hesitate to share it.
Just how he hadn’t hesitated to gift her a severed hand from one of the guards tonight.
I narrowed my eyes at the display sitting on a table nearby, a dark rose held between the obviously very dead man’s fingers.
How he had managed to do that and be rewarded with a smile and kiss on the cheek, while I was being completely ignored…
actually made a lot of sense, considering the circumstances.
I’d been such a fucking dick. I was regretting ever leaving her room.
“Which means she will probably put together our reasoning,” Zain murmured thoughtfully. It wasn’t like we had been exactly subtle about our attraction to her, so I had absolutely no doubt that she was going to figure that out if she hadn’t already.
“All of it is absolute bullshit, I’ve told you that from the start.”
“She can die. We could kill her easily,” I shot back at Saint.