Chapter 61
Sixty-One
W as I supposed to leave?
How long had it been since Alfie had left?
Fifteen minutes? Twenty? Who was he calling?
I need to make a call. Who responded like that to being told they’d been cheated on?
Alfie Tell, that’s who. My unpredictable man.
If he still was mine, that is. The thought that he might be done with me sent a sharp pain shooting through my chest, a pain so acute it stole my breath away.
I hovered near the couch, unsure what to do. My head fell into my hands and I bit my lip hard, trying my best not to cry.
A shiver ran up my spine at the sound of his loafers snapping smartly on the tile as he returned. Relief and fear flooded me as I stood like a defendant in court, awaiting my verdict.
I racked my tired brain for the right words to diffuse this situation, but I came up empty.
Alfie came to a stop about five feet away from me, staying out of my reach.
I expected fury but instead, there was just the same cold confusion.
He looked like he was trying to work out a complex mathematical formula.
What was going on inside that messy mind of his?
“You’ve fucked me up, O’Connell.” I flinched in surprise.
I hadn’t expected those words out of his mouth.
“You’ve completely fucked me up. I want to punish you but I can’t hurt you.
I want to throw you out but I can’t let you leave.
” His gaze speared mine and I saw the unspoken question there: What am I supposed to do?
I tried to keep my voice steady as I spoke.
“Whatever you need to do, just do it. I won’t hold it against you.
” I tilted my chin up, my shoulders falling back as I opened myself up to whatever came next.
Whatever it was I would deserve it, and I knew that whatever it took to fix this, I’d do it.
I wondered if he knew how far I’d go to keep him.
He studied my face before finally closing the distance between us, his movements slow and careful, as if he was wary of touching me.
He sidestepped me and I turned with him as if we were doing some sort of dance, his greys locked on my blues, until he stood with his back to the couch. He didn’t sit. He gazed down at me and just as I was about to cave and drop my gaze, he spoke.
“Kneel.”
I stared at him, shocked. I didn’t understand but I followed his order anyway. With curiosity sparking in my belly, I knelt. The effect on my psyche was immediate. I already wanted to spill my secrets.
He sat, his legs either side of me, barricading me in. “Place your hands on your thighs, palms up.” Again, I hesitated for only a moment before complying.
“What are you doing, Alfie?” I breathed, unsure if I was even supposed to speak. The fact that I was questioning my freedom to talk should have worried me more than it did.
“I need you to be honest. You’re at your most honest when you’re vulnerable, and you’re at your most vulnerable when I dominate you.
” I wished that wasn’t true, I truly, honestly did.
“I would rather fuck the honesty out of you, that would work better for me, but at this moment, fucking you would border on rape.” My eyes widened.
“What? Alfie, no it?—”
“Yes. It would. Listen to the rational part of yourself, Lola. Do you truly want me inside you right now?” I searched for a part of my mind that he didn’t own.
I craved him as always, but sex? Right now?
Like this? He was right. I would let him fuck me out of guilt and fear, and that was a grey area of consent that I’d been willing to overlook.
I shook my head, admitting I didn’t want him, and the sadness in his eyes was unmistakable.
But I hoped gratitude was showing in mine.
Even now, when he must hate me, he was still taking care of me, he still knew my body better than I knew it myself.
I lowered my gaze and gasped when he forced my chin up.
The coldness had returned to his eyes. His hands eased into my hair, coaxing it into a ponytail that he wound around his right fist. His hand came to a stop at the nape of my neck, his grip painfully tight.
He tested his grip, manoeuvring my head like I was a puppet.
He held me in place, his gaze locked on mine, searching.
Just then, the lift pinged behind me and I heard a pair of smart shoes step into the room.
Humiliation flared at being seen like this and I tried to rise but Alfie’s grip on my hair forbade it.
He gave the person behind me a glance and I wondered who it was and if it was whoever he had disappeared to call.
Was he really going to do this with an audience? Why? I didn’t want this. I didn’t.
“Tell me to stop, Lola.” Tell him to stop? I couldn’t. He was giving me this one shot at an out, but I couldn’t take it. I shook my head as well as I could manage and met his gaze.
“When?” What? It took me a moment to understand what he was talking about. I guess the cross-examination had begun.
“Yesterday afternoon,” I said, my throat hoarse. I hated myself for putting us here. We’d made love on this couch, watched TV on this couch, and now…
“You were wearing the dress I bought for you.” It wasn’t a question and a fresh wave of guilt washed over me.
I lowered my gaze again, ashamed, unable to take the look in his eyes or the barely restrained hurt in his voice.
He tightened his grip further, and I winced but didn’t complain, only brought my eyes back up to his.
I was oddly grateful. Despite the humiliation at being watched by an unknown person, despite the pain, he hadn’t thrown me away yet. He was talking to me. He was trying.
“Why? I was good to you yesterday, I’m sure of it.
I gave you a gift, I sent you flowers. I did not impose on or harass you in any way.
I did everything right.” His brows furrowed and this time I couldn’t help the tear that slid down my cheek.
My heart was breaking. However I’d expected this to go, it wasn’t like this.
It had never occurred to me that he might consider this his fault.
His eyes drifted over my face, studying me before falling on my mouth.
“What made you lean in and give your mouth to another man?”
“I don’t know.” I sniffed.
“Try again.” His tone was as cold and unforgiving as the tile I knelt upon. I gulped and tried to straighten out my scrambling thoughts, but how could I explain it to him when I didn’t understand it myself?
“I didn’t lean in…exactly,” I said, trying to think over the moments before my lips had met Bradley’s. Why had I done it?
“You didn’t initiate?” Alfie’s eyes narrowed slightly, searching me. I shook my head as best as I could with his hand fisted in my hair. My mind wandered to the person behind me and I wished they weren’t listening to all of this. “Well, that changes things.”
“But I allowed it,” I whispered.
“Where did he touch you?” he asked, ignoring my admission. I didn’t want to relive this. When Bradley had kissed me, it had been sweet and tender, but now the memory of his lips on mine made me nauseous. I played the wretched kiss over in my head and recounted the places where we had touched.
“My cheek, my mouth…and my hair.” His grip tightened and my scalp cried out. Alfie loved my hair. Just this morning I was thinking about how he’d forbidden me from cutting it once. He’d probably shave it off himself now.
“Open your mouth.” I didn’t even think this time, I obeyed without question.
I parted my lips and my breath hitched as he slid two fingers inside my mouth.
“Did his tongue touch yours?” I wasn’t surprised that he asked that.
Alfie was a man of details. He noticed everything, absorbed everything.
I nodded, wishing that I could say it wasn’t true.
“Did you like it?” he asked, his tone stiff, as if he didn’t really want to know the answer at all. Another tear slid down my cheek as I nodded again. He pulled his fingers from my mouth, leaving my throat dry and raspy. “Tell me how it felt.”
“Gentle. Easy,” I whispered.
“My kisses don’t feel that way?” His tone was like steel but his eyes, oh God his eyes, they burned me.
“Your kisses could kill me.” The silence drew out, my words deafening us both.
His grip remained tight on my hair and my scalp cried out for relief but I didn’t budge, didn’t look away.
I stayed with him, in this moment, as he tried to navigate this shit storm I’d plunged us into.
I could only hope he would find his way back to me.
“Why did you tell me?” he asked, his voice eerily calm. I was surprised. I would have thought that would have been obvious.
“Because I had to.” My heart hammered painfully in my chest as I spoke and I tried to stay as calm as him.
“No, you didn’t. You could lie. You should lie.” He studied me as if he’d just discovered a new layer of me he was trying to understand.
“I don’t understand.”
“Why aren’t you deceiving me?” he demanded, his tone accusing. “Why aren’t you duplicitous and cruel? Why are you good ?” He searched me again, that confused look returning to his face, and it broke my heart that he wasn’t just trying to understand my betrayal, but my honesty too.
“I’m not good.” I closed my eyes. This wasn’t what I’d expected. I’d expected a rage-filled explosion. This slow, torturous implosion was worse somehow, but his next question plunged that guilt-gilded dagger right into the hilt.
“Are you leaving me for him?”
“No!” I gasped, pure panic rising inside me at even the thought of it.
“Why not?” He pulled my hair tighter. “Why, Lola?”