Julian #2
"Because you told me people were trying to kill me! What was I supposed to do, stay in Santorini and wait for one of these supposed killers to show up? Or head on to Rome and see if they found me there?"
"You made the right choice," I say, keeping my voice level. "Staying, or not coming with me, would have gotten you killed."
"And going with you is so much safer?"
"Yes."
She stares at me for a long moment, her green eyes searching my face for some reassurance I'm not sure I can give her. "I don't believe you," she says finally. "I think you're just as dangerous as whoever's hunting me. Maybe more."
She's right, of course. But I can't tell her that. "Believe what you want," I say instead. "Just stay close and do what I tell you."
"God, you're insufferable." She turns away from me, pulling her hair out of its ponytail and running her fingers through it.
"Do you ever stop being so... controlled?
So cold? Wait, don't answer that. I know what you were like in Ibiza.
" She shoots me a pointed look. "You were unhinged there. So this…"
"This is the real me," I bite out. "Get used to it."
"That must be exhausting."
"It keeps me alive."
"And is that all you care about? Staying alive?" She turns back to face me, and there's something challenging in her expression now that makes my pulse quicken despite my best efforts to remain detached. "It doesn't look like much of a life."
I should shut this down. But instead, I hear myself say, "What would you know about my life?"
"Nothing. Because you won't tell me anything." She takes a step closer, and I force myself not to back away. "You won't tell me who you really are, or why you're helping me, or what you want from me. You just bark orders and expect me to follow them like some kind of obedient dog."
"Do you want me to put you on a leash?" My abdomen contracts at the thought, my cock twitching.
I've never thought of myself as someone particularly kinky, but the vision of Isabelle in a collar, on her knees, a leash wrapped around my fist while I drag her mouth to my cock, has me suddenly hardening. "I'm trying to keep you alive."
"By dragging me through airports and shitty hotels and refusing to let me have any say in what happens next?" Her voice rises. "I'm not a child, Julian. I'm a grown woman who's perfectly capable of making her own decisions."
"Your decisions are what got you into this mess."
The words come out harsher than I intended, and I see her flinch. But she doesn't back down. "What's that supposed to mean?"
"It means you're reckless. Impulsive. You ran off to Ibiza without telling anyone where you were going, partied in nightclubs where anyone could have grabbed you, with no care for your own well-being or security. You don't know anything about real life."
Her eyes go wide. "Fuck you." She spits it out, her voice suddenly venomous. "You don't know anything about why I left New York. You don't know what it's like to be suffocated by expectations and family obligations and a stepmother who looks at you like you're something she scraped off her shoe."
"You're right. I don't know." I cross my arms over my chest, keeping the distance between us, even though the lust coiling in my gut is screaming at me to close it. "But I know that your choices have consequences. And right now, those consequences include a contract on your life."
"A contract you still haven't explained." She moves closer again, and this time I do take a step back. "Who ordered it? Why? And how do you know about it?"
"I told you—I have connections."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only answer you're getting." I've repeated that over and over, but she looks as unimpressed by it as the first time I said it.
She laughs again, that same bitter sound. "You know what I think? I think you're lying to me. I think you know a lot more about this than you're saying, and you're keeping me in the dark because it's easier to control me that way."
She's too smart—smarter than she looks. I should have anticipated this, should have prepared better answers, but I've been too distracted by wanting her to think clearly. "Think what you want," I say, falling back on the same deflection. "It doesn't change the situation."
"The situation being that I'm stuck with you."
"Yes."
"In shitty hotels."
"Yes."
Her lip pushes out, full and pouty, and I try like fuck to not think about how it felt rubbing along the underside of my cock, all while my dick turns to steel against my fly. "While you refuse to touch me even though we both know you want to."
The shift in topic catches me off guard. I stare at her, my jaw tight, my hands clenched into fists at my sides. "That's not what we're talking about here."
"Isn't it?" She takes another step closer, and now there's barely two feet between us. I can smell her perfume, and it makes my head swim. My dick throbs. "Because I think it's very relevant, given we're in a room, with beds, and…"
"Isabelle—"
"You fucked me twice in Ibiza." Her voice purrs, sliding over my skin like a touch. "You made me come so hard I couldn't think straight. You pinned me down and bit my neck and made me beg for it. And now you're acting like none of that happened."
I clench my teeth. "It shouldn't have happened."
"But it did." Her chest is rising and falling faster beneath the silk of her blouse, and I can see her pulse throbbing in her throat.
I want to fucking bite it. Close my teeth around that beating spot and suck.
I feel pre-cum leak down my shaft at the thought.
"And you want it to happen again. I can see it every time you look at me. "
My teeth grind together. "What I want doesn't matter."
"Why not?"
"Because I'm trying to keep you alive, and I can't do that if I'm distracted by—" I break off, realizing I've said too much.
"By what? By wanting me?" She reaches out and places her hand on my chest, right over my heart.
I can feel it pounding against her palm, betraying every lie I'm trying to tell.
Her touch, even over my clothes, is enough to make what blood is left above my cock pound in my ears.
"You think I don't notice the way you watch me?
The way your hands clench every time I get too close? "
I grab her wrist—not roughly, but firmly enough to make my point—and remove her hand from my chest. "This isn't happening."
"Why not?"
"Because it's a mistake."
"You keep saying that, but you won't explain why." Her eyes search mine, looking for cracks in my armor. "Is it because of the danger? Because you think touching me will somehow compromise your ability to protect me?"
"Yes."
"That's bullshit." She pulls her wrist from my grip, but she doesn't step back.
"You've been keeping your distance for days, and you're still distracted.
I see the way you look at me when you think I'm not paying attention.
Denying what we both want isn't making you more focused—it's making you miserable. "
She's right. Again. And I hate that she can read me so easily, hate that my control is slipping enough for her to see through it. "It doesn't matter," I say, but the words sound weak even to my own ears. I'm losing this fight, and it's one I can't give in on, for reasons I can't tell her.
"It does matter." She tilts her head, studying me with an intensity that makes my skin feel too tight. "You want me. I want you. We're stuck together anyway. We fucked already. So why are you torturing us both?"
"Because if I touch you again, I won't stop.
" The admission comes out rough, almost threatening.
"I won't be careful or gentle. I'll take what I want, and I won't apologize for it.
And we'll keep fucking, just like that, how I want you, until I find a way to get you out of this.
I'll be buried inside you every fucking night, and I won't… "
I won't be watching. I won't be paying attention. I'll be fucking you until we're both drunk with it, exhausted, and it will compromise everything.
And… and I was supposed to kill you.
I expect her to back down. Most women wouldn't like being told that they're going to get used however I please, if I fuck them again—not that I've ever been with a woman who made me feel that way before.
But after the way she reacted to my hands around her throat, I should have known better.
Instead, her pupils dilate, and her lips part slightly, and I realize with a jolt of heat that she's aroused.
"You think I want gentle?" Her voice drops to a hoarse, lustful whisper.
"You think I want you to treat me like I'm fragile?
Julian, I've been lying in bed every night remembering how you felt inside me.
How you made me beg. How you pinned me down and fucked me until I couldn't think straight.
That's what I want. I want the man in Ibiza who fucked me and bit me and choked me.
Not some sanitized version where you pretend to be something you're not. "
Choked me. I was choking her because I was going to kill her, not because I suddenly became kinky.
But she doesn't know that, and the words send a bolt of heat straight through me, so intense it's almost painful.
My hands clench into fists at my sides, every muscle in my body tight with the effort of not reaching for her. "You don't know what you're saying."
"Yes, I do." She reaches out again, this time placing her hand on my arm, her fingers curling around the taut muscle there. I can feel the heat of her palm through my shirt, my pulse jumping under her touch. "I know exactly what I'm saying. And I know you're lying when you say it's a mistake."
"Isabelle." Her name comes out as a warning, but it sounds more like a plea.
"Just admit it," she says softly. "Admit that you want me. That you're not keeping your distance because it's the smart thing to do, but because you're scared of what will happen if you don't."
"I'm not scared."
She tilts her head up, meeting my eyes. "Liar."