EIGHTEEN
Harper
Harper was too busy worrying about her bladder to be concerned with the too-large body in her bed. She swung her legs off the edge and hurried to the bathroom. Once she’d seen to the most pressing needs, she paused at the end of her bed a few minutes later, frowning at the wide-shouldered man asleep on her pillows with the sheet gathered around his waist.
If she didn’t know him, she might think he was harmless when he was sleeping.
But he was a fox. Cunning and always scheming.
She thought about how he’d turned up and cared for her the night before. Harper was slightly mortified to know she’d slept in his arms for hours. And slept deeply, too. The best sleep in a while.
Had Cain not occupied most of her bed, she would have slept longer. It was too early for work. Dammit. She scowled and rounded the bed.
It was her apartment; she wasn’t hiding just because he was there.
She considered shoving him onto the floor, but re-evaluated when she remembered she’d have to deal with him once he was awake.
Instead, Harper slipped back between the sheets and stayed as close to the edge as possible. That was until an arm snaked around her and pulled her across the mattress until they were spooning.
“That’s better.” He rasped. “You took too long. Everything okay?”
“No,” she said, and though he was behind her, she sensed his head rising from the pillow. His voice was no longer sleep-heavy as he asked. “Why?”
“There’s an intruder in my bed when he shouldn’t be here.”
That chuckle of his was all evil, and he snuggled his arm tighter over her belly.
“He is where his wife is. Shut your eyes for a while longer. I’m fucking tired, sweet baby.”
Harper didn’t go back to sleep because Cain told her to—she was tired. And when she woke again, they were face to face, and her leg was slung over his, and Cain had a grip on the top of her thigh. It was all too intimate, and Harper flamed from top to bottom. Though rubbing her leg, he appeared still sleeping, so she studied his face.
It was not the first time she regretted how they met—she could’ve easily fallen for him otherwise.
He checked all the boxes she’d want in a forever partner, but she couldn’t let one feeling filter in for the things he’d done and was holding over her family. She had to remain strong against anything Cain threw her way.
And that included his incredible magnetism and slick way with words.
He was the most handsome man she’d ever encountered, with a successful business. He had money and was smart enough to hatch a diabolical revenge plot. He could have been the perfect man if he hadn’t put his intelligence into evil.
Maybe he still is . A stupid little voice whispered in the back of her head, and Harper shut it up by humming song lyrics until all those thoughts were banished.
He might be good-looking and able to turn her on with only a word or a slight touch. He kissed like the devil, but that was because he was the devil, and Cain Emerson was not the man for her.
In this reality or any other.
As much as she told herself that, there was always that voice asking, “What if, Harper?”
“You’re staring hard.” He grumbled, eyes still closed.
His voice jolted Harper’s heart into galloping, and she was about to put space between them when Cain locked an arm around her and buried his nose in the side of her face.
As syrupy as the man made her succumb to his touch, she had to remain like steel against him.
“You need to leave, Cain.”
His impact was too devastating to deal with, and she would never betray her family by falling for a man who hated them.
She had to keep pushing against him because there was no other option.
The emotion of that reality clogged up her throat, and when he pulled his head back as if he sensed the warring inside her head, his eyes darkened, and Harper did something stupid. She rushed forward, breeching the few inches separating them, and latched onto his mouth. It was closed-lipped, but it lasted a long time until Cain gently cupped the side of her face, and she drew back. Breathless, her heart a little wild.
“Don’t take that personally, it’s just your lips looked…”
“Looked, what?”
“Like they wanted to be kissed.”
How a man’s smile could devastate.
She felt crushed underneath Cain’s smile, and with her pained emotions, she flung her legs out of the bed.
“Can you be gone before I’ve finished showering?”
He rested his head on an elbow, looking at home in her bed. “I’m staying for a few days.”
Harper’s eyes widened. “You can’t. I have to work. And Angela is dropping by today.”
“I’m not leaving you while you’re in pain and bleeding.” He scowled.
Oh, he was ridiculous. She hated how he’d caught her at a weak moment. She’d been dealing with excruciating periods for years, so it was nothing new to her. “I bleed every month.”
“Then I’ll be here every month.” He declared, climbing out of her bed in an athletic move, and she held her breath when he came toward her. “Don’t forget who you belong to, little girl.” He used his bossy tone, and the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end. Unsure if she was mad or turned on.
“I’m moving in with my parents.” She declared with a white lie to get him out of her life for good. It was probably the one place she’d be safe away from him.
“Then I hope your bed at their house is big enough for the both of us.”
“Oh, my god, Cain. This situation is getting out of hand. Maybe I need to check you into a mental facility.”
Drawing nearer, he towered over her, his hand finding its way to the back of her neck as she tilted her head. She couldn’t help but tremble, though she didn’t want to.
“You’re not feeling well, little girl. That means I’m trying to be nice.”
She couldn’t help making the scoffing sound. Harper would bet her whole car that he’d never tripped over the word nice, let alone tried to be nice to anyone. When she looked up into his steel-like eyes, the burning lust there looking down at her almost buckled her weak knees.
He wasn’t hiding it; it was there to peel the wallpaper from every wall and eviscerate her heart muscle into dust.
“But if you keep working that little tongue, my wife , I can forget you’re not feeling well and do what I came to do. And keep in mind,” he dropped his mouth to her ear, his warm breath tickled, but she couldn’t think past the hand he was sliding down her stomach until he cupped between her legs. “I have no problem with a bit of blood getting in my way. Do you want the first time I fuck my wife to be when you’re bleeding?”
Shit! Harper’s rubbery knees wobbled. She was close to begging for…
The blast of her phone shocked a shriek from her lips, and she pulled out of Cain’s arms like lightning to answer.
It was Knox.
If she thought the monster would give her privacy, she was wrong. The heat of his nearly naked body behind her caused Harper to shudder before she felt the stroke of his hand on her lower belly, soothing her like he had last night. Unbidden, like her body had a control pad of its own, she leaned into his chest, and then Cain went further, kissing along her bare shoulder.
“I won’t be going to the clubhouse today.” She finally answered her brother’s inquiry. “I’m working on something for Angie.”
Even if her life depended on it, she couldn’t recall what Knox had said when the call ended; she was too winded by Cain pressing drugging kisses to her neck.
The man was slowly killing her, and she wasn’t doing a thing to stop the murder.
With a pat on her butt, he sat on the side of the bed like he hadn’t just been seducing her. “Grab your shower. I’ll shower after you. Unless you’re inviting me to share?” she glowered at him, and Cain grinned. “I thought not. I’ll make some food.”
This madness was getting out of hand. They were not playing house together! Harper flounced into the bathroom, slamming the door to show her displeasure.
Once she’d washed away Cain’s scent, she felt her senses return, as if she’d purged evil from her soul. The smile slipped off her face when she walked into the living area and saw him flipping eggs onto a plate.
They smelled great, and her belly grumbled.
“Oh, my hubby cooks. How lucky I am,” she snarked, hoping to piss him off enough he’d leave, but Cain only smirked, his eyes smoldering like he could taste her.
“I’ve got many skills. Do you want to see them?”
“Like threatening my family. I know.” She grabbed the plate and curled up in the armchair to eat; she wasn’t a girl to turn food down.
“Yes.” The monster agreed, and her slumbering temper boiled.
“I’m going to stop you, you know.”
“Oh? How?” he sounded amused.
“I can’t tell you my secrets.”
“Little girl, I know all your secrets.”
He probably did.
She was playing chess with a psycho who would crush Harper beneath his boots one day.
Ignoring him while she ate, he seemed content to sit quietly and watch her.
He watched her most of the day when she was hunched over the computer, working on research, making her copious amounts of coffee while he made his work calls.
Cain dashed out for food, and for a split second, she toyed with the idea of making a run for it—but this was her house, damn it. Besides, she was still in her pajamas and had zero plans to change. When Cain returned, lugging something that filled the air with an irresistible aroma, she almost snatched it from his hands. Thankfully, he had already plated it up and was on his way to the couch with her dinner in tow.
And when she went to bed that night, he shucked his clothes. He’d brought a heating pad, and he massaged her back again.
The tension between them was palpable, like the blood rushing through her veins. Harper only noticed the erratic pace of her breathing as their eyes met again.
It felt like something was changing between them.
If it was another man, she might have thought he was finally realizing the error of what he was doing.
But not Cain.
He only reached for her mouth in the dark and kissed the soul out of her.
They kissed for so long that time no longer meant anything to her. He skimmed a hand beneath her shirt and fondled her breasts until both nipples were hard and aching. When he dipped his head and sucked one and then the other, she cried out and grasped his hair.
Her morals and beliefs fled like sand through her fingers; the feelings were too strong to hold back when she begged for Cain’s mouth.
The kisses were endless. They were soft and then wild.
He devoured her whole, just like a monster would.
Tears threatened to fall. She felt like she was being split down the middle. Half of her was here with an incredibly terrible man, and the other half was always loyal to her family name.
“Focus only on me, sweet baby.” He growled, deepening his lips, stroking her with his tongue. And that’s what she did. For long hours, for those kisses, Harper fixated solely on Cain.
When the morning came, and the sun blinded her awake, she searched the bed and found the other side cold. He was nowhere in the apartment.
Like an apparition, or she’d dreamed him.
Cain had gone again.
But she knew, like the other times, it wouldn’t be long before he crept into her life again.
That’s how shadows behaved.
They came in the dark and swallowed the light.