28. Karia #2
And it’s like he wants to test that thought, or he sees the challenge and openness both in my eyes, because he switches his hold on the glass from the stem to the base. His entire palm covers it and causes the pressure of the rim to dig into my skin, pressing uncomfortably around my breast.
At the same time, he leans down, then he bites my exposed nipple, holding my gaze as he does, his lashes longer and thicker from this angle, his teeth tugging at me and I couldn’t stop it if I tried: I moan his name.
He is devouring me from so many angles. His hand on my belly, the deep ache of the rim sinking into my flesh, his teeth doing the same.
I am consumed.
But I’m not scared.
At least not until he lifts his head, his swollen lips brushing my nipple as he says, “You look so pretty, trapped in glass.”
My fingers flex above my head. A subtle, soft movement, but I am trying to hold myself back from grabbing at him. Forcing him to finish this. To make physical all this tension between us. To see me as more than a specimen.
Even though I don’t speak a word, he glances up, at my hands, as if we’re connected.
Chained. Bound. Then he slowly lifts the glass from my skin as he straightens his posture, only to grab the bowl in a vicious grip.
I hear the leather of his gloves creak, watch a tendon in his neck strain against his skin, just visible from the bandana he’s wearing.
I hold my breath.
Then the glass shatters.
Slivers rain down on my skin; cold, icy, dangerous. I suck in air, a whimper and a gasp both as he examines me while slowly setting what’s left of the wicked-sharp glass on the carpet at my side.
He keeps pressing on my exposed low belly, but his other hand grazes over the chips and shards on my breast.
I wonder if he can feel my heartbeat.
Still, I don’t move. I give in.
“Are you worried?” he asks quietly, drawing a lazy, ghostly circle around my peaked nipple.
“No.” I am a liar now, too.
He smiles, as if he knows, but he continues the same path. The same motion. Yet he’s looking at his other hand now, firmly over my pelvis.
“I could watch you change, couldn’t I?” He lifts dark violet-tinted eyes to me, and I swallow thickly.
I’m not sure how I know what he means, but I do. “To do that, you’d have to actually fuck me first.”
His index finger pauses, poised over a shard of glass glittering by my nipple. His jaw tightens, but he doesn’t look away. He doesn’t speak, either.
“What are you waiting for, Sullen?” I take a deep inhale. Exhale slowly. I can taste his blood on my tongue. “You know I’m yours.”
“You’re filthy,” he says, glancing at the pool of glass I’m covered in.
I flinch with his words, thinking of my dirty clothes. How I knelt in his room. “You made me that way.” It’s partly true.
He doesn’t meet my eye. “I will make you so much worse.”
“You bore me,” I tell him, injecting haughtiness into my tone. But my voice shakes, and even so, he doesn’t look up. “All these pretty threats but you are still too scared to give up your virginity to me. Are you the one who is worried, Sullen Bram Rule?”
When I say his full name, his eyes finally collide with mine. He slides his hand to my collarbone, but doesn’t go any further, no matter how much I want him to wrap his fingers around my throat, then kiss me.
“I am,” he says quietly, his expression placid.
If it wasn’t for the way his chest heaves between us, I would say he truly was bored himself, not about to catch fire the way I am with sparks beneath my skin.
“I fear that what little sanity you held onto, you’ve let slip.
Maybe too many sedatives and too much alcohol too close together, hmm, Karia?
” He sighs, shaking his head in feigned disappointment.
Then, all at once, he pulls away and swiftly stands to his feet, staring down at me as he does, his head tilted to the side as I try to make sense of feeling so empty before him.
“Oh dear,” he says softly. “You really are a mess.” He glances at the glass on my bare flesh.
The urge to cover myself is strong. I’m splayed out, half-naked for him, and yet he doesn’t want me.
Maybe he’s right. Perhaps I’ve deluded myself this entire time.
What’s broken inside him is something I could never curl around, not to heal or to save him but to simply be there.
I have been throwing myself at him for days in the most dire of circumstances, but what I haven’t wanted to consider is the fact he doesn’t desire me at all. Not like this.
Yet when I drop my gaze lower, unable to hold his, I see his erection, bulging in his pants.
Maybe he doesn’t love me. Maybe he never will. But I do affect him, at least a little.
I smile softly, refusing to get up as I lazily trail my eyes over his body, finally landing on his face once more. I stretch my arms, keeping them above my head, and pretend my heart isn’t about to beat its way out of my chest. “Oh dear,” I mimic him. “It seems I’m not the only one.”