Chapter Sixteen
Jacob
Iwoke up reaching for Abigail and found my arms empty. For a moment, my brain fogged with sleep, I panicked, nightmare images of Big John taking her flashing through my brain.
I bolted from the bed, heart thudding in my chest, before I skidded to a halt at her bedroom door at the sight of her curled up in her bed, fast asleep.
It was after dawn, and I would have been up already, but I'd turned off my alarm the night before. I hadn't wanted to wake Abigail. I had an early meeting, but I'd wanted to sleep as late as possible.
Now that I'd had her in my bed, I wanted to keep her there. Instead, she'd woken in the night and stolen away like a thief.
I didn't have to turn on the light to see the tracks of dried tears on her smooth cheeks. I didn't want to understand.
I'd be lying to myself if I didn't admit that I was disturbed by the changes between us. Abigail Jordan was supposed to be an experiment. A pet. A private indulgence.
I was not supposed to want to keep her. I'd planned to enjoy her until the danger from Big John had passed, then set up a trust to take care of her mother and send her on her way.
A few months of spectacular sex at a cost I could well afford. I'd always wanted a taste of Abigail, and this way, I could do a good deed and get my fill of her at the same time.
At its worst, the situation would soothe my conscience for all the time I'd spent lusting after another man's wife.
I should have known the plan would fall apart the first time she'd gone to her knees for me. The wave of possessiveness I'd felt should have been a warning.
I'd ignored it. I'd gorged myself on her, taking everything I wanted from Abigail, not caring that each day with her, my need had grown.
I hated the thought of her full name. Abigail Jordan. She didn't belong to them. John hadn't deserved her. She'd been wasted on him.
Abigail was mine.
It wasn't enough to own her body. At the start, I'd thought that would be more than enough. Her body and her willingness to give me anything I desired.
What more could any man possibly want from a woman?
What did I care what was in her heart, in her soul? The more I sated myself in her tight, slick pussy, the more her body alone wasn't enough.
I wanted her smiles, her laughter. I craved a soft look. Her casual affection. I knew she desired me. Abigail wasn't experienced enough to fake her body's reaction to me.
I was a greedy bastard, and I didn't care. I'd known what she was doing the night before with her strip tease.
Fucking hell, she'd been hot, peeling open her silk robe and sucking my cock like she'd been dreaming of it all day.
By the time I got inside her, she'd been soaked, so turned on from sucking me off that the moisture from her pussy had slicked down her legs.
Abigail was a treasure, and she was terrified of me. Of what was happening between us.
I wanted to pretend I didn't get it, wanted to tell myself this was simple. I knew it wasn't. She'd been victimized by her husband. He might have married her, while I'd tried to make her my pet, but John had used her love for her mother to enslave her.
And how is that different from what you did? A sly voice in the back of my head demanded.
But it was different. Maybe not at the very beginning. But I'd planned to set her free.
And now? Are you going to set her free now?
No, I was not going to set her free. I couldn't.
What if she actually left? First, she wasn't safe. I'd hid from her the details of Big John's intentions. He wasn't just planning to use her to convince the Raptors to work with him. She'd become part of the deal. If he got her, he'd give her to them.
What they'd do with her didn't bear thinking about. There were gangs out there who weren't that bad. Not all criminals were animals.
I knew a few legitimate businessmen who were far worse than some of the men and women on the wrong side of the law. The Raptors were every ugly cliché made worse. Abigail would be better off dead than with them.
And when that problem is taken care of? Will you let her go then?
The sneaky voice sounded a lot like my conscience. I wished it would shut the hell up.
I was taking better care of Abigail than John ever had. And no, I was not going to fucking let her go. I wouldn't chain her to the bed. I wasn't an animal. I wasn't Big John.
I'd just have to make sure she didn't want to leave me. She hadn't cried the night before because she didn't want me. I wasn't a mind reader, but I knew Abigail wasn't that good of an actress.
When she was hiding her thoughts, she got all proper and dignified. She didn't drop to her knees and suck my cock like she'd been dreaming of nothing else for her entire life. She didn't cling to my arms and cry out her orgasm.
I'd felt her shock when I'd kissed her. I'd shocked myself. I'd avoided kissing Abigail for weeks. Now that I'd done it, I had to wonder what the fuck had been wrong with me.
Kissing her was like tasting her soul. All her sweetness, everything that made her Abigail, was right there in her lips, in the way her mouth opened for me, in the little gasps and hitches of her breath as I claimed her.
Now that I'd kissed her, I was going to do it every day. Every hour.
She needed to tell herself that we were just sex. I understood. She'd been stripped of too much in the last few years. She couldn't take the risk of losing more. Of losing her heart.
Was that what I wanted? Her heart? Stop being such a pussy, that irritatingly knowing voice said. Man up and admit what this is about.
Fuck. Love.
Was it about love? Is that what I wanted from her?
I'd never wanted it from a woman before. I knew what love was. Knew what it looked like. I'd grown up in a home filled with love before it had been stolen from us.
A memory of the picture some asshole had sent of my Aunt and Uncle's deaths flashed through my mind, carrying with it a bolt of nausea.
I remembered that I still hadn't apologized for being such a bastard to Abigail. Fuck. If I wanted her to stay, I was doing a shit job of convincing her I was a good bet.
I had to do better. She was scared, and she should be. I'd been an ass from the start, wanting everything on my terms.
If I was really going to be honest with myself, that wasn't going to change. I still wanted everything on my terms. It's just that now, I wanted what was best for Abigail.
If I was going to give her my best, I had to make sure she wanted the same thing I did. I wanted Abigail to stay with me. I needed her to be mine. All I had to do was convince her she wanted the same.
I was already more than halfway there. She might have convinced herself otherwise, but I knew she never would have come to me in the first place, never would have let me touch her body the way I had, if she hadn't already been half in love with me to start.
She could have told herself that she was exploring her sexuality, or whatever bullshit she'd used to justify giving me control of her body, but the base fact was that Abigail would never have accepted my offer if she hadn't already had feelings for me.
At the very least, she trusted me. I could work with that.
My mind occupied with Abigail, I got dressed for my meeting and left the penthouse. I'd get coffee and breakfast there. Maybe I'd even leave work early. The building was quiet at this hour, the parking garage well-lit but silent.
That was probably why the scuff of the shoe on concrete caught my attention so easily. I couldn't see anyone else between the rows of cars. No engines were running, and no headlights flashed.
I slowed, looking around. We had security down here, at the entrances from the street, on top of cameras and hand scanners on the stairwell and the elevator.
No one should be able to get into the garage who didn't belong, but it wouldn't be the first time someone had managed to slip through the guards.
Cooper was right. If I'd wanted a truly secure building, I would have left off the retail and the office space. Once I decided to give the public access to Winters House, I'd made it far more complicated to keep the building safe from intruders.
At the time, that hadn't been a concern. Now that it was, I was starting to wonder if we shouldn't relocate to the real Winters House.
Our family home didn't have a formal name, but all of us had always called it Winters House, and my giving this building the same name had been an inside family joke.
The real Winters House, where my oldest brother, Aiden, and my younger sister, Charlotte, still lived, was a ten-acre estate in the heart of Buckhead.
Surrounded by a high wall, protected by motion detectors and armed guards twenty-four seven, Aiden's home, my home, was close to impenetrable. But I didn't want to move in with my brother.
I didn't think he knew what I’d been up to with Abigail. If he did, I'm sure I would've had a phone call or a visit already. Aiden loved his siblings and his cousins, but he was a nosy bastard. He took his position as the head of the family seriously. Too seriously.
I wasn't sure I was satisfied with my explanations to my own conscience. I already knew they wouldn't be good enough for Aiden's.
It was the best indication I could have that I needed to get myself together where Abigail was concerned.
As my mother always used to tell us, "If you're too embarrassed to tell the people you love about something you're doing, either you're doing wrong, or you need more confidence in your choices. "
I missed my mother.
Nearing my car, I heard it again. The scuff of the shoe on concrete. Not a dress shoe like mine. A sneaker. Maybe a work boot. Something softer, rubber, but the sound was there.
Investigate? Or get in the car and call Cooper? I wasn't stupid. I was in good shape, and I was fast. I knew how to use a gun, but I wasn't carrying.
If I thought there was trouble, I was better off getting the hell out of there than trying to deal with it on my own.