Chapter 28 #2
It shouldn’t hurt so much to be rejected by a man who already dumped me, but it does.
Sweet gods, it does. I turn to Beast, but I might as well seek solace from a glacier for all the warmth he gives me.
Hopelessness rising in my chest, threatening to send me to my knees.
I can’t fail. I can’t. My bottom lip quivers the tiniest bit before I shut my reaction down. “Please.”
Beast looks at me a long moment. His lips slowly curve, the barest hint of a cruel smile. I’ve seen that expression on his face before, always preceding his delivering one of my father’s punishments to someone who’s crossed him. “Get on your knees, Isabelle. If you’re going to beg, do it properly.”
Gaeton flinches like the other man struck him. “What the fuck, Beast?”
Beast doesn’t look away from me. It feels like the intensity of his gaze is a weight across my shoulders and chest, driving me slowly, inexorably, to my knees. “You heard me. How bad do you want us back?”
“You don’t speak for me,” Gaeton rumbles.
I already left my pride at the door. I can’t afford the luxury when I’m bargaining for the lives of so many.
In the end, it’s far simpler than I could have dreamed to give into the Beast’s gravity and sink to my knees.
The carpet is surprisingly soft against my bare skin and I shiver. “Are you happy now? Please come back.”
Beast rises and moves slowly around me. It’s a struggle not to twist to keep him in sight. Instead, I focus on Gaeton, on the way he watches us so closely, his gaze jumping from me to Beast. “What are you up to, you bastard?”
Beast digs his hand into my hair and tugs sharply, bowing my back and drawing a gasp from my lips.
In all our time together, he was always devastatingly gentle, until I thought I’d go out of my mind and scream in his face to touch me.
Pain flickers to pleasure and back again, and I have to bite back a moan.
I stare up into his beautiful face, but he’s not looking at me.
He’s looking at Gaeton. “I propose a bargain.”
“You’re out of your fucking mind.”
“Gaeton.” Beast says it almost gently. “Look at her.” He gives my hair another sharp tug. This time, I can’t stop the moan. My body doesn’t feel like my own. My skin is too tight, my nipples pebbling and my pussy clenching with an ache only one thing can assuage. What is he doing to me?
“Get your fucking hand off her.” Gaeton’s voice is low and strangled. “Now.”
Beast releases me in an instant and I slump forward, barely catching myself before I crumble into a ball on the floor.
Dazed, I touch the smarting spot on my scalp.
I should be furious that he dared touch me like that, but all I can focus on is how much I need.
I straighten back to kneel with some effort. “What’s your bargain?”
“No.”
Beast ignored Gaeton and resumes his position leaning on the desk.
“The three of us for a limited duration. At the end, you make a choice once and for all. Him or me. Regardless of your decision, we will both stay in the territory and resume our roles.” There it is again, his cruel little smile.
“And you will pay penance, little Isabelle.”
I shiver. “What does that mean?”
“It means that you played us to your heart’s content for months on end. Now it’s our turn.” He turns to Gaeton. “You’re furious about how things fell out.”
“Yeah,” the word feels almost forced out of him.
“We played by her rules and cut off pieces of ourselves to be worthy of her.” Beast turns those eerie blue eyes back to me. “Now we drag her down into the dirt with us.”
Gaeton folds his hands together and seems to be actually considering it. “Explain what the fuck you mean when you say ‘us.’”
“We top her together.”
My gaze jumps back and forth between them. Surely they’re not saying… “Together.”
Gaeton doesn’t look at me. “Careful there, Beast. Might start to think you’re sweet on me.”
Beast doesn’t blink. “It’s an efficient use of time and effort.
” He’s on the move again, but this time he circles Gaeton, coming to stop behind the big man’s chair.
He leans down, not touching Gaeton, but close enough that I catch my breath at the sight of him so close to the bigger man.
His rough voice is pure sin. “Think of every depraved thing you’ve wanted to do to that sexy little body.
All the times you held back. All the fantasies you kept locked down. ”
They’re both looking at me like a pair of wolves who happened across a lamb in the forest. I can’t stop another shiver. I came here with the intention of walking out with both of them. I didn’t bargain on this. Any of it.
Beggars can’t be choosers, though. I clear my throat. “State your terms in explicit detail.”
Beast still hasn’t moved back from Gaeton.
“Gaeton and I dominate you. We fuck you. We are your gods and masters for the duration of two weeks. You will have a safe word and will use it when necessary, but otherwise will obey our every whim. At the end of the timeline, when we’ve balanced the scales, you will make a decision and stand by it. ”
The loss of power is staggering. They want me trapped and helpless.
A safe word, yes, but we all know I have no choice in this.
If I say no and walk out of here without them, there’s a very large chance that my territory will fall.
Cordelia is ruthless and a good leader, but the loss of our father and his two top generals at the same time is too high a cost. Already our enemies nip at our borders, testing us.
We need Gaeton and Beast back, and we need them back now. “What will you do to me?”
“Anything we want.”