Chapter 14
Fourteen
Vicky
The cab pulls up outside Alex’s apartment. When was I last here? I can’t remember, it’s been that long.
He opens his door and gets out. I don’t; I wait for him to close it.
But he doesn’t. He’s not stupid, more’s the pity.
“Get out,” he says, while he’s standing in the road, his door held open, leaning forward to watch me while I sit there.
Resigned, I reach for my door handle. I don’t know what the cabbie thinks, but he’s carefully avoiding looking at me. Not the first domestic he’s witnessed, and not the last either. He’s practiced.
Alex waits until I’m half out of the cab before he slams his door and strides around. I can’t get back in before he reaches me, so I don’t bother trying. Tempting, though.
His fingers close around my arm again, though my coat gives me some protection. My bicep hurts.
Together, we walk into his apartment building. Past the doorman, who acknowledges Alex with a nod and gives me a curious look. I think Alex sees, because his grip tightens further. Then we’re at the elevator, and he pushes me in before him, like I’m an unruly child.
“You’re being a dick,” I say as the doors close, and I don’t care if the doorman hears.
Alex doesn’t reply, and the elevator begins its ascent to the twenty-fourth floor.
“What the hell’s the matter with you?” I ask, but he doesn’t answer, or even look at me.
He stands right in the center of the elevator, facing the doors, ignoring me like I don’t exist. Yet he’s not the perfectly composed Alex I’m used to seeing.
His mouth’s tight, and the muscle in his jaw clenches and relaxes as the only sign he hears me.
I’m not sure if it’s a relief or a problem when the elevator reaches his floor.
He doesn’t grab me this time, but steps out first, expecting me to follow. He’s four strides down the hallway before I do. The carpet’s thick enough to muffle the sound of my footsteps, and he pauses, gives a half-turn, checking I’m heeling like a good puppy.
Apartment 24A, and his door’s bigger than my bed.
He opens it, walks in, holds it as he waits for me.
I don’t really want to follow him, but what choice is there?
A fight, here on the landing? Call Carol to come and get me?
She doesn’t have a car and can’t drive mine.
Besides, it’s forty-five minutes, and our fight will be over by then.
I’ve never seen Alex angry, and he sure looks that way.
Why, I really don’t know. All I did was what he wanted me to.
“What is your fucking problem?” I ask as I walk in.
He closes the door behind me. The lights are low, illuminating the hardwood floors, open plan space, white walls and cream sofas.
The city’s spread out beneath us, and I remember the view from the windows is fantastic.
But that’s not where my attention is right now.
He still doesn’t answer me, just throws his keys in a bowl on the dresser, pulls his coat off, and lays it over the back of the sofa.
Then he turns and looks at me.
There’s not enough light to see the color of his eyes, but his glare sends a shiver through me. It’s primal, raw, and not an expression I’ve seen on his face before.
I take a step back, and that’s the wrong move.
He’s on me before I can back up again, his hands inside my coat, pushing it off my shoulders.
Five grand’s worth of cashmere hits the floor, and now I can’t move, because my heels will catch in it.
His hands return, running up my bare arms, over my shoulders, encircling my neck.
For a breath, I wonder if he’s going to squeeze.
This close, his eyes are so intense I wouldn’t put it past him.
Then his thumbs meet beneath my chin, tilting it up, and he leans in.
He kisses me.
Alex is fucking kissing me.
It’s bruising, hungry, an invasion of my mouth.
None of the gentleness with which he’s always kissed in the past. His lips lever mine open, his tongue forces its way in, and his hands hold me still.
I must’ve shifted a foot, because my shoe snags on the coat.
I have a hand against his chest; it’s achieving nothing.
My eyes are open in surprise, but his are closed. He’s tasting me, sensing me.
And all I can think of is his mouth on mine.
My fingers curl into his shirt. My other hand has found his lapel. I don't remember reaching for it. My heart is hammering, my nipples tight against my dress, heat gathering where it has no business gathering.
I really hate my body sometimes.
I try to turn my head, and it’s enough. He breaks the kiss, drawing back but not releasing me.
“Alex…” I begin, not sure what I can even say.
“Come with me.” It’s not a request. He takes my hand, steps back, then leads me through his apartment. We’ve made a half-dozen steps before I begin to get my wits together.
“Where are we going?”
He doesn’t answer, and we arrive a moment later. He pushes a door open, taking me into his bedroom.
His bedroom?
It’s been so long, I couldn’t even remember which room it was. This one, apparently. A large bed against the wall with a wrought iron headboard. It's moody, dim lighting, the carpet a grey ash, the blinds electric, slatted, and half-lowered.
“Alex, no…”
“Take off your dress.”
“Okay, ‘no’ just became ‘fuck no.’” That might have been the wrong choice of expletive.
“I won’t ask again.”
“Well, I’m happy to keep saying no.”
He’s on me before I can retreat, because he’s not disadvantaged by high heels. His hands grip my shoulders, turning me, then one hand wraps around my throat. I’m held against his chest, but his other hand’s between us, at my back.
“Alex—” It’s an effort to speak.
He ignores me, finding the zipper and wrenching it down hard and fast. Something tears. The zipper jams. His fingers hook inside, brushing against my skin, and he yanks. The material pulls tight, then rips. The tension leaves it.
The front gapes open, the sides are limp, the bodice, built-in cups—it’s all ruined.
“For fuck’s sake—”
“I warned you,” he says, mouth near my ear, voice low. I’ve never heard that tone from him before, and it pulls at me.
He’s not finished with my dress. He shoves it down with his free hand, keeping me pinned. If he wasn’t holding me, the force of it would have me over. He’s so much stronger than I am.
“Goddammit. Stop already.”
The dress falls to my waist, bunches, catches, then he forces it over one hip. And the other. I’m naked to the waist, until gravity takes over and it falls, leaving me in nothing but my heels and a thong.
“This isn’t funny, Alex.” I’m getting angry. No, I’m already angry. I’m pinned, my feet are caught again, and I’m really hating my heels right now. Almost as much as I’m hating him. “Get off of—”
His hand slaps hard into my right butt cheek, the shock more surprising than the pain. But that comes, a moment later. “Be quiet,” he growls.
“Alex, I’m not—”
His hand around my throat squeezes, cutting off my air, and his palm lands again. Right on the damn spot. I gasp out a cry, but it’s muffled. “Be. Quiet.”
He’s not playing, he’s serious. This is a side of him I’ve never seen before. Never even suspected it existed.
And I tremble.
Is that fear?
I don’t know if I want it to be fear, because I don’t want it to be anything else, or if I don’t want it to be fear, and something else is preferable.
He doesn’t give me time to figure it out, but drags me to the bed.
My feet catch in the dress, but he’s still holding me to him.
I stumble, he braces me. Half lifting me.
Then the dress is left behind, and the edge of the bed hits my knees.
He whisks the duvet off then releases my throat and pushes me forward.
I fall, catching myself on my hands, his sheets silk beneath my palms. Black silk.
Why does he always have black silk sheets? And who the hell else has been in this bed?
“Are you going to behave?” he asks, taking his grip on my neck again, this time at the back. He pushes me down.
“No, I’m not going to fucking—”
“Good,” he says. “Because you absolutely deserve to be punished.”
“What? I don’t deserve jack, you bastard.” Where does he get off, talking about punishing me when he’s the one who was kissing another woman tonight?
He pins me with a knee in the small of my back, and he’s heavy. It presses me into the bed, my muscles clenching, and it hurts.
“Get off me!”
“Stop struggling,” he says like he’s bored, while one hand catches my ankle. He has my shoe off in an instant, and it lands on the floor with a dull thud. I kick my other leg, but it does no good. He grabs that one too, and that shoe joins the first. The pressure of his knee lessens. “Up the bed.”
His removal of my shoes has given me time for my brain to catch up. I need to stop this before it goes any further, but he’s out of control. One of us has to be the adult. “Look,” I begin, fighting to keep my voice calm, to keep my growing fear at bay, “just let me free, and we can talk—”
His hand slaps into my left ass cheek, and my thong gives no protection at all. It stings like hell, drawing a cry I can’t bite back in time. “Up.”
It’s humiliating. I blink back tears of frustration, and inch forward. He lets me move when it’s the direction he wants. I’m soon fully on the bed, in just my thong, his hand still on the back of my neck.
And he pins me when I’m where he wants me to be. “Good girl, Vicky.”
My stomach flips.
Is that nausea, or something else?
He’s never said those words to me before.
Eight months—no, nine. Some nights of gentle, quietly passionate sex. The occasional romp in the kitchen, once up against a wall. Many, many weeks between where he’s barely touched me. Never pinned me, never spanked me, and never, ever, has he called me a ‘good girl.’
His hand caresses my bottom. “Do you know, I’ve always loved your ass.” His tone’s almost wistful. “Those running shorts you wear. Hell, even those thin pajamas don’t hide how firm and taut it is.”
“Alex—”