Chapter 12 #2
That she wanted to join him sometimes in the darkness.
Just because she had chosen not to follow in her parents’ footsteps and head into some kind of military service didn't mean that she was darkness-free.
She just liked her darkness contained in one particular area of her life, one that she could control, that could satiate her needs and leave her free to spend the rest of her time in the lighter parts of the world.
When Dragon looked at her, he saw spun glass.
Something he had to be careful with, treat like it was breakable.
But she wasn't breakable, and if they ever took their budding relationship to the next level, she didn't want to be treated like some porcelain doll that could shatter if he wasn't careful.
She was pretty sure Dragon would freak out more than all her brothers combined if they ever found out that while she was in college, she had frequented an on-campus group that participated in rough sex.
The kind where you tied each other up and inflicted a little pain along with a whole bunch of orgasms.
It was the wildest thing she’d ever done, and back then she hadn't quite grasped the consequences of what she was doing. It wasn't until she dated a guy she met through someone she’d known in the club after she’d graduated that she realized the potential dangers of the kind of rough, dark, dirty sex she craved with someone she couldn’t one hundred percent trust.
That particular lesson had left behind a few scars when the guy had neglected proper aftercare, and she’d realized that she either had to lock away her dark fantasies or find someone she could trust her body with.
Dragon was that man.
Part of her had known that from the second she first laid eyes on him. The darkness inside him called out to the darkness inside her, and she’d wanted so badly for him to see past everything else, the perceptions everybody else had of her, and just see … her.
But he hadn't.
Maybe more of the blame for that fell on her shoulders, though, because she’d been so busy just trying to survive. To figure out how her paternity changed her so she could discover who she was going forward and what she wanted.
When she reached the conservatory at the back of the house, where she’d done yoga every morning she’d spent there other than the day before, and that was only because she’d slept until after noon, she came to an abrupt stop.
The room wasn't empty as she’d been expecting.
Dragon was standing in the thin, first rays of dawn shining through the glass walls. He was wearing nothing but a pair of gray sweatpants that hung low on his hips and nothing else, giving her a perfect view of all that delicious, tanned skin and perfectly defined muscles.
Darn, he was droolworthy.
Too bad they weren't at a place yet where they could openly drool over one another. Might never get to that place.
So for now, it was look but don’t touch.
“What are you doing here?” she asked as she walked over to him like she wasn't growing wetter between her legs by the second.
“What are you doing here?” he shot back.
Narrowing her eyes at him, she held out the rolled-up mat she carried with her. “You know what I'm doing. Same thing I always do to start my day. Yoga.”
Nodding at the mat already on the floor, he shot her a smirk. “Same.”
“You don’t start your day with yoga.”
“I do today.”
When he moved over a little to give her space to lay out her own mat, his muscles seemed to ripple, and it took all her self-restraint not to reach out and trace them with her fingertips. Or the tip of her tongue. “Do you know, or is it an accident?”
“Huh?”
“Never mind.”
His hand grabbed her wrist as she bent down to set her mat on the ground. “Tell me.”
There was a slight command in his tone, but that wasn't what had her giving an answer. It was the sliver of doubt in his eyes. Her running yesterday had made him doubt himself, and she wasn't sure how to rectify that without sharing her secrets with him, and she wasn't ready to do that yet.
“The sweatpants,” she explained.
“What about them?” His brow furrowed as he looked down at them and then back up at her. “I thought they would be good for yoga, but I can change if it’s not appropriate.”
She snorted at his words. Gray sweatpants weren't appropriate for yoga, or for anything when you wore them with nothing else. Obviously, he had no idea that gray sweatpants were like the sexiest thing a guy could wear and turned girls on faster than any foreplay ever could.
“They’re fine to wear,” she muttered.
“I don’t get what the problem is then.”
“I know you don’t, and that only makes you cuter.”
“Cuter?” Dragon made a face at that, and since he still held her wrist in his hand, he brushed the calloused pad of a thumb over where her pulse was fluttering wildly.
His nostrils flared, and then a smile broke out on his face.
“Ah,” he nodded in understanding. “Now I get it. For some reason, my sweatpants turn you on.”
Knowing he could smell her arousal didn't help, and even though she definitely felt embarrassed, she also got a whole lot wetter. This man turned her on more than any other ever had, and she’d even dial back her dark fantasies if it meant giving him the soft, sweet sex he wanted from her.
She could learn to like it vanilla if it meant having Dragon, couldn’t she?
“Do we have to talk about this?” She groaned, sure her cheeks were flaming red, and it was only half from mortification, the rest was pure desire.
Using his hold on her wrist, he tugged her off-balance so she stumbled forward and planted her free hand against his chest to keep from falling.
His free hand curled around her backside, and since his hands were huge, the position left his fingers brushing achingly close to where she longed to feel them.
He’d set her on fire, it seemed only fair he should put it out.
Smoky arousal flared in his violet eyes, and she was positive he was going to crush his mouth to hers.
So sure in fact that the tip of her tongue swept along her bottom lip, already anticipating what it was going to feel like to kiss Dragon.
Properly kiss him, not the chaste little kiss they’d shared last Thanksgiving.
But he didn't kiss her.
At least not where she wanted.
Instead, he brought her hand to his mouth and pressed his lips to her palm. Then his fingers brushed across her center before he released her and took a step back.
Darn him and his restraint.
How did she get him to realize she didn't want restraint?
She wanted him to let go, unleash the monster he believed lived inside of him, and take anything and everything he wanted from her.
She wanted to be possessed, claimed, owned.
She wanted him to tear her apart and then put her back together again afterward.
Cassandra didn't necessarily want to want all of that. It felt so wrong now that she knew her mom had been held down and gang raped by four men who thought they could do whatever they wanted without consequence.
But wrong or not, she couldn’t deny that her darkest fantasy was to be chased, then caught. Tied up and held down. Clothes ripped from her body as she was spread open to be taken roughly until her body was littered with bruises, and pleasure built so high inside her it could no longer be contained.
If Dragon knew the thoughts running through her mind, he’d be disgusted with her.
Everybody would.
There was something wrong with a woman conceived via rape wanting to, for all intents and purposes, be raped herself.
Something was wrong with her.