Chapter 37 BETH
BETH
You know, you’re a really infuriating little witch.
‘I heard you like to do teachers’
The thought slithered into my mind quietly, like it didn’t want me to notice.
I felt my fingers dig into something hard, pain shooting up my nerves.
‘How about you keep my cock busy–’
‘I heard you like to do teachers’
‘How about you keep my cock–’
“–What’s going through that pretty head of yours?”
Zaghan’s voice startled me, and my head snapped up until my eyes fell on him standing by the closet entrance, grey sweatpants hanging low on his hips.
“Why am I here in the middle of the night?” I asked again, like I had done five times before when he drove to my house at 2:00 am, demanding I stepped out.
I had thought he just wanted to see me, talk, maybe. Make one of those stupid, annoying demands and disappear. But I was ushered into the car and the next thing, he was driving off.
Throughout the ride to the guesthouse, he never uttered anything to me. And when we arrived, he ignored all my questions as to why I was here in the middle of the night.
He had slipped into the shower right after, as if desperate to wash something away.
“The night is still young,” he said, shrugging.
The dim glow of the bedside lamp cast shadows over the taut muscles of his arms.
He got new tattoos. I didn’t know how or when he had the time to. I was just seeing it now since he had taken off his shirt.
The ink coiled up his right arm in a language that didn’t want to be read. Strange, jagged characters like an old spell, wrapping around his muscle, a vow he had bled into permanence.
I stared, enthralled, watching the ink gleam under the light; a whisper of sin against skin.
For the past fifteen minutes, I had rehearsed exactly how I would handle this. I wouldn’t waver. I wouldn’t melt under his touch. I would stick to demanding answers, answers to why he put a tracker on me, and maybe I would get to walk away.
But as he moved across the room now, languid and predatory, that resolve cracked, splintered. I stared at him, unable to tear my gaze away. His hair was let loose, damp curls framing his face and brushing against ice-laced lashes.
I wished he wasn’t wearing Callan’s skin. I wished he didn’t have those beautiful eyes. I wouldn’t have been attracted to this monstrous version of him.
I swallowed hard, trying my very best, but my gaze kept betraying me. He moved across the room to the table where a pack of Marlboro and a bottle of whiskey sat, his waist dipping and flexing with every movement. So fucking distracting.
Callan wouldn’t smoke. He told me this himself. I thought that applied to Zaghan too, as I had never seen him with a cigarette. But he picked the cigarette from the pack with the ease of habit, placing it between his lips before striking a flame to the end.
“It’s late,” I whispered, though I wasn’t sure if I meant to push him away or pull him closer.
“Patience, little witch,” he murmured, voice husky, settling over me like a warm shroud.
From the edge of the bed, I gripped the sheet, willing my body and mind to obey my heart, to choose common sense, at least. But the way his voice rolled over me, the way it seeped into my skin, made it impossible not to think of things–wicked, corrupt things.
Things he could do to me. Right here. Right now.
But I was supposed to be seething. Punch him the very moment I set my eyes on him. He shouldn’t have put a tracker on me. That was wrong, borderline creepy, and illegal.
But here I was, melting. And he hadn’t even touched me.
He finally joined me, the bed dipping under his weight.
He folded one leg on the mattress, the other planted on the floor.
He was close. Too close. His bare chest brushed my arm, and heat licked up my spine.
Smoke and aftershave curled around my senses, blending with something faintly floral. His shampoo, maybe.
My nipples hardened beneath the silk top, and I didn’t know if it was the air conditioner or the simple, devastating presence of him.
“I have a lot planned for us,” he exhaled, smoke curling in the air. He pushed his hair back, fingers threading through the damp curls. And I caught it again; tattoos. His fingers, each of the ten of them had a letter carved into the skin.
“You like ‘em?” he asked, amusement lacing his voice as he flexed his fingers in front of me.
Each finger on the left hand spelt LITTLE, the middle one had two LL carved on it, and the fingers on the right spelt WITCH.
What?
“I got them for you,” he said, wrapping his left hand around my throat, then leaned in until his lips brushed my ear. “So, I’ll never forget what my hands were made for.”
Say what now?
“These hands are yours now.” He flexed his fingers around my neck, cigarette still burning between his right fingers. “And whatever they touch from now on will learn of you. ”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” I managed to say, rolling my eyes. He was so incredibly…ridiculous.
“It’s late, Zaghan,” I whispered again, but the words crumbled as his lips grazed the shell of my ear again, his breath hot and teasing.
“I know.”
Smoke spilled from his lips, wrapping around me, choking my thoughts. I coughed, twisting away.
“Can you not?” I glared at him. “Secondary smoking is just as bad too. I’d prefer a cancer-free lung.”
He released a breathy chuckle, but he didn’t put the cigarette away, didn’t even consider it.
“I couldn’t track your movement for hours,” he said, voice lower, edged with something unreadable.
His fingers ghosted over my cheek, tucking my hair behind my ear before his lips grazed my jaw.
“Didn’t know where you were. If you were home.
” There was a pause as he took in a sharp breath. “Or if you were with another man.”
His jaw flexed, as if the thought alone unsettled him. His grip on my neck tightened possessively.
“Zaghan–”
“Why is the necklace I gave you in your friend’s house?” His voice turned sharp, the heat of his cigarette-tainted breath fanning over my skin.
“Are you serious?” My irritation flared. “You put a tracker on me.” I wrenched myself free from his hold, or maybe he released his hold. “You have been watching me like a goddamn creep. That’s not right. Does any of that sound normal to you?”
I had given the necklace to Kenzo after he dropped me off.
He went to check it and found that indeed there was a tracker.
But that wasn’t all. It had a camera too and could record audio.
He hadn’t just been mapping out my movements, he was watching everything I was doing. Hearing everything I was saying.
He was literally choking me.
Fucking psychopath.
He exhaled a slow stream of smoke, a smirk curving his lips. “You’re mine.”
“And you’re sick,” I spat. “Take me home.”
He watched me lazily through half-lidded eyes, cigarette returning to his lips as he took another slow drag.
“Sit,” he commanded.
“No–”
“Put your fucking ass down, Elizabeth!”
The growl in his voice was enough to make my heart slam against my ribs. My breath caught and before I even registered it, I was sitting again, though as far away from him as the bed allowed.
But I barely had time to settle into the new position as he was on me again. One hand gripped my thigh, the other snaking around my waist, pulling me closer to his body.
“Come on, I’m exhausted, baby,” he whispered, and I shivered at the nickname.
For some reason, I liked it a lot when he would casually call me baby.
It was gentle, yet rough, tender, yet possessive.
I preferred it to the little witch. I didn’t even know where he coined that idea from.
I wasn’t a witch. Though, I hoped I was.
I would have woven a dark spell and burned the world down.
“And I’m trying so hard to be nice to you.” His voice was smoke-laced with something darker. “Don’t push me tonight, Elizabeth. Don’t be your naughty self and make this harder than I want it to be.”
His lips found the fluttering pulse beneath my ear, pressing a slow, intentional kiss. Then his teeth sank into my soft skin, sharp and possessive.
I yelped, the sting pulsing through me as my fingers clenched on his thigh. As if aware of the pain he had caused, he stuck out his tongue, soothing the burn with a slow, languid stroke.
“I don’t want to rough tonight,” he murmured, lips brushing over the mark he just made. “I know you had a bad day. Trust me, I know. This is me trying to make you feel better.”
I shuddered.
“I just want to sleep,” I whispered. “Just take me home, Zaghan.”
“I will, darling,” he grunted, placing open-mouthed kisses along my shoulder. “But not now. Not yet.”
Dissatisfied with the limited access to my skin, he hooked the finger that held the burning cigarette under the strap of my top, sliding it down my arm until the fabric barely covered my nipple.
“Zaghan.” A soft moan escaped my lips when his hand cupped my breast, my breath hitching as the glowing tip of the cigarette pressed against my skin, leaving behind a gentle burn.
“Fuck, take it off.” He fixed the cigarette between his lips again, hunger and fire darkening his gaze.
“What?” I asked, breathless.
“Take it off or I’m ripping it.”
My fingers hooked under my hem immediately, lifting the thin, silk material over my head and tossing it aside.
His eyes traced the exposed curve of my body, lingering on my heaving and swollen breast. A slow, satisfied smirk tugged at his lips when he spotted the faint burn mark left by his cigarette.
“Fuck, little witch.” His voice was a husky whisper as he lowered his head to my chest, tongue flicking out to lap at the burn. “You’re perfect.”
His fingers tightened around my breast, kneading with deliberate intent. “You know what I really love?” His tongue flicked over the swollen nipple, dragging a soft moan from my lips. “Everything about you fits perfectly into my hands…and my mouth.”