17. Carsyn
SEVENTEEN
CARSYN
“ Y eah,” a rough voice whispers from nearby.
Is that Liam? In my groggy haze, I manage to open one eye, my vision blurry for a few seconds. When reality settles into place, everything rushes back to me.
Liam is dead.
Garrison shot Liam in the head, right in front of me.
Oh my God.
Liam is dead. Garrison murdered Liam.
I can’t believe it, but the ringing that lingers in my ears and the smell of blood remind me that it wasn’t just a nightmare.
“I can have it done in three hours,” Garrison says. His back is to me, one arm up, crooked, with a phone pressed to his ear. He smooths his other hand through his hair, adding, “See you then.”
He ends the call, placing his cell phone down on the counter top.
“Give me the needle,” I whisper, my voice thin and hoarse. Residue from my screams leave my brain sore, and I can’t physically speak any louder because of it. “Please, give me the needle,” I choke out, tears flooding my eyes.
I’m not on the floor anymore. I’m on the couch. And when I glance down at my feet, I see that my cuff is gone, yet I feel more like a prisoner than ever before.
Garrison turns to face me, but there's no terror written on his features. There’s no hardened criminal, no murderer, there is nothing on his face that silently warns me of impending murder. Still, his plans for me aside, he murdered Liam.
Liam.
I glance to the floor, a sucker for pain, both wanting and not wanting to see him one last time. But he’s not there anymore. His boots and socks are gone, and the shattered Tiffany lamp is cleaned up.
The wall, where we had meticulously splattered blood from the cut on Liam’s palm, tells no secrets. It is clean, the wallpaper bright and vibrant as ever before.
But it happened. I know it happened.
Garrison comes to my side. He doesn’t crouch, and he doesn’t tenderly reach for me. He simply stands next to the couch looking down at me. “Why?”
Why would I not want the needle? To fade off, escape into a quiet, dark, thoughtless corner of unconsciousness. I want that. I want anything but being awake. I want anything but remembering the way it sounded when Liam lost his life, that I’m a prisoner, that I fucked my captor, that I’m currently torn between lashing out or seeking comfort. God, please put me to sleep. Let me wake up in another life.
“You killed Liam,” I whisper, tears filling my eyes. “I don’t want to remember it. I don’t want to remember this.”
He strokes a hand down his beard, and I glance over at his hat, residing in the same place he set it before all of this. “You two were conspiring against me.”
I don’t know why it matters to me that he knows, but something behind my ribs jolts at his words. “I just wanted to go home.”
“You thought I’d let him go and he’d come back for you? Was that the plan?” Garrison asks, now tugging the legs of his jeans up so he can comfortably sit on the edge of the coffee table. It creaks when he sits, but there’s some relief that he’s no longer hovering over me.
“We were gonna run out of here together,” I admit, because why lie now? And anyway, how did I think that was going to work? “It sounds stupid now.”
“It is stupid. The whole thing was dumb.” His eyes search mine, dark and brooding, and it makes my insides warm and tight. “You heard what he said, didn’t you? You heard him admit that he was a lying, no good, piece of shit?”
Still woozy, still overwhelmed, I simply blink at him. Liam was none of those things.
“Carsyn, Liam was a mole. He worked for Forrest.” Garrison reaches out, his thick fingers tangling with the hair around my face as he smooths it back. I can’t help but wince.
The accusations Garrison flung at Liam, they come rushing back. The base of my head throbs as tears spill down my cheeks, all of my strength officially gone.
I don’t know what I’m sobbing about, but all of the sudden, I can’t stop sobbing. So many tears, so much gasping to breathe, so much anguish.
Liam was… I can’t believe it. I don’t believe it.
But then again, he admitted it. He did admit it, didn’t he?
And my gut. I can’t deny that something felt off.
Garrison scoops me up off the couch without so much as a grunt, curling me against him. “I got company coming,” he tells me over my sobs. “I’m gonna put you to bed for a while. Stay in this room, okay?”
“Please,” I beg through sobs, snot coating my upper lip, my eyes already swelling from the intensity of my breakdown. “Give me the needle, Garrison. Please! Give me the fucking needle! Knock me out! Please, goddamn it! Garrison!”
This isn’t just a panic attack. This is a nuclear breakdown. Liam is dead. Liam was going to use me to escape. Liam works for Forrest. Garrison killed Liam. Colton and Kinleigh are searching for me. I am missing.
Over and over, my mind spins out of control on the events of the last few weeks. I can’t do anything but cry and shake as Garrison lowers me to the center of the bed, tugging the disgusting blue comforter up over my legs. I’m not cuffed. When he walks out of the room, I could bolt. Why don’t I bolt? I have no energy, but to escape, I would find energy. My mind, my body, everything inside me tells me to stay put.
Too late now anyway. Garrison returns, a black pouch in his hands.
“You want it?” he asks, eyeing me as his hands work from memory on the zipper, opening the bag full of syringes and vials.
I nod. “Please.”
His skilled hands get to work and a moment later, the syringe is ready. Our eyes lock, and all the confusion and heartache fades under his intense focus. What is wrong with me? Why does Garrison’s focus steady the noise in my brain when I should be running without looking back?
With his eyes still set on mine, he places the syringe in the bag, and sets it aside, on the night table. Getting to his feet, Garrison stands at the side of the bed, kicking off his boots with a thud. His capable, gun-shooting hands fall to the gold buckle on his belt.
“You know I’m not lying,” he states, flinging his belt to the floor as his thumbs open the button fly on his Levis.
Sickness brews in my belly, stinging my throat, burning the back of my nose. Tears leak from my eyes, sinking into the pillow as I watch him yank off his jeans, his hands working vertically down his shirt leaving open buttons in his wake. “You heard him. He wasn’t ever the man you thought he was, in the worst ways, Carsyn.”
“Why—why’d you leave me with him?” I ask, finding myself buying into what he’s telling me. I did hear Liam, and I can’t gaslight myself into thinking he didn’t say the things he said. He did. Logically I know it. Still, everything hurts. My entire soul aches, my body throbs, but the worst pain is in my brain.
The flannel hits the floor as he reaches behind him, yanking his white t-shirt off. Has he showered since I passed out? I can’t quite remember what he was wearing before.
“We don’t need to talk about this now,” he says, slipping his thumbs in the waistband of his boxers. With a shove, they’re off, and Garrison stands before me, completely naked. The muscle, the body hair, the thick erection straining from between his thighs and the heavy, full balls that hang beneath—I can’t deny that I want this, despite the chaos.
He climbs over me, tugging off my pants and panties, then works to pull my tank off over my head. My hair feels tangled and sticky, and I know I look horrible, with swollen eyes and tear-stained cheeks. But Garrison nudges my legs apart, climbing over me, the look in his eyes telling me something entirely different. Telling me things he’s never said in words.
He wants me. And as much as he physically wants me, he wants me to know he’s not the villain I’ve painted him to be. I can see it in the way he pushes hair off my cheek with the back of his knuckle, the way his lips find my collarbone tenderly as he aligns himself at my entrance.
The first thrust is raw, and brings with it a pain that seems to numb the rest of me. The second thrusting of his hips between my open legs brings a rush of clarity, followed by some sort of escape. He moves over me, his mountainous frame rocking the bed as he fucks me harder and harder. Each thrust grows wilder, his breathing stuttered, my own breaths scattered and chaotic.
“Wouldn’t let him hurt you,” he groans, his dark eyes holding mine captive as he fucks me deep, making me forget everything but being beneath him.
My palms skate along the toned curves of his biceps, my insides fluttering at the raw feel of his power beneath my fingertips. I rest my hands on either side of his neck, holding his eyes with mine, my heart racing as his pulse kisses my palm.
“I will keep you safe,” he murmurs, his voice distant despite the fact he’s inside of my body, pulsing, throbbing, fucking. “Do not plot against me with another man, Carsyn,” he growls, the cadence of his thrusts dizzying me.
The bed creaks, and I think it moves against the wall a little as he brings my hands above my head, pinning them to the mattress by my wrists. “You hear me?” he questions, out of breath, dark hair falling over his forehead as sweat coats the rough stubble of his upper lip. “You don’t plot against me.”
I nod, unable to speak or look away. His eyes are complex, a kaleidoscope of evergreens and emeralds, unique and captivating, gold rimming the edges near the white. I can’t get enough of the strong curve of his jaw, and the way his tendons flex powerfully as he commands my submission.
My body tightens around him, the coil of desire winding up in my core. I want to come, I need to come, and yet I feel so guilty coming so hard, so hot, so fast for this man. This man who kills, this man who kidnaps.
This man who takes care of me and makes me feel so fucking alive.
“Garrison,” I sputter, my eyes rolling back as my back arches. I grind down on him, hungry for every inch, knowing I can’t hold back. I need all of him when I come, I’ll go crazy without it.
But he pulls out almost all the way, leaving just the ruby tip of his cock inside me. I clench hungrily for more, my fingers reaching for his hand where he keeps my wrists pinned. “Please,” I beg, but his eyes find and hold mine as he teases me with the tip of his cock.
“Apologize,” he commands, his abs tightening, sweat glistening on the dark hair lining his muscled torso.
My atonement is the way I earn my orgasm, and though he killed Liam, I wiggle my hips, desperate to apologize, desperate to come.
“I’m, I’m, I’m so sorry,” I breathe out, immediately rewarded by the harsh slam of his body into mine.
My toes curl, my eyes roll, and his mouth comes down on my nipple. He bites me as the first thrashing wave of relief rolls through me, my body tightening all around his rigid dick. Garrison’s groans rumble through my chest, our bodies connected in an erotic, maternal way.
“Give me what you owe me, come on my dick, show me who you’re loyal to,” he groans, his lips skating up my chest to seal against mine. Our tongues collide as I milk his cock, clenching, releasing, coming in quick but intense bursts. He’s so long and thick, and he fucks like he was put on this earth to make babies. The worries of the last week slip into a dark abyss as he warns me he’s on the brink.
“I can’t pull out,” he warns, and I know he isn’t wearing a condom. I know because I watched his unsheathed length enter my body. I feel every delicious vein, every single inch. “After what you did,” he groans, trailing off, his teeth clenching as he narrows his gaze on me. He’s breathing hard, or I am? We both are. The air between us is dense with all of the things unspoken, secrets and lies, fear and love and so much more. He kisses me again before his hips slow to a halt. Garrison releases my wrists, cupping his hand over my mouth.
“Feel me,” he whispers, and as if obeying a command, our breathing goes quiet, I don’t thrash and he holds still. The bed no longer creaks. My chest rises and falls in silence and a moment later, his beautiful eyes roll closed.
Inside my body, his cock throbs, and with each angry throb, heat spears through me, flooding my womb. It is the most erotic moment of my life, watching his face contort with relief and pleasure as he comes inside me, burying every drop deep, allowing me the gracious pleasure of his orgasm.
It’s intense, and watching a man like Garrison in his most intimate, primal moment will be burned into my core memory forever. He holds himself deep until the throbs grow further and further apart, and then he opens his eyes and gives his hips a little thrust, filling me with one last, powerful shot.
No condom.
With my free hands, I skate them up his arms and into the sides of his hair, forcing his mouth on mine. I don’t know who I am right now, not fighting a man when he wants to come inside me without a condom.
No.
That’s not even the part that shocks me.
Fucking Garrison.
Again.
After all the guilt I felt last time. I should feel worse now, because now I know he’s a murderer. There’s nothing to speculate. He killed in front of my eyes.
“Don’t,” I beg as he pulls back from my lips, my arms, my body.
He slides out, and I find myself staring at his cock, shiny in the moonlight, our come streaking his shaft. He doesn’t press a towel between my legs, he doesn’t run off to clean me up. Garrison gets off the bed and gets dressed, not meeting my eyes when he says, “someone’s coming over. You need to stay here.” He shoves the tail of his shirt into his jeans, then buckles the belt he slides through. Finally, his dark gaze comes to mine. “I ain’t recuffin’ you.”
My throat bobs as I sit up, pulling the sheet up to my naked body. “That’s some aftercare,” I say, trying to throttle down the desperation in my tone. I don’t want him to know that I don’t want to be alone. I really don’t want him to know that I desperately want him to stay.
He smooths his hand through his hair as he stares down at me, intensity and seriousness burning in his gaze. “I’m still gonna give you the needle.”
I shake my head. “I don’t need it now.”
Garrison smirks, but reaches for the loaded syringe nonetheless. “A little fuckin’ quiet your mind?”
My cheeks flare. “Honestly? Kinda.”
“Hmm,” he grumbles, his non-committal noise making my insides flare. Sitting on the edge of the bed, he sweeps his palm down my bare side, pushing away the sheet to expose my hip. Garrison places the needle to my flesh, and our eyes lock. “Smaller dose. Get some rest. We’ll eat together in a few hours.”
“In a few hours,” I breathe, my heart rate jumping from the sight of the needle, “it’ll be like four in the morning.”
Garrison injects me, and his lips dust mine in a soft kiss. “Breakfast.”
He stays at my side as I fade into a peaceful sleep.