Chapter 22 #2
Ellen panicked, even as his mouth-watering scent enveloped her and she took a deep breath of it.
They were still participating in the lesson. She was supposed to say what she wanted, but this—this was new territory.
“A man is touching you in a way that you did not consent,” Laurence said, his tone dipping another octave as he pressed himself closer to her. “Tell him to stop.”
Heat rushed through her. Not to her face as earlier, but to her loins. She felt it swirl and pulse as longing seethed into her core. She drew her bottom lip between her teeth, unsure how to proceed.
“This… ‘lesson’ is about making sure I adhere to my wants, yes?” she asked tentatively.
“Mhmm,” Laurence murmured. His eyes were tracing down the features of her face, as if she was some sort of magnificent creation painted just for him. That look alone was enough to keep her silent.
“Pretend I am Benedict,” he commanded, trailing the tip of his nose against hers.
Ellen’s heart stilled. Her eyes narrowed as ice sluiced through her veins and extinguished that heat between her thighs. Everything shifted. The mood. The room. Laurence’s expression. A sense of danger made her heart race faster, and she struck.
A loud crack! filled the air as Ellen slapped Laurence across the face as hard as she could.
Last night she had frozen and closed her eyes as Benedict had reached toward her, but she was not going to let that happen again.
She would fight and slap and scratch until he was in ribbons, just as she had done to the pillow in the dining room.
“Do not touch me!” she seethed, watching as Laurence’s head snapped to the side from the force of her slap; a red handprint was already forming on his chiseled cheek.
Laurence’s eyes were bright as he turned back to her, the tip of his tongue sliding over the corner of his parted lips.
A hint of a smile was on those lips as he reached up and touched his fingertips to the corner of his mouth, as if he was expecting blood.
He pulled his hand away, rubbing his fingertips together as nothing but a bit of spittle came away from his lips. Then his grin widened.
“You think that little slap is going to stop him?” Laurence asked with a raised brow. “All ladies slap. He will expect that. If he has you, you will need to stop thinking like a lady and more like a fighter.”
Ellen drew her hand up again, ready to strike once more, but this time Laurence was ready. He caught her wrist and forced it above her head.
“No repetition,” Laurence commanded, sounding slightly breathless as he caught her other wrist and brought it up to the other. “You will become predictable, and you will lose.”
Ellen could feel her blood pumping faster through her veins as her thoughts raced.
This was a lesson. Laurence was Laurence, and she could see that, but even so—the way he was trying to stop her, the way he was crowding her space and trying to make her feel small—it all felt so very much like Benedict.
She felt her mind begin to warp with panic and then, before her eyes, Laurence’s features shifted into her cousin’s.
His grip on her wrists made her skin crawl, and that breath panting down on her made every hair on the back of her neck stand up.
Even the scent of the air changed. She no longer caught the heady notes of Laurence’s cologne, but instead it was dark, too strong, and cloying to her senses. It was the scent of Benedict.
Ellen screamed as she brought her knee up, slamming it into Laurence’s groin. He snarled viciously as pain nearly doubled him over, but he still did not let go of her wrists.
“No,” she seethed, beginning to fight with all her might against his hold. She tried to bring her knee up again, but this time, Laurence twisted to the side, blocking her kick with his hip and pressing into her so she could not bring it up again.
“Do not be repetitive!” he growled ferociously. “He has you. He wants you. He will take you. Now, what are you going to do? Give in?”
“No!” She screamed, bucking wildly against him.
Her eyes were wide and wild as she looked around, trying to find anything to help. Then, she realized…
Ellen pressed her backside into the door, allowing her some leverage to push her shoulders away despite her wrists still being held, and she slammed her head toward Laurence.
Pain bloomed in her forehead as she connected with Laurence’s chin, but it worked! Her hit had surprised him enough that he let go of her wrists and stumbled back a few paces.
She wasted no time, remembering Laurence’s lesson not to be repetitive, and shoved at his chest with both hands.
Then she raised her foot and stomped down right on the tip of Laurence’s shoe.
Grunts of pain left Laurence’s snarled lips with every bit of contact she made, but he did not tell her to stop.
Her attack continued.
Slap. Kick. Punch.
You are mine.
Elbow. Stomp. Punch.
You will obey me.
Kick. Slap. Scratch.
I will make you beg for me.
Ellen screamed again as she heard Benedict’s threats in her head.
Laurence blocked some strikes. Others he caught with full force. But he did not tell her to stop, even as her lungs began to burn from her panting breaths, and her limbs and body ached from trying to avoid his grasp again.
It was only when she picked up the fire poker by his hearth and raised it above her head that Laurence dropped to his knees before her, put both hands in front of him, and told her to stop.
It was too late. The rage and the terror had come back and had taken over, and the lesson was not just a lesson anymore. It was a fight for survival. She brought the poker down.
Quicker than she could comprehend, Laurence was off his knees before the poker slammed down into the hardwood floor, splintering the wood.
Muscular arms banded around her from behind, and strong hands gripped around hers, prying her fingers away from the fire poker.
She threw her head back, but felt nothing but air as she made contact with nothing.
“Ellen, it’s me,” Laurence growled into her ear.
“Let go!” she snarled, digging her nails into the back of his hands.
Laurence let out a snarl more rabid than her own, and he turned her around, pinning her left arm to his chest and her right with his muscled arm. His other hand came up to her face, and he gripped her chin as he shoved his face close to hers.
“Look at me!” he commanded as she drew in ragged breaths.
She snapped her teeth at him as if they were monstrous fangs, as she struggled to break free from his tight hold.
“No, it is over, Ellen. Look at me!”
Ellen’s breaths were coming in short, panting bursts as she looked up into Laurence’s stern gaze; her face twisted into a feral mask of rage.
Then she saw him. Green eyes with flecks of gold. Black lashes. A lock of black hair falling over his smooth forehead. A sharp, straight nose and a square jaw. Chiseled lips that looked so hard but she knew were impossibly soft. It was Laurence. Not Benedict.
Ellen drew in a shuddering sob, and her body melted into his. That granite-like determination faded from Laurence’s eyes as she said his name, and he muttered something she could not quite catch as he bowed his head toward hers and kissed her forehead.
“Laurence?” she rasped.