Gaven didn’t speak. No words left his mouth as he reduced my struggle to nothing. Twisting one way and then the other, I cried out and cursed as he carried me over to the bed in the center of the room and tossed me upon the mattress. Stripping off his necktie, I half expected him to tie my hands, but instead, he surprised me. The necktie was yanked down around my own neck and then tied into a series of strange knots to the metal headboard.
“What the hell!” I fumbled, feebly to try and undo the knots he’d created, but the more I tugged, the tighter the fabric squeezed my throat until it grew hard to breathe. Spots of black and white danced in front of my vision as I gasped for breath. “Gaven … please.” I was beyond being too proud to beg. This had gone too far. “Let me go.”
Again, Gaven refused to reply. His jaw was tight, a vein throbbing in his throat as the dark look he gave me bore into my very soul. He gave nothing but utter silence. Instead, his hands moved to the button of my jeans. He popped the closure and then unzipped me. “No!” I screamed and kicked. A mistake on my part, because all the kicking did was make it easier for Gaven to remove my pants and underwear in one quick sweep.
Pressing my thighs together, I growled low in my throat, sure my skin was turning a molten shade of red as embarrassment spread through me. Gaven Belmonte might have been acting the gentlemen for me before, but the fact was … he wasn’t. He was amobster. A killer. Why would a killer respect a woman’s wishes if he could take her regardless? He was caustic. Selfish. Cruel. Controlling. And at the end of it all, I was just a means to an end.
My heartbeat—which was already racing fast—picked up the pace. The necktie around my throat cut into my flesh, making me wince. I opened my mouth to talk once more, but before I could say a single word, my own underwear was shoved between my lips.
Gaven’s gaze met mine. “Spit them out and you’ll regret it, Angel,” he warned, his voice low and dangerous. I contemplated doing it anyway, but I was already tied to a bed and at his mercy. There was no telling what else he would do.
Gaven waited a moment—I assumed to see what I would do—and when I didn’t immediately spit the thong back in his face, he went back to work. His movements were meticulous. Lifting a knife from his pants, he set the cold metal to my lower stomach. I sucked in a sharp breath at the icy feel of it as he sliced upward, cutting my shirt straight up the center and in half.
Tears gathered along my lashes, but I blinked them away—not wanting him to see as he carefully ripped my shirt to shreds and then used the pieces to tie my hands to the headboard as well. Finally, he was left with two long black strips of fabric of what used to be my favorite t-shirt.
One hand gripped the underside of my thigh, making me jump, and a muffled sound escaped past the underwear in my mouth. He shoved upward and then used one of the strips to bind my leg together, my calf to my thigh. Gaven turned and repeated the process with my other leg until it was clear that his objective was to keep me from closing my legs.
Closing my eyes, I turned my head to the ceiling as a tear broke free and then trailed down my cheek. Heat burned into me. I’d never felt so humiliated, and it had nothing to do with my nakedness but the fact that I knew he could see the ripenessbetween my legs. With the fresh air brushing over my pussy, I could feel just how wet I was.
It was wrong. It was disgusting. How the fuck could I be attracted to this? How could my body betray me like this?
“It seems you don’t mind a little punishment, Angel…” Gaven’s rough voice penetrated my ears a split second before I felt him drag a single knuckle up the center of my pussy and right through the soaking wetness that was revealed to him.
I shook my head back and forth, my thighs tightening instinctively. Try as I might, though, there was no closing them. Tingles raced through my trapped limbs.
“No?” I reopened my eyes and met Gaven’s gaze as he withdrew his hand and then licked his knuckle free of my juices. Gleaming eyes touched mine.
His hands fell to the buttons of his shirt and with each one he undid, a broad, muscular chest smattered with light hair was revealed. The small scar I’d noticed always peeking out of his collar was much larger and longer as it curved down over his collarbone in a wicked angle that still looked painful even though it had long healed.
Gaven was big—bigger than I thought beneath his clothes. He was also marked by scars, some more extensive and frightening-looking than others. Some were thin lines crisscrossing in random areas, and then there were the puncture holes that I knew only bullets could have left behind. As if being bound before him, at his mercy, didn’t make me realize seeing those scars of his reminded me that he was no regular man.
His scars were the markings of a man who’d carved through hell itself. I wasn’t numb to that. The knowledge that this man had felt pain and inflicted it made my insides tighten and convulse. My brain knew that he was dangerous and warned me away, but my body was an entirely different being—a hungry,needy thing that was helpless to the physical sensations of attraction seeing him like this elicited.
“A wife is supposed to obey her husband, Angel,” he said, unbuttoning his cuffs before stripping away the shirt and sending it the way of the floor. “Even if we’re not yet married, the fact is … you attempted to run from me, and as your future husband, it’s my duty to make sure you understand your mistake.”
Forgetting that there was a ball of fabric in my mouth soaking up my saliva, I tried to speak, only for the sound to come out in a garbled noise. I blinked and then shoved the underwear to the front of my mouth with my tongue. Before I could spit it out, though, Gaven jerked forward, bending over me as his hand gripped my face hard. He hovered over me, dark eyes glaring into mine.
“Remember what I said, Angel,” he hissed. “You spit that out and you will regret it.”
I narrowed my eyes on him.Fuck him. Rage and irritation slammed through me, and I shoved my tongue under the underwear spitting it out right in his face.
“Fuck you!”
The thong fell between us, right between my bared breasts, but a bit of my spittle landed on Gaven’s cheek. With his free hand, he reached up and swiped it away with his thumb before tucking that same thumb into his mouth and sucking my saliva free. I waited. My chest pumped up and down as I gasped for breath.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Inhale.
Exhale.
He smiled. He fucking smiled and I realized how wrong I’d been. There were worse things than being fucked by Gaven Belmonte. And he was about to show me just what they were.
Chapter 12
Gaven
