He snatched my foot before it landed in his crotch and tugged me down to lie flat under him. “Sorry, I gotta touch you.”
I sucked in a powerful breath, filling my lungs to scream. “Help—”
He smothered my mouth with a strong hand, funnelling the word back down my throat, and laid on top of me. He did not push his entire weight on me, merely enough to stop me from flinging myself around like a fish out of water trying to escape. My heart capsized into frantic beats, banging as if it might tear through my chest.
Oh, he smelled good.
Leather and blood and crushed cedar and musk and violent storms. A recipe of everything lush and dangerous and, sex… he smelled like sex.
I bit his fingers.
He rolled off me with a groan. My teeth clamped down on themselves from the absence of his hand.
A new set of arms grabbed me and tore me off the bed.
The lights flicked on.
Voices shouted.
Boots marched.
Panting, and riddled with an aching heart, I looked up to find the friendly face of Bernie, one of the estate guards using his body to shield me from the sight of the intruder being reprimanded by a string of guards.
Behind Bernie’s back, the Soulless man’s laughter echoed through batons battering into a body. Bone cracked.
Oh. My. God.
They were doing this over my rug!
Successfully they managed to secure the Soulless man, and I did not look as they lugged him outside of my room, his laughter scratching in the air like a dying thing.
“Did he hurt you?” Bernie cupped my cheeks and forced me to look up at him. “Ms De Astor, where are you harmed?”
“My rug!” I flung my finger to it, a horrible mess violated by blood and uncaring boots. “It’s ruined!”
2
I can’t come.
Sex turned into an examination. I couldn’t feel arousal unless I thought about red heart-shaped sunglasses. It did not matter if I made love to my hand or someone’s six-inch tongue, the feeling of bliss climbed and drowned, suffocating me with frustration.
A woman who walked past me wore spectacles in bright red and that horrible craving hitched up between my legs. I searched for the bathroom or an inconspicuous closet as heat soldered up my inner thighs. I remembered the breathing exercises before I wasted my entire time with a hand between my legs.
They said the sunglasses fascination was a result of trauma. Years of therapy flung over my shoulder like an apple peel.
Nothing worked to stop that delirious ache until I had left myself panting and undone and cringing from loss of dignity. When the ending built it lasted only half a second and was nothing but a little zap of electricity. There and gone. Quickly forgotten. A very unfortunate result of those who did not have their Soulmate. You can’t come properly unless you have your Soulmate.
I swallowed down the need and sifted through the crowd.
None of these people were my Soulmate.
My heart thrummed steadily without skipping a beat, no whiff of excitement made it move. I pressed my fingertips to my chest just to make sure it was still there.
Just to see if I were still alive.
The auditorium was plump with people my age, all probing through the disease of nametags, clutching their hearts and weeding through the crowd in search of the final piece of their soul.
Two women in front of me dove into each other’s arms, pressing their chests together, tears streamed down their face. They pulled down their shirts, exposing the flesh over their heart and there the blood insignia bloomed through their skin in the shape of half-hearts, showing that they would be connected for all time.
