“Anything that gives you pride or happiness is a weakness waiting to be exploited. But only if anyone would dare to cross you. And Aria, if you haven’t noticed, the stunt I pulled the other night will lead to whispers of what you mean to me. And that makes you a far greater weakness to exploit than you ever were to your father.”
“So, that’s what I am? A weakness?”
The tension grows between us as her expression softens but stays riddled with curiosity. She whispers a question I know has been torturing her. I watch her soft lips as she asks, “What do I mean to you? Me. Not the girl you thought I was.”
I replay her words that one of her greatest ambitions was to make her family happy, feeling my heartbeat slow as if time is forced to pause for me to consider how to answer her.
The mere idea of ensuring her happiness is becoming a greater ambition to me than anything else has ever been. If I spoke those words to her now, she’d laugh in my face. She doesn’t see what I see. She doesn’t know what I know. I could never tell her. I don’t have the words even if she was ready for them.
She doesn’t have the forgiveness to offer me for what I’ve put her through and what I’m going to put her through.
She wouldn’t believe me if I told her this is for her. That it’s all for her. And if she did, she’d still use it against me. She doesn’t even realize the woman she can be. The defiance and stubbornness that makes her perfection in my eyes.
“I’ll show you what you mean to me, Aria.” My voice is rough and deep but holds nothing but sincerity. “Until then, the new game has started. This room is for fucking you, punishing you and giving you pleasure beyond imagine. And outside of this room, you will be mine, and you will demand respect and earn the fear that’s owed to you.”
Her hazel-green eyes brim with something I’ve yet to see.
“Carter Cross,” she whispers my name. “I don’t know that I’m the woman you think I am.” Her words are etched with sorrow as if she really believes what she says.
I lean in closer to her, resting my lips against her shoulder and running the tip of my nose along her skin. My lips caress her jaw where I kiss her gently and then nip the lobe of her ear.
I whisper along the shell of her ear, watching goosebumps form down her shoulder and across her chest, pebbling her nipples. “You have so much to learn and so much to accept, but Aria,” I open my eyes to stare into hers before I continue, “I know you won’t disappoint me.”
My gaze focused on her lips, I speak more to myself than to her, “It’s all been leading to this.”
Chapter 21
Aria
I have three hours and a single bottle of wine. I should’ve grabbed a second bottle, knowing Carter will be waiting for me in his bedroom when this rendezvous is over.
There’s a tension in my chest, a faint flicker of life in my heart with the nerves of what’s waiting for me.
The idea of running back to the hideaway room flutters into my mind every so often. Carter held up his word that he wouldn’t come for me the first time I fled there, but what are the odds he’ll do that again? If I try to avoid the punishment and him, I have a feeling everything will only get worse. There’s a single distraction I’m grateful for though. Someone to talk to and someone who doesn’t know what I’m going through. I’m indebted to Addison, even if she has no idea. In fact, I’m grateful she has no idea.
Popping the cork out of the bottle, I stop pretending as if hiding will do anything at all. I may fear Carter at times, along with the thoughts of punishment, but there’s a darker piece of my soul that craves it.
I can’t deny the idea of being throat fucked or tied up by the most powerful man I’ve ever met has every nerve ending in my body lit like a fuse waiting to go off.
Even as I pour the wine, listening to the sound of it, I think of every way Carter’s punished me before. How hot and eager he made me for more as he played my body against my emotions. Even still, I’m numb with grief.
It makes no sense. Save the fact that my heart is truly torn and in disarray.
The dark liquid swirls as I set the bottle down and lift my glass to my lips, breathing in the dark blend to fill my lungs. Maybe I’ve truly lost it all. Maybe I’m crazy at this point.