Soulless (Starcrossed Lovers Trilogy 2)

I shut my mouth with a nod and carried on eating, but yet again Lucian Morelli was lying to himself.

There’s no way he’d cut my tongue from my mouth before he killed me – not when it played his cock so well.12LucianElaine was a shaky little girl as I forced her into her shitty bedroom that night. She was still naked, with those sweet, filthy tits on display. In anyone’s reality, she was a perfect specimen. She shot me a look from inside the room, big eyes fixing on mine with a please she didn’t say. Please don’t leave me here. She didn’t want to be in there alone.

A dumbass part of me didn’t want to leave her in there alone. I wanted her next to me, subject to my every whim, whenever I wanted it. Still, I couldn’t share a bed with a Constantine. I couldn’t stoop that low, even by my current standards of jackass insanity.

“Make sure you sleep,” I told her. “I want that body kept perfect for me.”

She didn’t reply, and no doubt the exhaustion won out in her. She slipped into bed and pulled the covers up high. She curled into a fetal position before I closed the door on her, and it was . . . strange. It gave me a weird squick of a feeling I couldn’t place. I didn’t like it in the slightest. I didn’t like . . . feeling. I shut the door firmly and headed away.

My bed was huge and grand in the mediocre surroundings. I usually enjoyed being pride of place in the center. Right now, I should be jerking off over the latest million banked. Right now, I should be listening in on the Constantine kidnap carnage, and probably jerking off to that, too. But I didn’t want any of it. I felt bored with it all but not with her.

I wanted Elaine to entertain me, but no, I wouldn’t share a bed with a Constantine, no matter how much I wanted to play with her. The vile pieces of shit deserved nothing but pain from me.

Instead, I made plans for Elaine Constantine. Plans to hurt, stretch, push to the ultimate limit, and I jerked off to the thrill of all the good things to come.

Sleep found me then, as always, it found me.

Elaine was already awake when I set foot outside my room showered and dressed next morning. She was in the kitchen making herself a coffee like she owned the damn place. It gave me another one of those weird squicks of a feeling to see she had another mug waiting on the counter, ready to pour. One for me.

I didn’t say good morning and neither did she. Her eyes looked tired, even through their prettiness. I knew from the sight of her she’d barely slept a wink.

“Uncomfortable bed?” I asked her. “Be grateful I gave you one at all.”

“Most beds are uncomfortable to me,” she said, “I’ve had a lifetime of bad experiences, staring at the door, scared of who’s going to come in and climb on my bed.”

“You should be scared, staring at that door. I’ll be the one climbing on your damn bed.”

She shrugged. “Yeah, well. Kill me and get it over with, I keep telling you.”

Again, I could have hurt her for her cheek, only this morning it wasn’t impudence, just throwaway. Tired with no filter.

I should’ve punished her before I left, but I couldn’t. I was already fast running out of time.

She cast a glance at my suit and the keys already in my hand. “Heading into the office, I guess?”

“Heading to reign over the Morelli Empire, you should be guessing.”

She poured me a coffee and held it out to me. “At least drink this before you hit the road. You hardly want to be driving without some kind of starter for the day.”

I stared puzzled, nothing short of shocked, because it couldn’t possibly . . . it couldn’t possibly be Elaine Constantine caring.

She seemed to register my confusion; it hit her as strangely as it hit me. Her justification was instant.

“It’s about your body, not you,” she hissed. “What’s going to happen to me if you never turn back up again? I’ll shrivel away to death in here with nothing. Fuck you!”

She made to take the coffee back, but I grabbed it from her. I’d been raised with solid manners, and they couldn’t hold back. The words were out of me before I could stop them.

“Thank you.”

Elaine was taken aback by that too. I knew she was fighting the response, but we couldn’t stop it. Even in our hate, we couldn’t stop it.

“You’re welcome,” she said with another shrug, then added the obligatory, “You’re welcome, asshole.”

“Have you any damn idea how ridiculously immature you sound when you use that term?” I asked her. “You sound like a rebellious kindergarten baby.”