Derision (The Broken Bonds 7)

Also, I wasn’t sure I could concentrate on my clients with her so near.

This is her test as much as it is mine.

“Pull my laptop out and get familiar with his cases,” I say, veering onto the highway.

Falls Church is only about fifteen minutes from the Skylark, but we make it there in less than ten. Ten short minutes where I convince myself of my client’s innocence.

11

My Mirror Speaks

Alexis

My weekends normally pass in a blur of nothingness. There is no measure of time more precise than that of boredom. Like flipping the pages of a book, watching someone else’s life play out in rapid succession, it’s safe, and isolating.

And for the past three years of my life, I have done everything within my power to keep my world at a distance from my past.

Being with Chase—even for the short time that I have—has suspended my internal clock. Days feel like years, minutes like days, seconds like hours. I can’t accurately compare it to anything I’ve ever experienced, as I’ve never experienced anything or anyone like him before.

I’ve watched him at a distance for a year, as an observer, fantasizing. Longing. Desiring…but never once confusing my reality with expectation. He was just like a fictional character. I was under no delusion that I’d ever become a part of his reality.

The moment he touched me, I changed. There was no impact on him; I absorbed the shock. I’m also under no delusion that I am anything more to him than what he desires for me to be.

I am his object of derision.

I am his.

A belonging.

And the glimpses he gives me beneath his rigid exterior are enough to sustain me. Like last night. I’m as equally aroused by his brutal touch as I am by his tender caress. I crave his harsh declarations just as I desire to hear his whispered confessions.

If you’re to love someone, love them wholly. You can’t break them down into pieces. Compartmentalizing. Puzzling a person into the perfect, ideal someone. If I belong to Chase, then I belong to the monster as much as I do the man.

I’m just unsure of which one will finally break me.

I fiddle with the top button of my thin blouse, unaccustomed to wearing such revealing or expensive clothes. I know it’s expensive, because his tastes are extravagant. The car I’m in now is sleek and silver, and is probably worth more than I earn in two years. It soars over the road at a speed I’m sure is faster than it feels.

In the short time allotted to me, I’ve gone over Malcolm Bates’ case files, trying to memorize the details. Chase peeks over at me often, a deep crease between his brows. I’m not sure if he’s concerned about my ability to be his personal paralegal, or if it’s the nature of the cases he’s worried I won’t be able to handle.

He’s not wrong to question either.

As we pull up to an enormous house, the gate is open, squad cars blocking off the entrance. “I’m the doctor’s lawyer,” he says as an officer approaches the car. “This is my assistant.”

Chase hands the cop his driver’s license, earning a scowl from the young officer. The cop glances at it quickly before handing it back and waving us through.

“Follow my lead,” Chase says as he parks behind one of the squad cars. “They’re going to arrest him, so we need to get as much information and any and all clues to the evidence they have before then.”

Recorder in hand, I stuff my phone and the laptop into his briefcase, only taking a pad and pen with me. I finger the little bird pendant as I stare ahead, notepad tucked close to my chest, concentrating too hard on regulat

ing my breathing.

Then the feel of Chase’s fingers clasping my chin speeds my already racing heart. He turns my face toward him as he leans over the console. “You’re mine. That means nothing can touch you. Not even this filth.”

His blue eyes blaze with the certainty of his words. I nod against his hold, and his fingers splay along my jaw, bringing me close enough to kiss.

“Later, I’m going to fuck anything that upsets you right out of your head,” he avows against my lips before tenderly touching his to mine, the contrast between his heated promise and gentle caress stealing my breath.

The whiplash spins my mind as I follow him past the open door into an elegant foyer. I need to focus, and yet all I can think about is the lingering wetness between my thighs. Only when I see the man who’s been splashed all over the Internet and TV seated at the bottom of the stairs, a cold blast knocks all enticing thoughts of Chase away.