I hooked my fingers under Aria’s shirt and gently slid it up. She giggled again, but I ignored it and her wiggling. Despite my best intentions, I couldn’t help but check her out when I pushed down her leather pants. Goosebumps covered her gorgeous lean legs right up until her tiny lace panties. I reached under her back, causing her to arch with another giggle as if I’d tickled her. I doubted she realized what she was doing. Her unfocused eyes were playful as she looked up at me. I unhooked her bra and pulled it off, then tossed it carelessly away.
Good Lord, even drugged Aria stole my breath. She was sprawled out before me in nothing but a tiny piece of lace covering her pussy, her nipples erect in the cool room, and smiling up at me. There was no anxiety, no fear. I quickly turned away before my thoughts could wander down a dark path. I got out of my clothes before I grabbed a shirt from my drawer then helped Aria to a sitting position. It took several tries to get her into the shirt, but it would have taken even more tries to get her into one of her flimsy nightgowns. I lifted Aria once more and laid her down with her head on the pillow. She didn’t move, only peered up at me with the same dreamy smile. I stretched out beside her.
“You’re impressive, you know?” she said, her eyes trailing over my chest, going in and out of focus.
I touched her forehead. She was overly warm. Aria giggled and touched my lower abs before she slid even lower. I quickly stopped her wandering hand and held it fast. “Aria, you’re drugged. Try to sleep.”
She gave me a droopy smile that was probably meant to be seductive. “Maybe I don’t want to sleep.”
I stroked her hair from her forehead. “Yes, you do.”
Aria blinked then yawned. “Will you hold me?”
I turned off the lights and cradled her in my arms. “You’d better lie on your side in case you feel sick again,” I murmured against her neck.
“Did you kill him?” she mumbled.
I considered how much to tell her, but Aria knew the rules of our world. She knew the man I was. “Yes.”
“Now there’s blood on my hands.”
“You didn’t kill him.”
“But you killed him because of me.”
“I’m a killer, Aria. It had nothing to do with you.” I didn’t want her to feel guilty for something like that. This death was on me, like every death in my past, like every death in my future. They would never tarnish Aria, because I wouldn’t let them. I wanted her life to be free of the horrors of my existence. I wouldn’t let the darkness consume her like it had my mother, like it did so many women in our circles because their husbands didn’t give a fuck about them.
Aria’s soft voice tore through the dark once more. “You know, sometimes I wish I could hate you, but I can’t. I think I love you. I never thought I could.”
My heart stuttered in a way it never had, and heat flooded my chest. Love? Fuck. Aria couldn’t love me. She didn’t know what she was talking about. She was drugged. The roofies had messed with her brain.
After a long exhale, Aria continued, her voice becoming drowsier. “And sometimes I wonder how it would be if you made love to me.”
I wanted to claim Aria, to own her, to fuck her…to make love to her? I’d never made love, and I didn’t think I was capable of it. “Sleep.”
“But you don’t love me,” Aria continued, her words a slur filled with misery. “You don’t want to make love to me. You want to fuck me because you own me.”
She was right, and yet her words didn’t ring true. I wanted more than that. With Aria, I simply wanted. I wanted all of her, every little thing, not just her body, also her smiles and her closeness and her astonished gasps and breathless moans. I tightened my arm around her. Love.
How did you know if you loved someone?
“Sometimes I wish you had taken me on our wedding night; then at least I wouldn’t still wish for something that will never be. You want to fuck me like you fucked Grace, like an animal. That’s why she told me you would fuck me bloody, right?”
It took my mind a moment to fully process her words. Grace had told Aria I would fuck her bloody? “When did she say that? Aria, when?”
I gripped Aria’s upper arm. “When?” I growled, but she had passed out.
I’d suspected it was Grace behind the attack, and now Aria’s words confirmed my suspicion. My body was bursting with tension and with the need to seek retribution. Rick had already gotten what he deserved, but there was still Grace. I wanted to kill her. She was a woman, but she was a despicable human being most of all. Could I dispose of her? She wasn’t her father’s favorite child, far from it, but there was a difference between not liking your daughter and wanting her to be killed. We needed his cooperation if we wanted to gain influence. Father definitely wouldn’t allow me to risk it by killing Grace in blind rage. It would only make him question my feelings for Aria, another thing I couldn’t risk.