“Yes. When you get scared you’ll have to curl up in my arms.” I winked and she laughed softly. At the sound, something funny happened inside my cold, dead heart. For the first time in a long time I felt a warmth flow through me. Olivia fluidly tapped into a part of me that I thought was inaccessible. She held the key to the vault I’d bolted shut years upon years ago. I didn’t intend to let her in, but now that she was here, I already couldn’t imagine what a life without her would look like. She was my world now, in a matter of hours, or perhaps just minutes. What had before been dormant, bloomed in her presence.
I handed her the remote as soon as we settled into the den. She looked nervous and it tore me up. I needed for her to know that she was safe, that nothing bad was going to happen to her while she was in my care. As if by instinct, I grabbed her free hand and dragged her toward the sofa where I fell back and she landed square on my lap. I cradled her face in my hands and made her look at me. Fuck, she was so damn beautiful. I needed her to know that my house was her home too and that my arms would be her shelter whenever she needed them. The insecurity of her past was over now that she was with me. She could have anything her heart desired, I’d bend over backward to see that I met each and every need.
“You know I would never hurt you, right?” I asked firmly. She nodded, but her chest was rising quickly and I could hear her shallow breaths.
“I know that, Silas. I do.”
She said the words, but they didn’t convince me. It was impossible for me to be less intimidating, my face still told a different story no matter how tame my words were. People were scared of me. It was a natural reaction, I reminded myself. In time she’ll adjust. Deep down, I hoped that fear could someday be replaced with love.
I tried to stay calm, tried not to notice how her tight little ass was cradled just above my erection. I knew she could feel it; I didn’t want it to frighten her more. As I was about to move her, she rearranged herself in my lap, either to distance herself or sink more into my cock, I couldn’t be sure. But I knew I affected her by the way her pupils dilated and from the soft parting of her pretty lips, and I became intoxicated by her, the sweet scent of her breath. I yearned to believe that she wanted me as desperately as I desired her. I was frantic for her to know I was neither a thug nor a beast. Her happiness and safety came first and I could hold off the sex for eternity if that’s what she needed. She was precious to me and I’d never push her in a way she didn’t want to go. Her presence paid the debt in full. Olivia owed me absolutely nothing, least of all her body—or her love.
“Nothing will ever happen to you that you don’t want. You don’t owe me anything. I’d never force myself on you or have you feeling pressured. Listen to me, Livie, you owe me nothing. I’m a man, simply put, and I can’t help the way my body reacts to you.”
Her eyes went wide at my words but there was no fear in them. She just nodded and removed my hands from her face. It shook me because I thought the moment ended, that she was about to move away. Then, to my utter shock, she placed her head on my shoulder and curled into my body instead. As I held her in silence, I felt the world shift under my feet.
She needed me. It’d never felt so fulfilling to be needed.
“I know, Silas. It’s ok. I want you to want me,” she whispered so softly that I thought I’d imagined it. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Olivia
As soon as I said it, I knew it was true. It had been true since that first day. I still remember when he took the broom from me, so sure of himself and assertive. He’d acted as if he cared so deeply, and I was just some girl in a bar with not much to offer. The warmth of his body when he picked me up and moved me just to ensure that I didn’t get cut by any glass was something I’d held onto from the moment I met him. It was an altruistic act of kindness the likes of which I hadn’t seen during the last few years of my life. Silas didn’t want anything from me but yet he showed me mercy and he was gentle. I knew it was because of him that in the last year Paul hadn’t laid a hand on me and that his creepy friends had stopped looking at me with lust in their eyes. Silas had scared them all away.