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“You were better off before you met me.”
Angry tears burned my eyes. Everything I feared was coming true, and he couldn’t give a shit. Anger surged through me as I shot back, “Was Ruri?”
He froze. “How do you know about Ruri?”
“I saw you two. At the airport. I heard your conversation, too, the one in which she referred to me as your sub.”
“Did you now.”
“Yes,” I said, raising my chin. “I heard her call you ‘Sir’. You told me that no one had ever called you that before—that you’d never had a relationship like ours before.”
“I haven’t.”
“Don’t lie to me, Dallon.”
He rolled his eyes and returned to the bar, filling a new glass. “I don’t need this right now.”
“You never tell me anything. Sam knew more about you than I did.”
He turned around slowly, glass in hand.
“Please, tell me who she is and what she means to you.”
His tone was petulant, his eyes widening in challenge. “No.”
“I heard you tell her to leave him.”
“So?”
“You still care about her, don’t you?”
He looked away, but not before I caught the guilty look on his face. I’d already figured out what was going on, but it still stung.
“How much? Because you’re telling me that I should have stayed away from you and it’s obvious that you still care about her.”
Agonizing seconds passed as he stared into his drink.
“I never meant to hurt you,” he said eventually, still looking into the liquid. “I never meant to hurt anyone.”
The tears hit my cheeks and I let them, no longer caring if he saw my pain—wanting him to see it, even. “This is what I was so afraid of. I’ve given you everything you wanted, and now you don’t want me anymore.”
I turned and ran to the safety of my room.
***
“I broke her. I sent her to him.”
I opened my eyes and rolled over to see Dallon silhouetted in the doorway.
“Ruri?”
He nodded and came into the room, sat beside me on the bed. “She was the one who showed me who I am.”
My breath caught. Now we were getting somewhere. Ruri was the woman that had introduced him to his lifestyle.
I sat up and shoved over so we could sit side-by-side against the headboard.
“She wanted a relationship, not just sex,” Dallon continued, putting an arm over his eyes. “She pushed me to continue, to do things to her that I was ashamed of doing, promising the whole time that she could help me accept who I really am. But I didn’t want that. I wanted to be… fixed. I hated her for making me into that person. I used and abused her, and then I kicked her to the curb.”
I tried to swallow, but my throat was dry.
Dallon let out a shuddering breath. “When I think of how I treated her—like she was an object—I hate myself.”
Holy shit. This glimpse into Dallon’s past was a lot, more than seeing the pictures. I’d known he was dark, but to hear him confess just how dark…
“To make things worse, she ended up with him. It’s all my fault.”
“Who is he?” I whispered.
Dallon’s arm dropped to his side and he looked at me with such misery, I shivered.
“Christopher. I went to University with him. He hates me so he went for her, but what I didn’t realize is that he already knew what we were involved in. He doesn’t care for anyone except himself. He’s one of those creeps that takes the lifestyle too far, and Ruri is too deep to get out.”
“What do you mean?” Images of scary S&M people danced through my head.
He closed his eyes as if in pain, pinched his nose. “Like I already you, trust is the most important aspect, but so are respect and love. Without that, a Dominant is basically asking for a sex slave to take advantage of. Some of the things he’s made Ruri do…” He opened his eyes, and they were blazing with fury. “I’ll kill him. If I see him, I know I’ll kill him.”
“Shh.” I took his face in both hands and kissed his lips, fear tugging at my heart. “It isn’t your fault. None of that is your fault. Ruri is a grown woman making her own decisions.”
“I broke her,” he repeated. “I stripped her of whatever self-esteem she had left, and then she walked right into his arms.”
“You can’t blame yourself. It sounds like he’s the one hurting her, not you.”
Dallon’s eyes flashed and he stood, pushing me off him. “You don’t get it, do you? I am a bad person, Amy. I want bad things. I get turned on by seeing your beautiful little ass redden under my hand, sure, but I want more.” His eyes hardened. “I’ve gotten more.”
I felt like I’d been punched. I couldn’t tell if he was angry he hadn’t gotten more with me or if he was disgusted with himself. I rose onto my knees and balled my hands into fists.
“I don’t give a shit about your past because I have one too, okay? I’m not some perfect little angel that you defile. Everything you’ve ever done to me, I’ve enjoyed. Wanted more, even. There, I said it. So if you’re a monster, what does that make me, a whore?”
Dallon’s eyes widened momentarily, and then his lip twitched, but his eyes were cold. “I made you that way.”
“Screw you.”
I moved to get off the bed, but he caught me, pinning me down. He was on top of me now, our faces inches apart.
“I don’t mean I made you a whore. I meant I made you like me.”
I blinked as understanding set in. That was what he’d meant when he’d said he’d turned me into what I am.
“You revealed it, that’s all,” I whispered to his tortured face. “I responded to you the very first night we met, and you know it. I’ve always wanted what you want and it’s taken nothing for you to convince me of that.”
“The point is that I did. I brought it out in you.”
“No, it’s always been there. I’m fucked up, too.”
A muscle thrummed along his jaw. “Not like me.”
“Exactly like you.”
He released me, moving to the edge of the bed as if he needed to put some distance between us. I immediately sat up, rising onto my knees on the bed.
“What do you want from me, Dallon? You told me that I have to trust you, that you know what’s best for me. Now you’re acting like being with you—being the way I am—is a bad thing.”
He stood abruptly and moved to the door. “You’re right,
I’m not myself right now. Arnold will take us to work in the morning. Have a good sleep.”
Then he was gone.
I cried into my pillow. I don’t know how long it took me to fall asleep, but when I did, I dreamed of Ruri.
Dallon and Ruri and the man that he’d lost her to.
Chapter Twenty-five
I woke up for my first day of work looking like shit.
My eyes were puffy and ringed with dark circles, which I tried my best to cover with makeup. It was not a good first impression.
The smell of coffee filled the penthouse. I found Dallon sitting at the breakfast bar looking equally as tired. He was scowling at his phone and only glanced up when I appeared beside him to pour myself a cup of coffee.
“I’m sorry about last night,” he said, standing and pulling me into a hug. “Seeing Ruri just… threw me.”
Me too, I wanted to say. I felt absolutely shredded.
He stepped back and searched my eyes, still holding my shoulders. “This weekend was amazing. I can’t begin to describe what it meant to me.”
I swallowed, unsure how to respond.
Fear flashed across his features. “I’m a jerk for screwing that up.”
“It’s okay,” I said, shrugging out of his grip. “I know you were feeling guilty about Ruri. That’s all. Should we get going?”
Arnold was waiting for us at the bottom of the building. This time he greeted me by name and a warm smile, which I returned. Dallon and I didn’t talk for the entire drive. At one point he took my hand, and I let him, but I continued to look out the window.
When I walked into the office, Becky was waiting in the lobby. She looked up from the magazine she was reading when I entered and smiled warmly.
“If there’s anything you want to keep in here overnight, there’s a key in your drawer,” she said as she hung my light jacket up in a closet beside the reception desk. “I’ll sit with you this morning, and then this afternoon I’ll leave you to it. First we’ll take the tour and introduce you to everyone. Don’t worry about remembering everyone’s names, though,” she added with a laugh.
