“Declan…” It’s barely a whisper, since I can hardly breathe. His eyes! They don’t look like his anymore. There’s something hot and fierce behind them. “Please, listen to me. Please, don’t hurt me.”
He only reaches down under his hospital gown and wraps a fist around what’s standing straight out under the cotton.
And the funniest thing happens in my core. It goes hot—like molten lava hot—even though my heart is fluttering in panic andevery sort of instinct left in me is screaming at me to run. Run where? I have no idea, since there’s nowhere to go.
It’s too late for that now, anyway. I yelp when he grabs me, when he almost flings me across the room to the exam table bolted to the floor. He throws me over it and knocks the wind out of my lungs. Stars dance behind my eyes, and I’m barely aware of the cool air when he yanks the tied gown halfway up my back.
“Declan!” I gasp, but he doesn’t hear me. I don’t even feel him through our bond, like whatever they put in him has muted the connection between us the way it’s muting his humanity. He’s doing the only thing he knows, which is spreading my legs with one of his before he slams himself inside me.
I bite my lip hard, not that it does anything to silence my scream. Pain and pleasure fight to see who’s strongest. Tears fill my eyes at the same time a moan fills the air, a moan that comes from me. One he’s torn from the deepest part of me.
He pulls back, then pushes me forward, making the edge of the table cut into my hips and pelvis. Again. And again. And every time he does, a grunt comes out of him, something wild and animal. Somewhere in the haze my mind has become, I realize it’s a word. One single word, again and again, every time his body crashes into mine with a sharp slapping sound.
“Mine.”
And something inside me screams yes, because I am, I can’t help it. I’m terrified of what he’s doing to me, but I’m even more afraid of how much I like it, love it, because I’m his. And he could never do anything that really hurts me. Not really.
Right?
I’m already shooting over the edge, clenching around him, but he doesn’t slow down even when I reach back, trying to pry his hands off my hips. It’s like trying to break steel—all he does is grip me harder and pull me back against him now with everystroke, doubling the impact, doubling the insane pressure and friction.
“Declan! Please!” He can’t hear me over his own voice. I don’t know if he can hear me at all over whatever is in his head, forcing him to do this. One hand slides between the table and my body so he can grip my breast, and I yelp in pain even as another orgasm rushes up to meet me.
I close my eyes and clench my teeth, screaming from behind them as the pressure suddenly breaks all at once, and my body spasms helplessly. My fist pounds the table and a sob breaks loose, but he doesn’t hear me; he doesn’t care. He just takes and takes, driving himself into me, and I think he might come, too, but I’m not sure, I’m starting to go numb, there’s wetness sliding down my thighs, and I don’t know if it’s mine or his or both.
I only know he’s still rigid, still driving into my core. My tears hit the table and pool underneath me. “Please!” I sob brokenly. “That’s enough! Please, it hurts!”
Even as I scream, I’m tensing up again. I don’t know if I can take it anymore. I only know he’s inside me, but he’s far away, too, grunting and panting like the animal he is, marking my body with his hands.
And when he leans down over me, crushing me against the table so he can latch onto my shoulder again, a bright flash of something hot and blinding slams into me almost as hard as he does before everything goes black.
One thought lingers in my mind as I sink into nothingness.Thank God.
13
DECLAN
She’s breathing.That’s what I have to hold onto. She’s breathing and she’s warm. Her heartbeat is steady against my chest. If I focus on those things, I can keep the guilt from swallowing me alive.
It doesn’t do a damn thing. I would happily die if it meant undoing what just happened.
Whatever they put in that dart ripped through me like wildfire. I remember the heat building, the way it burned through my restraint and my reason. Everything that makes me more than the animal Moore already thinks I am.
I remember her underneath me. I remember not being able to stop.
I remember being rough. Again. Worse this time than before, because she cried. She begged. I didn’t listen—or I did; I tried to, but the drug was too strong. There was no fighting it. Not that I feel any better knowing that. Not that I hate myself any less.
Iris is awake, but barely. She’s curled on her side, her hospital gown twisted, her hair stuck to her face with sweat. There are marks on her hips from my hands. Purple bruises are forming on her pale thighs. The bite on her neck is freshly red again where I bit down too hard.
I did that. Not the drug. Me. Because even if the drug lit the match, the fire was already there, and I should have been stronger. I should have fought harder against it.
She moves. Her hand finds my arm and her fingers curl around my wrist, but it’s the way she reaches for me inside that makes my heart clench. There’s no anger flowing from her to me. No blame. Just exhaustion and a quiet, steady warmth I don’t come close to deserving.
“Stop,” she whispers with her eyes still closed. It’s a quiet sound, but there’s something steely underneath. “I know you’re beating yourself up. Stop.”
She opens her eyes slowly. They’re glassy, tired, but clear. “I know what he did. It’s not your fault.”
It is, though. That’s the thing she doesn’t understand yet, or maybe she does, and she’s choosing to let me off the hook because she’s too exhausted to hold me accountable. Either way, the guilt sits in my chest like a boulder, and it’s not going anywhere.
