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Plain and simply put: Alaric was twice as dangerous as I initially thought. And he didn’t give a damn that I knew it. No, he wanted me to know. The man needed to be wrapped up in chains and caution tape. Slap a few bold red signs on him for added security.
“There is something seriously wrong with you.”
“Isn’t there something wrong with all of us, Cat? It’s what makes us human. Even you’re pretty little head is a fucked-up mess.” He ran his eyes up and down my body. “But I do find everything about you, including that, to be the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen.”
This wasn’t someone who felt any kind of grievance over losing their wife. He was hellbent on making his sister-in-law his exclusive possession. I could hardly be called a carbon-copy of Meg, so why?
Based on what Rebecca had said, and what was proving to be disturbingly true, I didn’t fit in any of the boxes Alaric typically checked off when pursuing someone.
“Why are you doing this to me? Is it because of this deal you made? How do I get out of it?” I planted my feet and told myself not to retreat any further.
“Our relationship is separate from the deal. I’m not faking this or my feelings for you.”
“Feelings?” I sputtered. “Don’t do that. Don’t pretend you care about me. This is exactly what someone does that doesn’t care. What do you want? I’ll give you anything if it means I can go home.”
“You don’t get to dictate how I feel or not. And you are home,” he replied firmly.
“Alaric, please.”
“I want you. I want everything you have to offer and all the things you think you can’t or don’t. Will you give me all that?”
I swallowed and rubbed the back of my neck, shifting my weight from left foot to right.
“I…I can’t. Anything but that.”
“I wondered how you would answer.” He pulled his plump lower lip between his teeth and looked up at the ceiling. “I don’t know if you’re not understanding me, or you think I’m talking out of my ass.” He shook his head and admonished me with a cool smile.
“You don’t have to give it to me. I’ll keep taking until you willingly offer everything. You’ll learn to love me more than the air you breathe.”
“He’ll make you need him and when you finally worship the ground he walks on, he’ll decide he’s done and leave you to crash and burn. No amount of begging will bring him back.”
His words and Rebecca’s warning clashed inside my mind and caused a rift in my heart. He was right in saying there was something wrong with me. It was true. I wanted his words to be real. I wanted him to show me if what we did down in the basement was more than just a scrappy figment of a dream.
I was scared too. I was scared of becoming the woman I’d be once he finished awaking the demons that had been dormant inside me. That, in itself, was a twisted dream.
“I know I’m not special. You’ve done this before. I’m not like your other girls. I--.”
“Precisely,” he interjected, marching across the bathroom to stand right in front of me.
“You aren’t anything like them. You are beautiful and worth keeping. I know what you think of me and you’re not wrong.”
He brushed a few strands of hair away from my face, leaving his hand to rest against my cheek.
“I’m not a good person. I’m selfish and have no boundaries I won’t cross or break to get what I want, but there’s a madness in my methods that will give you the best version of me and a life befitting of a queen.”
He made madness sound beautiful.
Only Alaric could say something poetic, yet also macabre. I reached up and touched the side of his face, running my fingers across his stubble and over his prominent jawline. He captured my hand and looked down at me with his eyes conveying an emotion I couldn’t decipher.
Without a word, he began to lead me back into the bedroom, walking backward the whole way there so that he could keep watching me.
There weren’t any lights on in there, the room was illuminated solely by the bathroom until he flipped those lights off too, cocooning us in near-total darkness.
We reached the bed and he let me go to undo the robe.
He placed a hand around me, slowly gliding his palm up my back to unhook my bra. The cool air hit my exposed breasts and the nipples hardened. He leaned in and kissed the side of my neck, making a trail down my body. I sucked in a breath as he kissed across my navel. Two fingers hooked inside my lacy thong and eased it off.
“Alaric,” I murmured.
“Let me,” he intoned rather politely. He kissed my apex, working his way to my pussy.
