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“To laugh, really.”
Piper’s brows snapped together. “Laugh?”
Celeste’s mouth curled into a cruel smile. “Oh yes, things went exactly as I knew they would.”
Levi’s mind touched Piper’s again. You don’t owe it to her to hear her out.
Never said I did, Piper told him as she folded her arms and waited for Celeste to expand.
“It’s no secret that I didn’t want you and Levi to claim each other. Even the very thought of it hurt. And I hated that it hurt … because it forced me to face that he still has too much of a hold over me.”
Piper blinked, surprised Celeste would admit to what she evidently saw as a weakness.
Send her out or I’m coming over, said Levi, the imperious bastard.
Not a fan of that tone, Piper clipped, Don’t fire orders at me, Levi. If I want to talk to someone, I’ll talk to someone.
A soft male curse floated into her mind.
Celeste looked at the floor. “He was right when he accused me of only wanting him back to spite you. Well, partially right. I also wanted to hurt him, and that meant getting him back first. But I saw that he wasn’t going to be up for revisiting the past, and I don’t care to waste my time.”
Funny. She was wasting it now. She had to know that Piper really couldn’t care less what Celeste thought about anything. Then again, Piper had been dancing around her wants and moods for years until recently, so maybe not.
“I didn’t bother appealing for you to reconsider accepting him as your anchor. I knew you wouldn’t. You’ve wanted Levi for a long time, and there was no way you’d hesitate to use the bond to trap him and make it so that he can’t ever leave you.”
Piper’s frown deepened. “That’s not how it went down at all.”
Ignoring that, the banshee continued, “The thing is … the one who was being played was actually you, not him.”
Exhaling an annoyed sigh, Piper scratched her temple. “Celeste, I really need to work—”
“I heard about the agreement you two made.”
Piper tensed. The fuck?
“Someone overheard you mention it to Larkin. Don’t you see that he used your crush to get you to bond with him? Don’t reject the idea, think about it. Levi uses whatever means necessary to get what he wants. He knew he could get close to you using sex, so he proposed that you two share a bed until the bond was formed. It didn’t occur to you that maybe he’d be happy to stop fucking you once you were bonded because he’d only been doing it to get his way? Seriously?”
Piper’s stomach bottomed out. No, she hadn’t considered that at all. Until right now.
“But he didn’t merely sleep with you, did he? He made the kind of mark on you that’s hard to scrub away.” A faraway look entered Celeste’s eyes. “The thing with Levi is that he knows how to make a woman feel owned,” she added, a sad note to her voice. “So then it’s such a shock to the body and mind when he drops you.”
Her scalp prickling, Piper swallowed. As much as she despised it, she could relate to what her stepsister had said.
“He’s so intense with women in the beginning,” Celeste continued. “Bombs them with attention. Drinks in their attention. Makes himself a part of their everyday life so that they can’t picture one that doesn’t include him.”
Piper recalled telling Larkin that she’d gotten so used to having Levi around all the time that she couldn’t imagine not seeing him each and every day. The harpy’s response drifted to her …
“He made sure you got used to it. He wanted you to feel like you couldn’t imagine not having him around. He’s sneaky that way.”
“He doesn’t demand exclusivity of women,” Celeste went on. “He doesn’t need to. They can’t picture having another man touch them. I used to lie to him that I was sleeping with other guys, because I wanted him to care. He didn’t. Some perverse part of him gets a kick out of knowing that whoever fucks a woman he owns will fall short; that he is all they can think about. And that’s exactly how it goes. I mean, truly, would you want another man to touch you?”
The thought alone made Piper’s skin crawl.
Clearly sensing that, Celeste nodded. “He ensured you couldn’t stomach the idea. Don’t beat yourself up about it, though. You’re not alone. It’s what he does to women. He burrows deep under their skin. Once he’s sure they feel utterly owned, his interest begins to fade.”
Pausing, Celeste took a step closer, her lips pursed. “It’s kind of like a kid being so excited to finally have a toy they wanted. But once they own it, once the novelty of playing with it has worn off, it just becomes yet another toy in the box. They don’t appreciate it anymore, they’re more interested in what they can buy next.”
