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“Until what, Gray?” She starts laughing about something, her frame continuing to rub against Malachi in some show of insolence. “There’s no pain you can bring that I haven’t already felt. I’m enjoying broken. Leave me alone.”
I bite the words back in my mouth, keeping them locked down rather than carrying on with arguing. This isn’t an argument. This is an order, before she goes mad like everyone else who stays too long. She has a life outside of this place. A world to get back to so she can organise the rest of her time in it. This is neither real nor acceptable for normal human beings, and if physicality is all she understands now I’ll use that rather than conversing.
I move quickly, hands reaching for her to drag her out of here if I must. She ducks sideways from Malachi and sprints around the furniture, her ass moving swiftly through the open doors to Malachi’s bedroom. The door gets slammed in my face before I can catch her, lock engaged. I pound at it repeatedly, shouting at her to open the fucking thing again. Nothing. No answer. No opening. No damned response. There is only the sound of these two behind me with their laughs quietly echoing around the room.
“Unlock the damned door,” I shout again.
Still nothing. I glower at the wood, knowing there’s not a chance I can break it in. Fucking castles and their wood. I pace by it, more anger and rage building because of her insolence, the fact that she’s locked a damned door on me again, and the situation I’ve allowed to happen around us. This is all my own fault. And now what? Wait it out until she’s had her fill of this place and the people in it?
“All of this is futile, Gray,” Malachi says. “As you well know. Leave her here. She’s not your problem. Or consideration.”
I round on him, my body half a breath away from showing him exactly where my thoughts about this woman are. They’re engrained. Deep seated and formidable when it comes to getting her out of here, let alone the unbearable thoughts I’m still having about some sense of possession I shouldn’t have.
He doesn’t move an inch, just stares me down as if any threat I might bring is irrelevant to him. “Make her open the door,” I grate out.
“No.” He shrugs and moves a step backwards, turning away from me. “She’s welcome to stay in my room as long as she likes. I like not liking her. She’s intriguing.” Faith moves in the background, mixing herself another drink and still damn well giggling about the situation.
“Malachi.”
“What?”
“She’s not a toy.”
“Of course she is. And at the moment so are you if you carry on behaving like an idiot.” He takes a drink from Faith’s hand, his body slumping down onto the armchair. “Just let her go, Gray. What does it matter?” It matters. It matters too much for me to deny or forget.
It shouldn’t, but it does.
I grab at a chair and move it to the door, planting it down so I can sit and wait. “You have no right to take her if she doesn’t want to leave. In fact, as you know, you have no right at all.”
I snarl at that and focus on the door, mind trying, and failing, to wrap itself around that obvious statement. No right at all. None.
Chapter 11
Hannah
Why is he so angry? I don’t understand. Leave?
I’m not leaving. Wouldn’t leave before, and I’m certainly not leaving now that he gave me to someone else to play with.
My feet traipse around the room, thoughts trying to find a reason why I would leave anything. And I thought he wanted here and me. He told me he did. He held me and whispered words in my ear. Dirty words that pulled us deeper into each other. I felt them inside me, understood them like I’ve never understood anything before. Everything outside here means nothing compared to the feelings I have inside these walls around me.
I stop by the window and look out into the expanse of snow dimly lit beneath me. What time is it? Night? Day? I shiver and bite at my nails, as I think about his stance out there. So definite. So harsh and angry because I wouldn’t do as he asked. Don’t care. I don’t. I am me. My own decisions and my own thoughts. And he gave me to Malachi. He did. He must have passed me over in my slumber and offered me up like a piece of meat for use. I don’t like that much.
My brow twitches and I open the robe around me, looking down at the bruised and welted area on my stomach. Didn’t like that much either, but the orgasm? I liked that. I giggle lightly and turn from the window, part skipping through the space in search of a bathroom, as I remember the consuming feeling racing through me like a tornado.
Shower? Hmm.
Another shout through the door reverberates all over me, making my feet stop in answer to the call. Open the door? No. Not unless he asks me nicely and then comes in here and does the thing we’re doing while we’re here. All this shouting and anger is reminding me of things outside of here, of times I don’t want to feel or think about. Rick is dead. Gone. As is my marriage and any thoughts of monogamy. I am new and fresh and happy to dwell under this roof until those thoughts no longer mean anything to me but distant memories I care little for.
Still, I am poised by the door, listening to his huffed breaths behind it. I can feel them in me, circulating and winding around my bones as if they’re part of me. It makes me squirm, as my hand rests on the wood, my nails lightly scratching and tapping to find rhythm again.
Only a few inches between us. Inches that seem like miles when he’s angry and rage filled about something he doesn’t need to be rage filled about. Nothing here is anger, not even the pain that still floats on my skin now from Malachi’s torment. Here is laughter and light. Amusement. Even fear seems tinged with a happiness I can’t describe. I want it again. All of it. I want ball-gowns and dancing, happiness and twirling. And I want it from Gray. No face veins anymore. No hate or fury or scrambling across the floor in search of answers I don’t have. Just that feeling that he gives me, that connection.
Faith had a ball-gown on. Red.
I don’t want red. I want black. Black to match my darkened mood, regardless of the light and fun around me. It’s the new me, the me who lives in that dark now and enjoys the wretchedness of the dour colour on my skin. Straps, ball-gowns, underwear. Buckles, chains. What’s the difference? Naked even. Naked is good. Naked is strong and unabashed.
I strip the robe from my shoulders and let it pool around me on the floor, my fingers still scratching at the door for Gray. He’s here. There. Right behind this wood barring me from him. Harsh fingers. Solid and unforgiving. Not like Malachi. No light feathers or teases. No separation either in the middle of hedonistic fun. I wonder if he dances well. Malachi did.
