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Elijah reaches for me, and while I should pull away from his embrace, I need it right now, and I’m not ashamed to say, I needhimright now. His arms wrap around me tightly, his head resting on my breasts as he holds me against him. His warmth radiates through me, bringing me comfort I didn’t think would be possible. The rage that vibrated through my veins calms, and his presence brings me a reprieve I so desperately needed.
“That’s better,” he murmurs.
“I need to check you over,” I whisper, holding him to my chest despite my words. I’m not ready to give up what we’re sharing yet, but I know what I need to do. Blood seeps from the open wounds of his face into my white blouse, the red a direct contrast to the silky fabric. It’s not the shirt I’m worried about though. No, it’s the injuries I can’t see. My brothers and Everett are fucking machines when they want information, and I don’t need to have ever seen them interrogate someone for me to know that.
“I’ll make you a deal,” he mumbles into my breasts, my nipples hardening against my bra despite the layers between his face and the hard peaks.
“I’m not making a deal with you, Elijah. You’re letting me patch up your wounds.”
He draws back and looks up at me through amused eyes. He’s getting too much enjoyment out of this considering how messed up his face is. I’m surprised he can still open his eyes at all, and I suspect the swelling will soon take over. “I’ll let you clean me up if you do it with my cock inside you.”
My mouth drops open and I quickly snap it shut. He’s the only person to ever render me speechless, and I don’t like it. I’ve always been quick-witted and snappy, but not with Elijah. He knows exactly which cord to strike to have all the words in my mind disappear.
“So do we have a deal?” His green eyes peer up at me despite the swelling.
“No, we absolutely do not have a deal,” I snap, pulling my body away from his only to be tugged right back in. “Elijah, let me go. That is not happening.”
He tilts his head and stares at me, as if he doesn’t understand the meaning of the word no, which actually makes a lot of sense. The number of times I’ve said the word to him since I got here and he’s completely ignored it seems to grow by the day.
I take a deep breath, allowing some of the anger in my chest to roll off me. I shouldn’t clean his wounds while I’m angry, I could end up hurting him more. “I am barely holding on to my composure right now, I still have my period, and sex is literally the furthest thing from my mind.” The words come out low, but the anguish behind them is clear.
There are so many reasons I don’t want to have sex right now, starting with all the blood he’s coated with, and ending with the deep ache in my chest because I won’t have one member of my family at my wedding. Everett won’t let Wynter come without him, and I don’t want him anywhere near the church on Saturday, just the same as my brothers. The emotional pain burns in my heart, and the more my adrenaline calms, the harder it is to stop the tears behind my eyes from falling down my cheeks. Sex won’t help anything. All it will do is make me more vulnerable than I already am.
“If you do it, I’ll call that as your punishment and we’ll be even.”
“Punishment?” I cry, pulling away from him and stumbling back. “What the fuck am I being punished for? I saved your ass!” All the rational thought I had a few moments ago has gone out the window.
Elijah stands to his full height, his injuries barely making his movements slow before he stalks toward me. For each step I take, a larger step he takes toward me until my back hits the cool tiles of the shower and he crowds my space. “You put yourself in danger today, Snow. You inserted yourself between me and a threat, and you could have got seriously hurt,” his voice is low and menacing, and the blood in my veins cools under them.
“They’re my brothers! They would never hurt me!” I move my hands to his chest with the intent of pushing him away, but he quickly bundles them into one of his and holds them above my head, rendering me completely helpless, just the way he likes me.
48
Elijah
Having Snow at my mercy is my favorite thing on this earth. There’s nothing better than holding the woman of my obsession and seeing an intoxicating cocktail of fear and arousal mingling in her heavy gaze, and I can’t get enough.
The pain in my ribs is excruciating, but it doesn’t stop my dick from hardening the moment I had my face resting on my woman’s tits, and hell, if I’m honest with myself, the moment she stood between me and a threat like a lioness protecting her pride was the moment my cock stiffened painfully in my jeans.
But she put herself in harm’s way, regardless of who the threat was, she never should have put herself between me and it, and that’s something she can never do again, because next time it might not be her brothers. Next time it could be someone who could really hurt her, and the thought of that makes me homicidal. I would tear the world apart for my Snowflake, and anyone who dares to lay a hand on her will meet their maker before their next breath.
“Youneverput yourself between me and a threat, Snow. Never,” I growl. “Rayne could have hurt you unintentionally.”
“He wouldn’t—” she starts.
“Never, Snow. Never.” The words come out harsh and she flinches, turning her head away from me to get any space she can. She should know by now that there will never be any space between us, and it’s something she needs to get used to. “If you ever do that again, I promise I will spank you so hard you won’t be able to sit for a week, and then I’ll keep you locked in our room for a month so I know where you are and that you’re safe.”
“You can’t do that.”
“On the contrary, my dear Snowflake. I can do whatever the fuck I want because you’remine. Every single part of you belongs to me, and if you ever put yourself in that kind of danger again, I will not hesitate to punish you, and it will not be as kind as the one you’re going to get today.”
She stares at me for long moments, as if she’s trying to process the words I’ve said. She needs to realize that her safety is everything to me. If something were to happen to her, I would tear this city apart and slaughter every last person who ever dared harm my Snowflake.
I wait patiently for her to respond, for her to understand just how much she terrified me today. It didn’t matter that it was her brother, or that I know no one in that basement, myself included, would ever harm a hair on her head, the thought of Snow in any amount of danger has the monster inside clawing at his cage, begging to be set free.
“I’m sorry I scared you,” Snow says finally, her tongue darting out to wet her lips. “I saw you tied to the chair, and I…” She pauses to choose the right words. “I acted on instinct. I won’t do it again in the future, I promise. But I’m not going to sit on your dick while I assess your injuries. You’re hurt enough as it is, and I won’t be a party to you hurting yourself more.”
She’s skating around admitting that I wasn’t the only scared one today. She has real feelings for me, but she’s still processing them and that’s one thing I can’t push too hard on. She needs to come to the conclusion I came to ten years ago on her own.
