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As if his words are magic, I finally crest and fall over, the explosion rippling through my body and sending showers of sparks behind my clenched eyelids. I cry into the carpet as wave after wave slams against me, shattering me.
“Oh, yes, yes, yes…” I moan, and I can hear his groans from high above me as the convulsing of my inner walls milks him and forces him over the edge too. His body shudders with release, and when he’s done, he lets out a long, contented sigh.
As he slowly slides out, mini tremors rock my body and I pant shamelessly, dazed with the aftermath. He unties me, and I roll onto my side, lying on the carpet, feeling limp and boneless. He lies down behind me and hugs me to him. I feel completely safe in the fortress of his arms, caged in but loved and cherished and protected. His shirt is soaked with sweat. I press back against him, drinking in his scent—perspiration and woodsy cologne and the musk of his arousal.
He presses his lips against my ear, and his hot breath sears my flesh. “You see, Tamara? Your body belongs to me. Your orgasms belong to me. My name is branded onto every cell on your body. Deeper than that, even. I own you on a subatomic level. How could you ever escape me? I’m part of you now.”
CHAPTERTWELVE
TAMARA
I actually doze off on the plane. I didn’t sleep last night, and the orgasmic sex with Joshua is followed by a great wave of weariness.
When we land, I wake up with a start, groggily, and realize my head is resting on Joshua’s shoulder. Just like a normal couple. I lie there for a few seconds and relish the feeling, the way I used to do sometimes when Joshua was holding me captive. I used to spin lies in my head, back then, pretending that I was living my dream life with the sexiest man in the world.
I’m sitting here on a private jet with my rich, handsome boyfriend who loves me…
“Home sweet home,” Joshua says, shattering the illusion.
I straighten up and look out the window at the tarmac. “Prison sweet prison.”
He looks down at me fondly and runs his thumb over my lips. “Keep it up. I haven’t delivered a really good ass-beating in far too long, and clearly you’re in need.”
We sit there in silence while the plane taxis to a stop, then wait for the plane’s door to open.
“My tights are ripped,” I say, suddenly self-conscious when the door opens.
“It’ll be our dirty little secret.” He grins at me wickedly.
I look around as I walk down the stairs. We’re on a private airstrip. It’s about thirty degrees warmer than Flat Plains; we’re not in Nebraska anymore. The trees here are lower and scrubbier looking. They’re strangely twisted and look as if they’d be thorny to the touch.
“Those are mesquite. They’re called the devil tree,” Joshua says, following my gaze.
How appropriate.
Near the airstrip, I see high stucco walls with a lacing of razor wire running all along the top.
I squint into the distance, across the plains, at mountains whose tops are swallowed by haze. “Where are we?”
“North Texas. Home sweet home. For now. We can decide where we want to go once my brother’s back in prison. Until then, I like it here. We can see anything that’s coming at us for a hundred miles in any direction.” Joshua walks toward a man who’s approaching us in an open-top jeep, the kind with the roll bars.
“Wecan decide, can we?” I stand stubbornly still as a man loads my suitcases onto the jeep. Joshua walks back to me and favors me with one of those smiles that hold a hint of menace.
“Yes. Unless you decide to be a stubborn, annoying pain in my ass, in which case I will whip some manners into you and decide for myself where we go.”
I ignore the little thrill that shoots through me when he says that.
“Just because we have amazing sex doesn’t mean I want to live my life as your slave.” I struggle to find the energy to glare at him. “I want the freedom to decide where I live, and what I do with my life.”
Do I, though? I was completely lost at Sarah’s house. Deciding what I wanted to do from one minute to the next drained me of all my energy.
Do I need someone telling me what to do? That can’t be right. Before Joshua kidnapped me, I lived my entire life alone, even when I was in a house full of foster kids. I was forced to be my own parent, to forge my own path, from as early as I can remember. I had dreams, and I fought for those dreams, worked long nights and went without sleep and scraped together my pennies and knew exactly who and what I’d be when my dreams come through. Until Joshua swooped in and snatched me off my clear-cut path.
Has Joshua broken me? The thought of not knowing what I want makes me break out in a cold sweat, because that must mean I don’t want anything. Has Joshua stripped away my life’s purpose?
Joshua grabs me by the arm, breaking into my reverie. His fingers stab into the sides of my elbow. I yelp in pain as he steers me toward the waiting jeep.
“If you still think that way in a few months, and if my brother is in custody again, we can talk about it again,” Joshua says calmly. “Until then, you’re just wasting your breath and my time, telling me the same thing over and over again. I don’t like having my time wasted so there will be consequences.”
