AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Is it what you want, Your Grace?” I push the hoarse words from my mouth, barely squeezing the air through my constricted airway. “To fuck me?”
The dark rake of his gaze skims over my face as he spins me to face him. My hair loosens around my neck a fraction, allowing me to gulp down lungfuls of the hot air between us. If ever there was a beast in this world, I am looking at him. His hackles are up, and his teeth are bared in a dangerous glower that contorts his far-too-beautiful face with a furled brow.
Oh, my heart.
Oh, my stupid, idiotic, senseless heart.
I can’t contain it as it batter-rams into my ribs, trying to burst from my chest to his. Maybe that’s the only way he can have a heart—by stealing mine.
“Why are you here, Eve?” He blows out a frustrated, defeated breath.
His large, rough hands bracket my jaw, lifting me to the tips of my toes so that we’re face to face when I reply, “You called.” Denial flickers across his face, but before he can verbalise it, I tell him, “Maybe you’re an entitled bastard, but you’re not a liar. Are you?”
“You don’t know what you’re doing.” Henry tightens his grasp on my jaw as he pulls in a long breath. “Tonight is not the night for you to be here. To be near me.”
“I came…” I murmur over his lips as my hands flatten to his chiselled stomach. “I came because you called.”
“And?” he asks, the indifference in his voice wavering.
“And I couldn’t stay away. I-I just can’t, and I don’t really know why. It’s just—”
“Just.” Henry repeats the word as though it has some hidden meaning I’m not aware of.
“A part of me,” I whisper, unsure if I should be admitting this to him. He’ll probably think I’m some crazy, psychopath stalker he’s got to cut loose, but it’s the truth. I’ve never been a liar, and I’ll never be a liar. So, with great trepidation, my hands clamber up his torso. “Something inside me recognises something in you, and I can’t stay away.”
Stroking my fingers lightly over his jaw, I relish the scratch and prickle of his thick stubble.
“My soul,” I breathe as he comes closer. Perfectly moulded lips hover over mine. “Your soul. I don’t know, Henry. I—”
I’m cut short when he trails his nose to my hair and his lips press to my cheek. Hard and unyielding, just as I imagined them to be. After this one chaste kiss, nothing will ever feel as good or as right. One kiss from him, and my heart beats like it’s living a thousand lives all at once. I’m ruined and doomed, and there is nothing that could be enough. I will take whatever he gives me, how he gives it, without question or reservation. I’m greedy and gluttonous for him. I want all his kisses and his never-ending touch. I want him more than my yearning soul can bear.
“Fuck,” Henry hisses over my burning skin. His lips trail to my ear as he tells me, “You don’t belong here, darling.”
Darling. Just like the first time he called me that, my heart stutters, skipping a beat or two before it trips and stumbles back to a fast-paced thrum that echoes at the back of my throat.
Every word in my vocabulary disappears, leaving me speechless, completely wordless as he continues to hum into my ear, “My sweet, darling Eve. You’re too good…too pure.” I shake my head, and he pulls back a tad so that our stares kiss while he nods affirmation of his statement and his thumbs stroke over my lips. “You’re too young. Too fucking young for this.”
For him. That’s what he means because he’s lived life like I never could. He’s fought in war and seen the worst of humanity. I wish I’d known all of this that first day we met or that he had told me then instead of me reading it all online. If we could talk about more than my music or about my day, he would realise that I’m not too young or pure or whatever it is he thinks about me.
But if that’s how he feels, then why… “Why did you call me?”
His face falls at my question. Pity, guilt, disgust, regret…so many knives to my foolish heart that I can’t think past the pain to stop myself from welling up.
“Why?” I choke out as he braces himself over me, a hand pushing into the wall on either side of my head.
“Because I needed to hear your voice.” An ugly, teary snort blusters from deep in my chest. “I had to hear your sweet voice at a distance because the possibility of crossing the line with you is too much, Eve.” He breathes out my name like a curse. “And it can never happen.”
Heavy tears drip angrily from my eyes, leaving bereft tracks down my face. It shouldn’t matter. He shouldn’t matter. This was always a means to an end. I do this job, and I get the credit and reference I need to help bolster my chances into a decent career. It was never meant to be this. I was never meant to care. And he was never meant to mean anything. Yet here I am. My heart is breaking into smithereens in front of his eyes. My heart, which had been bruising and battering itself to get to him moments ago, can’t seem to find any kind of rhythm.
Pushing onto my tiptoes, I crane my face as close to his as I can, licking my lips as I inch them closer to his. He kissed me; why can’t I kiss him? Maybe it’s all he needs to see and feel that I can be what he needs no matter what my age says about me.
“No,” he snaps, pushing off the wall and taking a couple of steps away from me. “No, Eve. You’re a child,” Henry states. It’s a slap in the face that wakes my anger. “You shouldn’t be here, and it’s time you leave.”
“Why?”
“Go home.”
“Okay.” The indignant hiss chokes from my lips as I stand tall and drag in an agonised breath.
