A protective instinct snaps and howls. I don’t want them seeing her like this. I don’t want this to be happening at all. Haley’s sobbing, tears streaking down her cheeks, her body shaking. “Darling.” I get closer. Stroke her hair away from her face. Her expression contorts and she jerks her head away. Christ. No one can be here for this. No one will understand. They won’t understand what she needs. God help me if I don’t know what she needs.
I can only start where she’s at.
“Get out,” I tell Gerard. “Wait in the hall if you want. I don’t fucking care. But if she wakes up and you’re in here, I’ll have your job.”
The door closes a moment later, and I reach for Haley’s hands. Pull her toward me. She falls, her balance deserting her, her palms landing on my chest. One connects with the bullet wound. “Fuck. Darling. It’s me. Wake up. You’re dreaming. Wake up.”
“Leo,” she says, and her voice is so broken, so terrified, that my throat constricts. Her love for me follows her everywhere, even to her nightmares. “You’re bleeding. You’re burning up.”
“I’m not.” I take her hand and press it harder into the wound. It hurts. “Feel my shirt. It’s dry. There’s nothing there. I’m not bleeding.”
“I have to stop it,” she says. Haley scrambles up onto her knees and brings her other hand up to my chest. “I have to stop it.”
I have to get her out of this. This dream, this night terror, whatever it is—it’s hurting her. I put both my hands over both of hers and hold them there.
“Good girl,” I tell her, because I don’t know what the fuck else to do. I don’t know how else to be with her, other than to step into the nightmare too. “It’s already less. It’s stopping. It’s—” My god, this is painful. Her touch on sensitive, damaged flesh, yes. But seeing this happen to her with clear eyes—“It’s not so hard to breathe.”
She blinks, then blinks again, staring at my hands over hers. “I—” Another sob. This one softer. “I’m having a terrible dream.”
“I know.”
Her eyes come up to mine. “It won’t let go,” she whispers. “I have to stop it.”
I take her chin in my hand. Fuck no. She’s not falling into whatever this is, not for another second. “You’re awake now.”
“I don’t feel awake.” Worry is creeping into her tone. “I can’t take my hands away.”
“Look at me.” Her eyes have slipped down to her hands again, but they come back now. Tears drip from her lashes. It makes me fucking furious. At Caroline, at Ronan, at myself. One long blink, and her eyes go wide again. Her hands push in. Sitting here in the dark isn’t going to do it. We need a clean break. And I need to fuck her.
I take Haley off the bed in my arms. She fights to press her hands to my chest again and I let her. She doesn’t seem to notice when I stop at my closet. Her focus is back in the nightmare. The dreamworld. Whatever the fuck is happening. I’m getting her out. I’m bringing her back to me.
I’m keeping a promise.
“Stand here.” I put her on her feet on the rug by the armchair.
“No. Why?” Haley’s crying. Reaching for me.
“Because, darling, you’re half-asleep, and I want you awake when I fuck your ass.”
The windows here look like solid panes of glass, and they are. But they open on an angle. I wouldn’t live in a house where I couldn’t open the fucking windows. I press the switch at the bottom of the one nearest and open it halfway.
Winter air rushes in and Haley lets out a soft gasp. She crosses her arms over her chest. Her expression is the picture of relief. I’m not going to let it stay that way for long. She scared the fuck out of me, with all that screaming. My heart pounds with fresh anger. How dare Caroline. How fucking dare Ronan.
I go to her, thread my fingers through her hair, and kiss her until she whines. Until I know it’s verging on too rough. And then I take her clothes. My shirt. Her panties. Gone in a heartbeat. Her nipples are hard from the frosty air. I push her hands out of the way and pinch them. Haley tips her head back, her eyes closed. “You pinch so hard.”
I pinch harder. She makes a hot, wounded sound at the back of her throat. “I’m awake now,” she gasps. “I’m awake. I promise.”
“Awake isn’t enough.” I pull her in and bite. Another, just below her ear. On her neck. On her shoulder. I back her up while I do it. When she’s in the right place, I shove her over the arm of the chair, the beast snapping at the end of his leash.
Shove her face right into the cushion. “You’re going to stay where you are.” I allow her to turn her head so she can breathe. That’s it. “And you’re going to cry for me. Not for some fucking dream. Not for that coward with his gun. Me.”
I undo my pants and test her with my fingers. She’s wet. Nothing gets her wetter than being bent over and ordered around, the filthy thing. It’s like she was made for me. I push into her, filling her pussy, stretching her, and she grips the cushion. “Leo—”
“Let go with one hand and play with your clit.” Haley obeys me, pushing back against me to give herself enough room. “You have thirty seconds to come.”
I make her spend the first ten seconds in silence. She’s panting by the end. On the verge of begging. I can tell. Her muscles ripple around my cock but she doesn’t come. Haley rises on tiptoe, trying harder, trying her damned best, and it’s all I can do not to destroy her now. Her screaming. Her terror. I’m barely hanging on to my humanity.
“You can tell me, darling.” I slide my hand up her spine to the back of her neck. Her pussy clenches when I add pressure to her head.
“Tell you what?” Haley’s cheeks are a deep, lovely pink.
“That your fingers aren’t enough. That you’re stretched too far to come without help.”
New tears shine in her eyes. “No. I can do it.”
“But you’re not doing it. I don’t feel your cunt getting tighter and tighter until your body can’t take it anymore. I don’t feel you getting wet enough to drip down your thighs. I promise you, darling, you’ll want my cock to be dripping.”
“You’re not really—” Another squeeze to my cock, and I groan. “You’re not really going to fuck—”
“I keep my word. You only have ten seconds left. I’ve brought the strap in case you don’t make it. How many would it take? Ten? Twenty? How many until you’re out of tears? How many until you never scream for anyone but me again?”
I bring my hand down hard on her ass and Haley comes with fluttering muscles and a trembling body and a gorgeous moan. A gust of cold air sweeps in from the window. I’m so hot for her, already on fire. It doesn’t touch me. But Haley shivers. I let her feel the chill. Her whole body tightens with it. Good.
“Hold on.”
She grabs the sides of the seat as I gather lube and press two fingers against her hole. It’s tighter because of the cold. More resistance.
I push past it, and Haley turns her face into the cushion. “Oh—oh, oh.” She’s so tiny, and so tight, and her muscles tremble and tense. “Wait. What if I can’t—what if I can’t—”