“I do want to hurt you other ways,” he admits. “It would make you so wet, little painter. It would make your cunt clench so hard. Oh, fuck. Just like that. It would make your pussy tighten just like that.”
I let out an embarrassed moan. He said he wanted to hurt me, and I liked it. I don’t know who I am anymore.
I would let him do it. I want to give him this. I want Emerson to take it. The darkness I have inside of me. The shame. The hurt. I want him to fuck it out of me. I want him to hurt me in whatever way he’s talking about.
Here, with him, I’m allowed to want that.
Emerson lets out another groan. Thinking of him that way—thinking of him with control over my body that way—it almost makes me come again. Oh, Jesus, I’m desperate to be past this place. I’m desperate to have all of him inside of me. I rock back against him, struggling, pushing.
“So brave,” he says. “So good. You can cry, little painter. Let it out. Cry for me. Let me see everything.”
One powerful thrust of his hips, and he tears into me. He warned me but I’m still shocked. The scream gets free before I can stop it.
Emerson curses, again and again, while I sob. He’s fucking me through this pain. Hard, cruel strokes.
“Take it. You can take it. It’ll feel better soon.” His fingers find my clit again. I don’t believe him. He’s broken me irreparably. I’m about to tell him when the stinging pain begins to fade under his fingers.
I try to get up from the stool. He can fuck me on the floor. Or in his bed. “I want to see your face. Please. Emerson, please.”
His hand comes down on the back of my neck and turns my head forward.
“Just for a minute,” I plead. I want his arms around me for a minute. I want to see the blue-green perfection of his eyes. I want to kiss him. I want to feel how close we are. I want to feel even closer.
“Don’t turn your head.”
“I want to. Please. I want—”
He reaches in front of me and knocks the canvas off the easel. It falls sideways and tips onto the floor, paint up. Emerson pulls out and wrenches me down. Puts me on my knees. I catch myself on the canvas. Both hands in the ocean now. For three heartbeats I’m scared, but then his fingers are at work. He pushes back inside. All my dangerous desires return. This is wrong. This is filthy. To be fucked on a painting like this. On the floor. It’s good.
I should have known better than to doubt him. He watches me so carefully. He wouldn’t do this unless I could take it.
He pulls out, leaving his tip inside, and pauses. Emerson’s fingers dig into my ass, rough and unforgiving. I think each fingertip might leave a bruise, that’s how hard he squeezes. He’s pulling me apart around the head of him, still impaling me. “Your blood is on my cock.” His voice is choked. “It’s so fucking hot. I’ve never seen a more beautiful red. Hold on tight, little painter.”
Hold on tight, because he’s lost control. His strokes rattle me. They shake me. They feel so good. I lift my head up and catch a glimpse of us in the window. I look awestruck, and so does he.
“You’re looking at me like I’m art,” I say. “You’re making me into a painting.”
Emerson freezes.
Cold crashes into me like I’ve done something wrong. He takes one harsh breath, then a second, and his hands are so tight on my hips that it hurts. Not a controlled hurt, either. Not when he decided to break me open for him. As if he wants to crush me.
“Is that how you feel?” He jerks me upright by the throat. Rough. Uncaring. I whimper with the shock of it. His other hand goes between my legs and he’s not easy on me, he’s not gentle. “Like you’re a piece of art? Something I acquired for my collection?”
I shudder against him. “I can’t come again,” I try to say, but he doesn’t stop.
“I don’t care.” Emerson forces it out of me. He makes it happen. Pinned against him. His clothes feel like sandpaper. As it peaks, mortified moans spilling out of my mouth, he shoves himself inside so hard I cry out. “You’re on display,” he murmurs in my ear. “Only for me. In my collection. Only to come around my cock.”
Tears leak from my eyes. “Emerson.”
But he seems galvanized from my words, as if the accusation that he treats me like art has made it real. As if he’s accepted it as fact. “You’re art, remember? I want to see you come, to hear you come. I want to feel your pretty little canvas around my cock.”
His muscles bunch as he comes, working to pump himself inside me.
He’s painting me. On the inside.
It’s hot. I can feel it. What I can’t feel is him. There was emotion in the air before, but now there’s a strange distance. And…a strange pride. I got what I wanted. I escaped my apartment, and I came here, and I’m not a virgin anymore.
He pulls out of me and I hiss at the sting. His absence hurts, too. As soon as he’s gone I scramble up from the floor and turn around to face him. Emerson’s on his knees, but there’s something wrong with his eyes. They’re shuttered. Suspicious.
“Please,” I say. My knees are jelly. I can’t stay upright much longer.
He stands up and puts his clothes back together. It’s a fascinating process. The zipper flashing. The cloth in his hands. I might fall over, I try to say. Getting fucked is a lot.
The last thing I feel is his arms going around me. Catching me before I hit the ground.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Daphne
I resurface from sleep with a jolt. In the scramble to catch myself I find the edge of the bed. The sheets feel different. The thread count is way higher than what I have in my apartment.
Which bed is this? Leo’s house?
No. I don’t recognize the way the moonlight comes in through the windows. It’s at the wrong angle. And—I’m not dressed. Not in my clothes, anyway. I’m wearing an oversized t-shirt.
Oh my god.
I’m at Emerson’s house.
It’s late. I know it’s late. I can feel how very late it is. Or very early in the morning. My stomach turns over. A lamp is on, the light low on the bedside table.
I left the light on at my apartment.
I left the light on.
Guilt chokes me first, followed by fear. I left the light on, and the security team will check on me. They’ll discover I’m not in my apartment.
No, it’s worse than that. They’ll have done it already. Leo’s new orders mean that when something is out of the ordinary, they have to follow up on it. I almost never leave my lights on all night. One of the bodyguards will have noticed. One of them will have crossed the street and knocked on my door to check. Or they’d notice when I don’t leave in the morning.
They already came to check. It’s a done deal.
Certainty makes my blood feel cold. I can picture the suited men walking around my apartment with purposeful strides. I can picture them placing the first call.
Leo always answers. He always does. Even in the middle of the night.
The scene flashes into my mind. Leo, sitting at the edge of his bed, rubbing a hand over his face while one of those bodyguards tells him that I’m missing. That I am unaccounted for. I know what his eyes will look like as he understands the news. I know how angry they’ll look. How haunted.