Home > Tamed (The Condemned #4)(22)

Tamed (The Condemned #4)(22)
Author: Alison Aimes

“N-no.”

Grif raised an eyebrow. “Yes. We both need this before your next session. We need to get clean.”

You need to be cleansed. The memories hit hard.

Rearing back, she dug in her heels. “No.”

His gaze narrowed. “I’m tired of hearing those words from that pretty mouth. If you don’t know how to swim, I’ll hold you.”

You will be held down. She would not go through that terrifying sensation again.

She screamed, a primal sound of pain and rage and betrayal. She flew at him, shoving him over the edge of the pool.

She expected him to let the rope go. Instead, he held on tight, their gazes locked as he toppled, her flare of triumph vanishing as her eyes went wide.

He crashed into the pool.

Dragged by the rope, she followed, wrists first, then her head.

Panic shot through her, the past and present colliding as water bubbles erupted everywhere. She’d failed and now he would hold her down until she passed out.

His nice words meant nothing. In the end, the outcome was the same.

She thrashed. Flailed. Her bound wrists made gaining leverage impossible. The squeezing in her lungs as terrifying as she remembered.

An arm banded around her waist and pulled her upward.

She gasped, wheezing hard as her head broke the surface, water sluicing down her cheeks, flattening her hair to her temples.

“Shh, wild thing. I’ve got you. It’s okay.”

But it wasn’t. He would send her back under. Keep her down. The cleansings were always her worst punishment.

“In and out. Slow and easy.” Warm heat seared into her back as she was lifted and slammed against a wide chest.

Without thought, she followed his command, breathing in time with the steady rise of the muscled chest at her back.

“Good girl. Just like that.” He shifted her in his hold, the water lapping at her neck as he held her closer.

Another long breath. Her heart calmed. She knew it couldn’t last, but she did her best to sear the sensation into her soul.

“Better?” His low baritone rumbled in her ear.

Reluctantly, she nodded. She would endure this, too. She always did.

“Good.” He let out a slow breath. “You scared the shit out of me.”

Panic gone, she took full stock of her current situation, especially the thick, veiny forearm curled beneath her breastbone that could crush her with one strike, and the rock-hard male part jabbing into the curve of her bottom.

She attempted to shift away. Talg was always roughest inside her right before he punished her.

Her captor only held her tighter. “Stay still.”

“W-what happen now?” Her voice quivered more than she wanted. She was glad she couldn’t see his face. “How long I under for cleansing?”

He didn’t say anything.

Icey dread pooled in the pit of her belly. “P-please tell.”

He flipped her around so that they were face-to-face, her legs straddling his hips.

“What did you think was going to happen here?” The water had darkened his hair to near black, droplets beading on his long, spiky lashes, making his green eyes even more intense. “Did you think I was going to hold you under?”

She tried to understand what he was up to.

“What happened to you, Nayla?” His tone was even harder than before.

She stiffened. “W-what you mean?”

“Did someone hold you under the water? Ramm or Talg?”

She didn’t want to think about the past. All she wanted was to know what was coming so she could brace herself for the pain. “What you going to do?”

She’d threatened him. Resisted. Fought back. If she’d done that to Talg, she’d already be dead. Or worse.

“Answer my question.” Another droplet rolled down the straight blade of his nose, over the dip between his lips. He was so fierce. The hard press of his man part nestling into the V of her legs, as insistent and huge as the man himself. “Did one of them hurt you? Is that why you’re afraid of the water?”

“I-I am in comfort in water, but…” She held up her bound wrists. “This is how pack p-punish and cleanse Gazi.” She swallowed hard. “Hold under water. I-I prefer beating as punishment. P-please.”

Her captor stilled. The lines in his forehead deepened until they were sharp, angry slashes across his forehead.

“Fuck.” He cleared his throat, his hold still firm as his wild green eyes bored into hers. “I just wanted us to cool off and get clean.” He blew out a breath. Unwinding the rope at her wrist, his thumb gliding over the faint marks in her skin. “I’ll make you a promise, wild thing, and you know by now, I always do what I say, right?”

She gave a nod. She did know that. She might not trust much about him, but he had proven this to be true.

“No matter what goes on between us, I will never strike you. I will never hold you under water. I will never cause you extreme physical pain. In return, you’ve got to agree to trust me on this—and react in ways that won’t risk yourself.”

Shocked, she turned his words over in her mind. He couldn’t mean it. Not the promise not to hurt her. Nor the suggestion that he cared about preventing her from harming herself. And yet he had never lied to her. Not once.

“Why you make promise?”

“I know what it is to survive that kind of brutality. I refuse to have you fucking terrified of me.”

It took her a moment to find her voice. “H-how you know that brutality?”

Of all the unfathomable things he’d just said to her, she found that part especially impossible to comprehend. He was so strong and powerful.

“I was a little boy once.” Again, it was as if he knew her thoughts. “My sister and I had to deal with an asshole who was a lot like Talg,” His eyes dulled as he spoke, the vivid green leaching away. “I survived him. My sister did not.”

As if her body had a will of its own, it leaned forward, an unwelcome tie cinching the connection between them tighter. He might be a savage Other from a different world, but they were not so unalike, after all.

He, too, knew suffering.

“My father liked to hurt my sister and me.” He swallowed hard, looked away. “It’s why I am how I am. The monster inside…the one you see? It’s because of him.” He cleared his throat. “Now you know one of my secrets, too.”

“I sorry.” Her heart ached. She’d never had direct kin, but how much more terrible would it have been to be tortured alongside a loved one and know their agony? To know exactly how they suffered and be helpless to protect them?

“It’s not your fault.” His arms wrapped tighter around her. “I’m beginning to suspect none of this fucking is.”

Until now she had only seen him as her enemy. For the first time, she saw him as far more.

“You’re sweet, aren’t you, Nayla? As sweet as you look.”

She started to shake her head. Gazi were defective. She—

He gripped her chin, his finger wet and warm against her skin. “You have worth.”

She stilled.

“Give me your promise,” he demanded, “so I can give you mine.”

The promise. She replayed the words in her mind. He hadn’t promised to stop touching her to the point of madness or pushing her to give him the information he wanted, but he had offered her a bargain she’d never expected him to make.

Hot Books
» House of Earth and Blood (Crescent City #1)
» A Kingdom of Flesh and Fire
» From Blood and Ash (Blood And Ash #1)
» A Million Kisses in Your Lifetime
» Deviant King (Royal Elite #1)
» Den of Vipers
» House of Sky and Breath (Crescent City #2)
» The Queen of Nothing (The Folk of the Air #
» Sweet Temptation
» The Sweetest Oblivion (Made #1)
» Chasing Cassandra (The Ravenels #6)
» Wreck & Ruin
» Steel Princess (Royal Elite #2)
» Twisted Hate (Twisted #3)
» The Play (Briar U Book 3)