AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“And if I…submit?” The words shocked her even as they left her lips. She shifted uneasily beneath the weight of him, even though he wasn’t resting the entirety of it on her. “How long until you want…need…” For God’s sake, she didn’t even know how to phrase the question without sounding exactly like what she was—an anxious, virginal idiot.
“As much as the thought of fucking you turns me on,” Saul murmured against her mouth, “that won’t happen until you decide you’re ready, and I believe it’s what you truly want. That doesn’t mean that I won’t use anything else at my disposal to make you scream, Caera. This is your time to explore yourself, to find out who you are.”
She felt like she’d been claimed, Caera thought. Saul had left his mark on her, forging a bond, and that connection would keep calling her to him whenever it pleased. She knew who she was, what she was, and hated herself. But if being with him made some of that self-hatred ease, even for a short time, she was willing to offer everything she had.
When it was over, and he hated her as much as she hated herself, at least she could die knowing that for a brief period of time, she’d been a woman in another’s eyes, not just a lifelong failure in her own. “What if I…I mean, if I said I was ready now…”
Saul sighed and rained kisses over her face. Beautifully soft touches of his lips over her cheeks and forehead, even over her eyelids. Caera’s sigh echoed as she melted into the mattress. “I’d be a complete and utter bastard if I ignored all the signs you’re throwing at me, little rabbit, because you’re lying. Not just to me, but to yourself as well.”
“Maybe it’s what I want,” she whispered.
“Maybe it is. Maybe you’d look back without regrets. I’m not interested in maybes, Caera. I need you to be sure. For you, I want your first time to be without fear, without regret. I want to look in your eyes on that first thrust and see nothing but pleasure. Adoration would be nice too, of course.” He winked at her.
Feeling rejected, Caera turned her head to the side and tried to hold back brimming tears. It was ridiculous that she felt this way when she was aware he’d read her correctly, but that didn’t make it any easier. The last traces of her confidence, along with the remnants of her orgasm euphoria, died a sudden death, and she fell back into the role she was most familiar with—the shy little rabbit made her reluctant return. “Let me up.”
“Caera?”
She flinched at the touch of his hand to her cheek. “I need the bathroom. I’d like to get up now.” When his weight shifted, she slipped out from under him before he could stop her. Silently, she pulled clean clothes from her suitcase.
Silence didn’t stop the tears.
“Caera, wait.”
Ignoring his firm command, Caera walked into the bathroom and clicked the locks into place. The tears rolled free, sobs tearing from her chest until her throat burned and her ribs ached. Shame and embarrassment twined together into a great beast, one that settled into her heart to fester.
Mind dull with dejection, she used the toilet, then washed up and got dressed. Something flickered at the edge of her memory, something dark and painful. Breathing hard, she braced her hands on the sink as the flicker became voices.
Get rid of her. She’s of no use to us—too clingy, too needy. She’s defective.
Are you sure? There’s time—
I’m not wasting time on a defective. Get rid of her. Today.
Where the hell had that come from? Caera looked in the mirror, cringing as she saw the rat’s nest her hair had become, the bruising beneath her eyes, the gaunt outline of her facial bones.
Someone—someone whose voice was distantly familiar, even if there wasn’t a face to remember—had thrown her away.
Was it a memory or a fabrication? Was she so sleep deprived that her brain would conjure something so hurtful in the wake of Saul’s gentle refusal? Or were those voices part of a past she couldn’t recall, a stepping stone leading back to a lost childhood?
There was a soft knock on the bathroom door. “Caera, come on. Come out and talk to me.”
Sniffling, she swiped her hands over her cheeks, smearing the tears. If those voices were truly a memory, it served only one purpose—a reminder that she wasn’t wanted. She wasn’t loved.
She was, and always would be, alone.
Defective. Too clingy, too needy.
Slipping out of the other door, Caera crossed over to the front door and put on her shoes. Without looking back, she opened the barrier between her and the big, wide world, and walked away.
*
Fuck.
Knocking quietly on the bathroom door again, he ran the last few minutes back through his head and cursed. He’d managed to hit a sore spot in Caera, somewhere that hurt. He had to apologize, make it right, before the pain he’d caused created a rift.
Caera hadn’t heard what he’d been saying, hadn’t understood he was genuine in his need to make her first time more than memorable, that he wanted it to be perfect for her.
As a Dominant, he demanded perfection even when it wasn’t always attainable, and he all but foamed at the mouth at the thought of her having regrets.
