Taking Him (Lies We Tell)(34)

“You can’t blame yourself,” she said, feeling the tears slide slowly down her cheeks. “You were a kid. You thought you were in love. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“Shut up!” His hands on her thighs were hard, forceful as he pushed them apart. “Shut the fuck up!”

She should have been afraid. He was so angry, the rage pouring off him like monsoon rain off an iron roof, and he was so much stronger and more powerful than she was. But she didn’t feel fear. She only hurt. For him. For what Liz had done to him. For what he couldn’t admit.

And she didn’t know what to do, what was the right path to take for someone who’d been hurt like he had. She only knew he couldn’t keep on doing this.

Because it was going to destroy him.

“I know what you’re trying to do, Hunter,” she said as he knelt on the bed between her spread thighs. “What you’re trying to prove. But you can’t turn me into your victim. Everything I’ve done with you I did because I wanted to.”

“Just like I wanted everything she did to me.” His voice was a rough growl as he lifted her legs around his hips, pulling her up then shoving into her brutally hard. “Everything.”

Ellie drew in a sharp breath because it hurt. But she didn’t look away from him, from the tortured expression on his face. “I want you. Do you understand? I want you.”

He shook his head, a sharp jerk of denial. Then he began to move, hard and fast, and she started to tremble because even though he was rough, her body still wanted him. Still craved this. “I want you, Hunter.” She said it aloud, so he knew, so he’d realize. “I want you so much.”

But he shut his eyes, closing her out.

No, he wasn’t going to escape. Not this time. She wasn’t going to let him.

Ellie locked her thighs around his waist. Then she pushed herself up and reached for his shoulders, pulling herself into his lap. His eyes flicked open, staring into hers, inches away.

She slid her fingers through his short, thick black hair. And held him still with all her strength.

“If you’re going to fuck me, then do it with your eyes open,” she said.

Fury blazed in his face. “Don’t you—”

“Listen to me, damn you! I want you, Hunter. I want you so much. I want you inside me. I want you to fuck me. You’re not forcing me. You’re not making me do anything I don’t want to do. “

His hands on her hips were so tight it was painful. He growled, shoving deeper inside her. She gasped but didn’t let go. Holding onto him to keep him looking at her. “I want everything you do to me. Everything. Even hard. Even rough. Understand?”

“Stop talking for fuck’s sake!”

“No!” She gripped him like he was drowning and she was desperately saving his life. “I’m trying to show you there’s a difference. Between what your body wants and what you want. And just because she made you hard, it doesn’t mean you wanted it!”

“Ellie, stop!” The words were harsh and desperate and full of such anguish it sounded ripped from the depths of his soul.

Her heart cracked. She hated doing this to him.

“No,” she whispered. “Not until you stop running and face this.”





Chapter Thirteen

“I can’t.” The words were ripped from him like stitches from a partly healed wound. Words he hadn’t meant to say. But he was surrounded. Trapped. By Ellie’s body, her heat, her scent. Her arms around him, holding him with such gentle strength he wasn’t going to be able to escape.

Anger and pain and desire all pounded in his head. And a wild, unreasoning fear he couldn’t seem to control. Or escape from.

“Why not?” There were tears on her face, glittering there like small drops of rain. And he knew they were for him. And he hated himself so fiercely in that moment, hated himself for using her to prove a point, for causing her pain, that if he could have wished himself out of existence he would have.

“There’s no shame in it, Hunter. How could there be? You were a child.”

He turned his head into her hair, buried his face in the softness of it, held her like a drowning man holding onto a life preserver. All the anger and desperation had gone, leaving him shaking and hollow.

Ellie’s hands moved in his hair, stroking. Gentling.

“I didn’t want it,” he heard himself say. The truth he’d never said to another soul. The truth he scarcely admitted to himself. And because of her, because of Ellie, he now understood the difference. “I didn’t want her to touch me. But she wouldn’t take no for an answer. She made me hard and I thought… You were right. I thought it meant I must like it.” The breath heaved in his chest, not enough air to fill his lungs. “I did like it. It felt good. So good. She made me fall in love with her and after that I couldn’t even remember what no meant.”

Ellie’s hands had dropped, stroking down his spine. She didn’t say anything. And he waited for a flashback to hit him, a memory to come at him, either a visual of Liz in his bed or at least the physical memory of her hands on his skin. But there was nothing. Only the feel of Ellie’s fingers on him. A gentle movement up and down.

He shut his eyes, wanting to feel only her. The heat of her body clenched hard around his cock, her hands on him. He moved, rocking his hips, hearing the intake of her breath, feeling the shiver that ran through her body.

She’d always been a haven for him. A place of peace. Of happiness. And he needed that now. Needed her.

“Hunter,” she murmured as he moved. “We should—”

“Let me have this,” he whispered, cutting her off as he nuzzled against her neck. “Please, Ellie. Liz can’t touch me when I’m inside you.”

Her arms tightened and he felt her breath against his hair. Then her body melted into his and he kissed her neck, her throat, moving slowly inside her. His hands slid up the graceful column of her back, feeling her arch as he picked up the rhythm. Pleasure built, drowning out the darkness and the pain, the anger and the sickness sitting in his gut, built and built until he didn’t think he could hold on anymore. And then Ellie cried out and he felt her convulse around him, her inner muscles contracting around his cock, sending him over the edge and almost into unconsciousness.

Afterwards it took him long minutes to gather the broken pieces of himself together again, Ellie’s arms the only things holding him together.

“You were right about the tattoos,” he said at last. “I need the pain. It helps me distance what happened. Not feel it.”

“That’s what you were doing with the drawing pin too?”

God, what a pathetic piece of shit he was. “Yeah. That too.”

Her arms tightened around him but she didn’t speak.

A small silence fell. Then she said, “What did you mean? About Liz not being able to touch you.”

He didn’t want to move. Didn’t want to open his eyes. He only wanted to stay right here holding her, being held in turn. “I get…memories of her sometimes. When I’m with other people. Memories of what we did. But not when I’m inside you.”

“You didn’t do anything,” she said softly. “Remember that. It was her fault. Not yours.”

“It’s hard,” he began hesitantly, “to admit that. It makes me feel…weak.” His mouth dried but he made himself say it. “Weak and helpless.”

Ellie curled around him, holding him tighter. “I know. But you aren’t either of those things. You were young and she took advantage of that.”

His throat constricted. “I should have said no.” His voice didn’t sound like his. “I should have pushed her away.”

“But you didn’t want to hurt her, did you?”

He didn’t know what to do. She was small and delicate, shorter than he was. He could have taken that exploring hand, twisted it and broken it. But you didn’t hurt girls.

“Don’t,” he said instead. “I don’t think this is a good idea.”

“Why not? You like it. See?”

And he had liked it. And hated it. Until the two had become so mixed up he hadn’t been able to tell which was which.

“No. I didn’t.”

“And she knew that, Hunter. She totally manipulated your feelings, your protectiveness. You loved her and would have done anything for her and she knew it.”

Christ how he hated the sound of that. Hated how vulnerable it made him feel.

A small kernel of ice sat inside him. He lifted his head at last, looked into her bright silver eyes. “And have I done that with you?”

“What? What are you talking about?”

“Vin.” He didn’t add anything more. He didn’t have to. They both remembered what Vin had accused him of doing.

“No. No, of course you haven’t. I told you. Everything I did with you was because I wanted it.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course I’m sure.”

“And you didn’t do it because you were in love with me and would have done anything I told you to do?”

A blush crept over her cheeks, staining her skin. Coppery lashes veiled her gaze. She didn’t speak.

The kernel of ice grew barbs, like a fishhook. “Ellie?”