Falling With Grace

“Are you okay? I heard what happened downstairs.” She drew her knees up to her chest.

“Do. You. Dream. About. The. Men?”

The closet light flicked off, casting the next corner in reaching charcoal shadows.

“Sometimes.” She wrapped her arms around her knees as I walked towards the light on the other side of her closet.

“And what are they doing to you?”

A staggered breath brushed through her lips. “Elias?” She swung her legs over the edge of the bed, tossed the sheet away, and rushed toward the closet light, flicking it on before I turned off the one beside her bed.

Light shot through the space I’d plunged into darkness as she rushed for the one beside the dresser. I darted for her and caught her hand as it tucked under the lampshade.

“You’re scaring me.”

“Good.” I pushed my hand through her hair at the base of her neck and tipped her head back, forcing her to look at me. “I want to erase your nightmares until the only thing you see in them is me.”

My lips crashed down on hers, devouring the fear lacing her staccato breaths.

28

Grace

His fingers twirled in my hair as my stomach swished with heat, his tongue moving over the sensitive spots in my mouth as his other hand gripped my wrist, preventing me from turning the lights on.

“Delicious.”

My breaths quickened as he spun me towards the bed.

What’s happened?

What’s different?

Will he take it out on me?

For years, I’d been subjected to the whim of every man, their wicked desires forced upon my body, and no amount of strength in my voice carried weight against them.

I was at their mercy.

Am I at his?

The backs of my legs met the mattress, and he forced me to sit, towering over me. My head tilted back as far as my bones and tendons would allow, his fist gripping my hair.

“Are you afraid?”

I shook my head. “Should I be?”

A crooked smile branched across his shadow-strewn face. “Never.” He pressed a gentle kiss to my lips, his caress a sensual masterpiece that had my stomach fluttering.

What game is he playing?

He wedged himself between my trembling thighs while planting a trail of kisses towards my ear. “You can always say no.”

He pressed me onto the rumpled black silk, my back chilling, his hand falling away from my skull as he tucked them behind me. His thigh hit the back of my legs as he settled his hard erection against my swelling clit, forcing a gasp from my lips, my heels resting against his lower back.

“Do you want to say no, Grace?” His lips trailed down my neck to my breasts. He engulfed a single peaked nipple in his mouth, soaking the sheer fabric settling between us.

I moaned, his tongue flicking over the tip, sending zings of electricity between my legs. “No.”