Page 32 of When the Last One Falls
My bravery took a hit with that threat. “You wouldn’t dare.”
“I’d also make sure to leave your goddamn pills at home, making sure that I spent every minute of our ‘honeymoon’ fucking you within an inch of your life,” he continued like a psychopath. “If that’s the only thing that you really believe that I’m after, then ask yourself something, Keris.”
“What?” I bit out.
“If last week and last night were all about getting you pregnant, then why would I bother cumming in your mouth?” I could feel my face turn red with humiliation at the reminder. “Why would I have wasted my nut by cumming in your ass? Why would I smear all those possibilities into your skin, on your face, on your tits? If the only goal was to get you pregnant, I would have kept flooding your pussy and that’s it.”
Grasping for the right answer, I said, “To lure me in. To make me willing. You played this entire thing to make me compliant. You knew that you’d get nowhere if you kept treating me like I was bought and paid for. You knew that you couldn’t keep treating me like a whore if you wanted to keep up appearances. So-””
“Treating you like a whore?” he sneered down at me. “You couldn’t be more wrong, baby. Still, if you want me to show you how I treat my whores, I can do that.”
I could feel my green eyes flashing with rage. “I’m pretty sure that you already showed me that last night.”
Before I knew it, I was being tossed on the bed, my towel coming undone. I quickly tried to scramble off the bed, but Brantley was too fast, too big, and too pissed off. He had me pinned underneath him, my towel a useless piece of cloth beneath my naked body, escaping an impossibility.
With his hand squeezing my chin painfully, he said, “My whores were paid to take it any way that I wanted it. You’ve been paid to take it, whether you want it or not. You keep comparing yourself to a whore, but you couldn’t be more wrong about that.” Brantley leaned down in my face, his fingers digging into my jaw. “You’re not a whore, you’re property, baby. You’remyfucking property.”
Chapter 22
Brantley~
I’d never been so fucking livid in all my life, and that was saying something. Anger had always been a very comfortable companion of mine, but this wasn’t anger.
I wanted to fucking murder this woman.
Keris was glaring up at me, no ounce of fear on her face as she laid naked beneath me., and I had no idea how I’d gone from accepting a companionable marriage to refusing to let this woman leave me. I honestly believed that no one could anger me the way that Ares Cormac could, but I was clearly wrong. Keris didn’t only anger me; she drove me mad with fury.
“I’m no one’s property,” she seethed.
“Wrong again,” I hissed down at her. “Now, you can be mad at me all you want, Keris. You can even think that I only want you for the mines, and you can also think that my hard dick is just to get you pregnant. You can think whatever the fuck you want, but it changes nothing. You’re my wife, and youwillact accordingly. Do I make myself clear?”
“You don’t scare me,” she said, her eyes so dark with anger that I believed her.
“I should,” I warned her. “But I think that’s your problem. You’ve been pampered all your damn life and dating pussies that you don’t have the sense to know when you should be scared and of whom.”
“So, what’s the plan? To hold me against my will? Hire security to follow me around everywhere?” she sneered. “Exactly how do you plan on controlling this marriage and me?”
My hand reached down, circling her slender throat, then I squeezed my fingers around her. “Don’t act like the idea of me holding you against your will isn’t making your pussy wet, baby,” I smirked. “Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if you started this fight just so that you can get fucked like you like.”
“Not every argument is foreplay,” she replied scathingly. “If sex is the only card that you have to play, then you better know when it really is foreplay and when it’s rape.”
That had me jumping up off the bed.
That one word.
Keris quickly sat up, wrapping the towel around her naked body; a body that I was never going to touch again. I could only stare at her as everything about our relationship changed. Every time that I had put my hands on her, she’d been soaking wet, giving me silent permission to fuck her, no matter her arguments. However, she wasn’t wrong by demanding that I better know the difference. Not only did a woman deserve that type of consideration, no matter what kind of sex she liked, but I’d felt uncomfortable enough after that first night to know that I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I ever accidentally raped her. Hell, rapedanywoman. While I might enjoy rough sex and dominating a woman in the bedroom, it was still all about consent for me.
Now, while I had always wanted a marriage born out of mutual respect, not really caring about love, that wasn’t what I had. I was actually in love with my wife, had been hoping to escape what Onyx and Magnus had, and my wife hated me. She thought I only wanted her for those damn mines, and she also believed that I was only sleeping with her because of the trust requirements. As I stared at her beautifully enraged face, I couldn’t even blame her. We had doomed this marriage with our first impressions of each other, and now I had to figure out what to do next.
As a matter of fact, I knewexactlywhat to do next.
“No need to worry,” I told her. “I think it’s safe to say that any hope of a civil marriage between us is out of the question now. So, since you have no desire to give me children, and since I have no desire to become an actual rapist, I think that marriage on paper thing is a perfect solution to all of this.”
Her face paled a bit, anger giving way to confused surprise. “What?”
“I have more money than I will ever need, Keris,” I reminded her. “I couldn’t care less if the mines end up belonging to the Central American government. It’s notmyfamily’s legacy that will be lost. Besides, I have plenty of time to bleed the mines dry before it becomes obvious that we’re not going to have children.” I slid my hands in the pockets of my sweats. “Of course, if you get pregnant by a future lover or something, the lawyers will have to figure something out, but I don’t see a problem with that.”
“So, that’s your new plan?” she asked quietly as she tightened the towel around her luscious body. “Bleed the mines dry before we lose them?”
