Page 15 of Unorthodox
Addison is shuffling on her hands and knees. It’s a sound I recognize well. It’s how all of the women at my father’s compound were expected to walk, save for my mother.
Many days, my mother was so black and blue she couldn’t walk at all.
Not for the first time this week, I have to force myself back to the present. Force myself not to think about my mother, or Oliver, my brother.
About all the fucking ways I failed them both.
I glance at the bloody knife on the white sheets of my bed, bringing back my focus. It’s tempting, but Evora and I have both bled enough. And with her throat tightening around the tip of my cock, my hand cutting off what was left of her air supply, I’ll be done soon anyway.
I look down into her deep brown eyes, watch her face turn pink as she fights the panic from not being able to breathe.
She doesn’t look away from me though. Not once. And she’s not even my slave.
Just the adult daughter of a friend. A girl I use after I slip out of Addison’s bed.
I loosen my hold on Evora’s throat as I finish in her mouth, my blood-coated fingers threading in her hair. She gasps for breath and the way her mouth opens wider and then closes again as she tries to draw out my orgasm for as long as possible, feels really fucking good.
When I’m finished, eyes still locked on hers, I drag her off of my cock by her hair. She licks her lips clean of me and her own saliva, and then looks down at the floor, hands on her bare thighs, legs tucked underneath her.
She might not be a slave, but she knows what I like—total obedience.
I run my thumb over her swollen lip, smooth back her long, dark hair, pressing my fingertips against the ridges of her skull. “Good girl.”
Then I get ready to watch Addison on her last day of training, to see just how much work I’ll have to put into her the next few weeks.
She’s holding out hope her father is coming back for her. Maybe her brother.
But they’re not.
I know they’re not.
Because someone has already made an offer for her that I just can’t refuse.
* * *
She isn’t crying.That’s the first thing I notice as I descend the stairs into the basement where Dante stands guard at the top.
She’s not crying, and I don’t hear the crack of the whip against her back, so I assume she’s behaving herself.
Still, I don’t make my presence known. I don’t want her to fuck up, and I don’t want her to think I’m here to save her.
I have no business being thought of as anyone’s savior.
If she starts crying, I’ll need to leave. I hate crying. Some men get off on it, and I understand why. Knowing you brought someone to the point of tears, holding their emotions in the palm of your hand, their physical limitations, the mental ones…it’s a heady experience. Like floating in the clouds, but your feet are firmly planted on the ground, a girl’s throat beneath your fingers.
I understand it, but I don’t like it. I hate loud noises. Even screams. The tears I can deal with, silent sobs held back by stronger girls.
But the pitiful moaning and sniffling? It pisses me off. It only makes me want to hurt them more.
I sometimes wonder if I owe Oliver for my love of silence. He was on the spectrum, non-verbal. I enjoyed his company more than anyone else’s.
But as much as I might like to pretend otherwise, I know it wasn’t just Oliver.
When I was a child, our father took a knife to my side every time I cried. A blade against the ribs hurts more than most anywhere else on the body, save for maybe the eyelid.
I’ve got a dozen scars lining my ribcage.
It took me twelve times to learn that crying doesn’t get you love.
