“You’re wet now,” he observed. “Does it arouse you to make me angry? To lie? To have me punish you?”
I moaned, because he had found that perfect spot inside that turned me at once tense and melting.
“It does. Such a bad girl. So filthy to find pleasure in such things.” And then he took his fingers—slick with my own want—and slid one into my ass. I whimpered as he added a second and then used his other hand to caress my clit with feather-light touches.
“Please,” I said raggedly. “I need to be fucked.”
“Filthy,” he repeated. He didn’t move, just kept stoking that dark fire with his fingers and watching me writhe with a rigid, almost disciplinary, expression on his chiseled face. “Tell me why you asked, Ivy, or I swear to God, I will never let you come again.”
“I…I was scared,” I managed.
“Scared of what?”
I didn’t answer for a moment. Even in the haze of pleasure, I realized that I was close to revealing something irrevocable, and that doing so carried a whole host of consequences—wounding him emotionally was but one. It didn’t seem wise to alert the predator that I’d caught his scent; if I confessed that I was worried for my safety, would that alone seal my fate?
He pinched my clitoris and twisted, a bright, sharp tweak that elicited a noise I’d never heard from myself. “Scared of what?” he demanded.
“Of you,” I whispered finally, tears spilling out of the corners of my eyes. “I’m scared of you.”
Time seemed to freeze then. His mouth parted with surprise and his eyes widened. That wound I’d been afraid of creating—it was there, an almost visible slash across his chest. I regretted it all then, not just confessing to my fears, but to having them in the first place and maybe to even coming to Markham Hall at all. Then his eyes narrowed and his mouth pressed into a thin line.
“On your knees,”
he ordered.
I clambered to obey, tears still falling, desperate to make that brief look of pain a distant memory, desperate to show him how much I did love him, despite everything else.
“So you believe all the gossip then?” he breathed, standing up and walking around me. “That I’m in the habit of killing my wives? And you thought you’d make sure that, at the very least, I didn’t kill one of them?”
I knew there was no point in lying now. I nodded, miserable with crying and also with the pulsing, unsated want between my legs. He came around behind me and laid his hands on my shoulders.
“Are you afraid now?” he asked. “We are alone, after all, I could kill you right here in this pasture and nobody would know.” The jagged sarcasm in his words couldn’t hide the bleakness in his voice. My heart split at that bleakness, wanted to heal it, cover over the parts of him that I had blighted with my admission.
His hands slid up and wrapped around my neck. I shivered, and there again was the pull of fear and desire, the adrenaline sending fast and painful throbs to my swollen cunt.
“Are you afraid now, wildcat?” he asked, his fingers tightening. “Afraid of me?”
“Julian,” I murmured. “Please.”
“Please what?”
His fingers were still loose enough that I could turn my head, and I did so now, looking back at him and wincing at his tortured expression. I only knew one thing that would help, the one thing that always helped us, the language our souls both spoke and demanded. “Fuck me,” I pleaded. “Fuck me until this isn’t here anymore.”
This. This fight, this betrayal, this doubt. This ugly thing I’d nursed for the past two months and now let free in a sunny meadow on a perfect afternoon. But he could get rid of it, my Julian could. He always did that, with his mouth and his fingers and his cock. He could drive us away from pain and into bliss, erase my doubts, if only temporarily. If only he would give it.
If only.
“Not this time, wildcat,” he said. And he let go of me, stepping back.
No. No, that couldn’t be it. We’d always shared our bodies with each other, sharing pleasure, giving and taking, our skin whispering what our words could not. And he was saying no? Even as the hard length of his cock was so erect, I could almost trace the veins through his trousers?
“No,” he said again, reading the horror on my face. And then he said nothing else, scooping up his jacket and leaving me kneeling, weeping, among the bluebells and the rustling grass.
I don’t know how long I knelt there, slumped and sobbing, my heart rending itself into pieces. But the blue sky had silvered itself gray and the breeze had turned chilly and sharp by the time my tears finally subsided. I tried to stand¸ but my muscles screamed in protest—cramped from kneeling for so long—and I half fell over instead, curling onto my side and staring at the sky listlessly until I felt the muscles loosen and relax.
But even then, it was hard to find the motivation to stand. I would stand up and walk back to…to what? To Mr. Markham, angry and cold? Or to an empty house, bereft of his presence? Certainly, it would be to an empty bed, and I couldn’t stand that. Not when I needed him more than ever.
I stood shakily, wondering when the independent and free-willed Ivy Leavold had become this wreck of a girl who could barely walk. When had I traded my reason for madness? Because it could only be madness, this feeling that drove me toward Julian Markham. Despite what Silas had said, the police and the county were convinced that Mr. Markham had killed my cousin. What’s more, he had expressly forbidden me from asking about her death. All the evidence—the testimony of others and his own behavior—pointed to his guilt.
