Chosen: Part Four (Allure Book 4) Read online

  “Because nothing is more guaranteed to go viral than a celebrity sex video?” The words spewed from me, poison that I had to eject before it ate me alive. “That was what you intended, wasn’t it? The videos of me in the cell would only have elicited sympathy from the public, for me and for my family. But the last one…”

  I was choking on the revulsion rising up in me. Barely able to breathe, I managed to gasp, “Oh, god, you didn’t--?”

  No, of course he hadn’t. If the video of me being forced to orgasm over and over had been released, I wouldn’t have been able to set foot outside my apartment without being overwhelmed by paparazzi. Every sex fiend, pervert and weirdo would have me bookmarked. I would be notorious, the infamous object of shock, titillation, and endless, X-rated speculation.

  As for my family---

  “It would have been an incredible scandal,” I said. “The public image of the Delaneys, so carefully maintained for so long, would have been tainted beyond repair. The family’s reputation would have crumbled. Everything would have been open to scrutiny.”

  My voice fell as pain twisted through me. I had known on some level all along but now I truly knew. The people I should have been able to depend on the most cared less than nothing for me.

  “That’s why they finally gave you Uncle Ned,” I said, sorrow welling up in me. “Not to save me, to save themselves.”

  Slowly, Adam nodded. He took a step toward me, then thought better of it and stopped. But the look in his eyes made his feelings all too clear.

  “Don’t,” I said, hating how shaky I sounded. “Keep your sympathy, your pity, whatever! It’s meaningless. You used me every bit as much as they did. I was just a means to an end for all of you.”

  I wouldn’t cry, I couldn’t. The tears that I might have shed fell instead into the inferno of my emotions. They rose transformed, sizzling wisps of smoke escaping from the charred remains of whatever dreams I had clung to. Foolish, stupid dreams about a man who had never seen me as anything other a necessary step to the fulfillment of his duty.

  To his credit, Adam didn’t even try to deny it. “That was true at the beginning. I chose you because I believed that you were strong enough to withstand being held captive for what I assumed would be a very short time. I never imagined what the real effect would be on either of us.”

  He hadn’t just said that. He wouldn’t have dared. But this was Adam, unlike any man I had ever known. He recognized no limits except those that he set for himself.

  “Us?” I spit the word, laden with bitter contempt. “You’re claiming to have been affected? You took the intimacy we shared and twisted it into a weapon to get what you wanted. Did you think for a moment how that made me feel?”

  The last words slipped out before I could stop them. I tried all the same, biting down on my tongue hard enough to taste blood. As exposed as I had felt before, I feared being even more so, stripped bare, unable to hide anything from him.

  His eyes glittered darkly. At his sides, his fists clenched and unclenched, as though he was fighting a battle with himself not to reach out and--

  “For a moment?” he demanded, the challenge exploding in the air between us. “I couldn’t think of anything else then or now! I let you go because you deserve every chance to be free of me! You think I don’t know what I am? What I’m capable of?”

  I couldn’t tell which was worse, the rage I felt at his actions or how much I felt for the man himself. As much as I hated what he had done to me--or even to us, as he claimed--he had acted from a deeply ingrained sense of duty and a determination to wrest justice from an unjust world. If that made him a monster, then some aspect of my own nature was equally as dark and flawed.

  I had never conformed to my family’s expectations, at least not more than superficially. But now America’s Princess, the name I had always despised, was well and truly gone. She might as well have drowned in that rip current. By the time Adam and I mated in a wild frenzy on the beach, I was well and truly free of her.

  As reluctant as I’d been to admit it at the time, ours had been a savage celebration of life hurled into the face of death itself. If he thought for a moment that I would forget that, he didn’t know me at all. The question was could I ever forgive what had followed?

  Trapped in my pain and rage, I stood frozen, unable to move. Not so Adam. The space between us shrunk in an instant. Miles, worlds, opposing realities dissolved into nothingness. I saw the flush that darkened his high-boned cheeks and the harsh surge of his breath. The air between us trembled.

  “Damn it, can’t you hear me?” he demanded. “I was trying to do what was right--for Rolf, for the people who depend on me, and ultimately for you. I couldn’t let my own feelings sway me. Your attempt to escape again--putting yourself in danger again--forced me to act. I had to end it and then I had to let you go!”

  He thrust a hand through his hair in a gesture of raw frustration and made as though to turn away from me.

  The red mist returned, moving in front of my eyes. Rage at all that had torn us apart threatened to consume me. Only one force was greater, overriding everything else. Yearning--hot, remorseless, carnal but also so much more.

  “Don’t you dare do that,” I said.

  He frowned, his gaze returning to lock with mine. “Do what?”

  “Turn away from me. After all that happened between us--”

  The memories of how we had been together, how we had touched, what we had revealed to one another were unbearably real and raw. They drove me over the brink and beyond. What little was left of my self-control shattered.

  I lashed out, my palm striking his lean cheek. The sound reverberated in the opulent room, against the silk-covered walls and beyond the terrace doors opened to the night descending over the city.

  My skin where it had touched his burned but I was hardly aware of that. All I could think of was that he hadn’t so much as flinched. I waited through the space of one heartbeat and the next for him to retaliate but he just stood there. Slowly the realization dawned on me that he intended to take whatever punishment I inflicted because he believed that he deserved it.

  Sobs clogged my throat. I shook from head to toe. My vision blurred, awash in tears.

  “Don’t deny what really happened between us,” I said, half-plea, half-demand, all desperate. “Or do, tell me that I’m wrong, that I’m deluded. But don’t lie--to me or to yourself.”

  He sucked in breath, let it go slowly. Something shifted behind his eyes, a giving way as though he, too, had walls that were crumbling.

  “No lies?” he asked.

  I stood on the precipice, feeling the ground falling away under my toes. In another moment, I would find out if I truly could fly or--

  My chin lifted. I stared at him directly. “We deserve the truth, both of us.”

  A moment passed, another. I couldn’t breathe. My heart hammered painfully. A constriction built in my throat, a hard knot of regret, loss, despair…

  “Grace.”

  No one had ever said my name like that, part plea, part benediction. No one had ever touched me as he did, closing the distance between us to stroke his hand tenderly along my cheek, catching the dampness of my tears.

  “Grace,” he said again, his tall head bending, at once blotting out the light and banishing the darkness.

  Chapter Eight

  I tasted blood, a faint trace of it when my tongue stroked hers, taking, claiming even as I marveled at what she permitted.

  Was it possible--? I couldn’t even frame the thought, forgiveness being so far beyond anything that I dared to hope for.

  But the blood…the copper tang of her life…that stirred a dark force deep inside me that I was all too familiar with.

  I wanted her--hard and fast, up against the nearest wall, driving into her until she screamed in ecstasy and took everything that I had. And then I wanted her again, over and over, until all the barriers between us were gone and nothing was left except the stark honesty of our nee
d for each other.

  But first--

  She wanted truth and I wanted to give it. But I didn’t have the words, not then, for something that I had never experienced before in my life and didn’t know how to make sense of. All I could do was show her.

  My hands shook, slipping under her skirt, over her slim, taut thighs to find the little scrap of lace between them. A groan broke from me when I felt her dampness.

  Clasping her hips, I eased her skirt up to her leather-clinched waist. She gasped but didn’t resist. Nor did she object when I turned her around so that we were both facing the glass doors that led out onto the terrace. Lavender and pink remnants of the sunset still clung to the western horizon but above the long swathe of Central Park the sky was a pewter dome opaque enough to hide the stars.

  Every city I had ever been in was the same, an isolated enclave interconnected with one another but cut off from the wider world. At least on Malta, and a few other places that I frequented, it was still possible to see beyond ourselves.

  Breathing in Grace’s scent, I murmured, “Keep your eyes open.” Gently, I pushed her panties aside, baring her to me. Her cunt was pink, soft and glistening. Ignoring the painful hardness of my cock, I parted her and flicked my index finger over her clit.

  She moaned, the sound at once sweet and plaintive. Her hands fluttered before settling on mine at her waist where I held her and below. I waited through one heartbeat and the next for her to push me away. When she didn’t, I began again, stroking her slowly at first, then more deliberately. Our hands moved as one, hers riding on mine.

  “See how beautiful you are,” I said as her head fell back and she moaned again. She was close, very close. The coiling tension in her body fueled my own. I thrust my thumb deeply into her, rotating it as I pressed down hard on her clit. She was so exquisitely primed and so sensitive to my touch that very little more was needed. The spasms of her release, coming with brutal swiftness, went on and on.

  When they subsided at last, I dropped my head against the curve of her shoulder but continued holding her upright. A strange sort of relief filled me, at once elated yet humbling. The faith I had received in childhood was more formal than real, a matter of ritual to be locked away again along with the candles and censors as soon as the mass was done. But just then I felt a rush of gratitude so overwhelming and uplifting as to qualify as prayer.

  However profane that might be, I couldn’t regret it no matter what came next.

  I was staring at our dark reflections framed in the glass door when the blessedly real Grace, flesh and bone, fire and heat, turned in my arms. Her fingertips skimmed my cheek where she had slapped me, lingering over the precise spot where the skin still stung. I stayed very still, wondering what she was thinking. At times, her expression was so open and guileless but not just then. I sensed a debate raging within her, the contents of which remained a maddening mystery.

  Just as I was confronting the possibility that she could still decide to leave, she dropped her hand down along my chest to the bulge between my thighs. My breath sucked in. I was so painfully aroused, so desperate for her that only the weight of profound regret and guilt for what I had done to her held me still.

  Looking up, she met my gaze through the thick fringe of lashes that guarded her own. “No lies,” she said and pushed firmly against my shoulders, stepping forward as she did so and nudging me backward.

  When my legs brushed against the Chesterfield couch, I sat and was rewarded with a smile. Tossing the silken fall of her hair back over her shoulder, Grace straddled me. Her skirt was still drawn up around her waist, her lovely cunt glistening with her arousal.

  I knew her as a deeply passionate, sensual woman but now she surprised me. Her boldness was unbounded. Without hesitation, she unzipped my trousers and freed my cock. A groan of relief broke from me but the sensation was short lived.

  Hovering above me, she stripped off her sweater and tossed it aside. Beneath, she wore a pale lacy bra that matched the scrap of fabric between her legs. Arching her back, she cupped her breasts, her thumbs teasing her hardened nipples.

  A spurt of pre-come oozed from me. Deep in my chest, a warning growl broke loose. “Grace…”

  “Be quiet,” she said. As my eyebrows arched, so did hers in mock imitation of my surprise. “We can talk later. Right now, I only want to hear what your body says.”

  Between gritted teeth, I managed to state the obvious. “It says I’m about to come.”

  “Not yet.” Wrapping her hand around the base of my cock, she squeezed. I gasped as the desperate need for release shot back through my groin and straight up my spine to what passed for my brain.

  The sensation of tightness and intense engorgement was an exquisite torment. To add to it, she lowered herself slowly until her hot, wet sex rubbed against my shaft, coating me with her own nectar.

  “Christ…Grace!”

  Ignoring me, she swayed, restraining my cock with one hand while with the other she rubbed my crest over and around her swollen clit. I stared at the intensely erotic sight with mixed feelings--aroused beyond bearing yet also marveling at her audacity.

  I--Adam Falzon--was being taken, toyed with, used for this woman’s pleasure. Incredible!

  There would have to be a reckoning, of course, but for the moment I was content to let her have her way. Or at least as content as I could be given the build-up of semen that threatened to blow off the back of my skull.

  Just when I thought that I couldn’t possibly stand anything more, she lowered herself onto me far enough to clasp my tip within her hot, tight cunt before rising again, perfectly balanced, one hand holding me firmly, the other teasing her nipple while she swayed in an ancient dance, tormenting me ruthlessly…

  Enough! I shouted the word but only in my mind. Through an effort of will that I wouldn’t have believed possible, I remained silent. She wanted to hear what my body had to say? Fine then, I would let it speak--of patient desire, endless endurance, above all of the willingness to give her anything and everything that she needed.

  If it killed me, well then… My fevered mind darted around for any distraction that might help me hold on. It settled in a most unlikely place, some ancient joke about an undertaker needing a week to get the grin off a priapic corpse’s face.

  “You’re smiling,” Grace said, her tone at least mildly accusatory.

  “I’m not; it’s a grimace. You’re killing me.”

  She laughed, the sound a delight to hear despite my suffering, and lowered herself a little more. I watched, entranced as she rode me. It was a novelty, to be sure, this experience of being little more than a means to an end. Honesty forced me to admit that I was accustomed to being on the other side in any such transaction. But Grace was so beautiful, so entrancing and the clasp of her tight, demanding cunt was so…

  She was close to coming again, her head thrown back, the muscles of her abdomen rippling. But damn, the woman was nothing if not focused. Her grip on my cock didn’t lessen.

  Until, abruptly, it did. As the first spasms of orgasm hit her, she freed me at last.

  I shouted--something garbled but certainly obscene and grasped her hips. A wave of release more powerful than any I had ever known crashed over me. Even as I succumbed to it, I clung to the raw intimacy of what we had just shared as savagely as I clung to Grace herself.

  Chapter Nine

  I didn’t remember getting to the bedroom. Adam must have carried me, just as he must have stripped off the rest of my clothes before drawing the covers over us both. When I awoke deep in the night, his naked body was twined around mine. I lay for a time, turned on my side, feeling the weight of his arm and thigh thrown over me as though even in sleep he wanted to keep me from slipping away.

  Before I could think about that the sheer daring of what I had done crashed in on me. Even more stunning was the fact that Adam had allowed it.

  When had he last put himself in another person’s hands? Allowed someone else to have control, especi
ally in such a profoundly intimate way? Above all, what was I to make of his actions beyond the fact that they spoke far more loudly than any words? The possible answers were too fraught, heavy with hope that I was still too afraid to acknowledge.

  The stickiness of his semen and my own juices between my thighs distracted me. I slipped from the bed, careful not to disturb him. In the lavishly appointed bathroom, I stood under the shower and let a sense of relief wash over me. It was likely to be short-lived but while it lasted I savored it.

  When I returned to the bedroom, wrapped in a white terrycloth robe that I found neatly folded on a shelf, Adam was still asleep. I stood, gazing down at him. No lights were on in the room but the ambient light of the never-sleeping city, filtering through the curtains, illuminated him. The covers had slipped below his waist, revealing the sculpted perfection of his torso.

  Such a beautiful man. Such a twisted past, bent under the weight of tragedy. As for the unknowable future--

  I tore my eyes from the rise and fall of his breathing and padded on bare feet into the kitchen. It was well appointed with the added sheen of being rarely used. I found herbal tea in a cupboard, dropped a bag into water and stuck both in the microwave, pulling them out again before the timer could sound. The robe I had put on was far too big; I had to push the sleeves up before I could hold the cup.

  Nestled in a wingback chair in the living room, my knees folded to my chin, I fought a cowardly impulse to find my clothes and slip away. I had what I had come for after all. The explanation as to why Adam had done what he had. A shiver ran through me as I contemplated Uncle Ned’s fate, however well deserved. But I also couldn’t help wondering what Grandmother had in store for me, the unwitting cause of what had befallen her baby boy. Nothing good, I was sure.

  In the three weeks since I had returned to New York, I had spoken with my parents precisely once. A mother might have thought to stay in touch with the daughter who had been kidnapped and subjected to such duress but mine had remained aloof and silent.