Page 54 of Cruel Pleasures

I’ve never done well with taking orders. Mom used to lose her shit and knock me upside the head whenever I mouthed off. She’d put all of her frustration into the smack and scream at me to shut up. She’d screech with strained vocal cords about how I refused to behave myself like Kendra and Jamila. Even Balinda, the youngest, was better behaved.

But Mom didn’t understand that I was craving attention and affection. For once, I wanted to be seen and heard. I wanted to be cared for…

The only way I could get noticed was when I made myself stand out.

I don’t back down often for this reason.

That includes times where I’m facing off with men who look like they snap people’s necks for fun. Did he have something to do with Talia’s murder?

You’d think this would make me run for the hills. My hard head doesn’t let me. Instead, I double down.

“Ask me nicely and I’ll consider leaving,” I reply.

The man reacts as soon as the last word leaves my lips. He leaps from the bed of jagged rocks and surges toward me. Though I remain rooted in the sand, I’m not immune to the instant affect his proximity has on me. Sensory responses that I can’t control.

Fear unfurls inside me and makes me second guess my decision to challenge him.

It’s too late now. I’m on his radar. His target that he strides toward with dark fury clenching onto his chiseled face. He’s like an angel of death descending on me. Grim circumstance dressed up as a man with a taut jaw and violent energy. His long black coat billows behind him thanks to the beachy winds.

If I had any sense of self-preservation, I’d still try to make my escape. I’d run away or take my chances in the water fizzing at the shore. Which says a lot considering I can’t swim…

But I remain where I am. Despite how unsettled I feel, I stay in place and wait for his wrath.

He comes up so close, I could reach out and touch him. I can practically feel the darkness in him. Some kind of menacing aura that enshrouds him permanently. Wherever he goes, whatever he does, it’s an intrinsic part of him as much as the brain in his head and heart beating in his chest.

All thought is wiped out. I stare up at him and feel like I’m peering into a dark mirror. The twisted reflection shines back at me in his black eyes.

Just when I’m uncertain what he’ll do—if he’ll strike me or hurt me in some way—he cracks a grin. His lips twist, though the humor never alters the rest of his chiseled face. It’s a grin that’s cruel, cold, and isolated.

“I understand now,” he says.

“Understand what?”

“You won’t give up anytime soon.” He looks me up and down. His dark, narrowed eyes flit over every inch of my body and the fear inside me pulses harder.

In my heart and veins. Stalled in my lungs and knotted in my belly.

A solitary pull between my thighs. The clench of air my pussy gives on its own.

What the fuck is wrong with you?! Get a hold on yourself! This guy is BAD news!

“Yes,” he says after another second passes, then he begins circling me. “I see it all over you. You’ve got it in that stubborn little head of yours.”

“W-what?” I try to follow him, but he’s fast and fluid. He moves weightlessly like a ghost.

“You convinced yourself you can do it. And nothing will change that.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“It’ll be entertaining. But if you had any common sense about you, you’d see what’s staring you in the face.”

“And that would be—hey, get back here!”

He’s bypassed me, striding for the large house in the distance. My feet sink into the tiny granular sand trying to chase after him.

But he gives every indication our conversation is over. He doesn’t turn around and he says nothing else. He disappears between hedges that lead into the gardens. Finally giving up, I stumble to a stop, almost dropping the pair of shoes I’m clutching.

“You’re going to have to be more specific!” I yell after him.