Page 56 of His to Possess

“Stop!” she cries, her voice suddenly filled with fear. She releases her hands from the headboard. Before I can even think of chastising her for letting go, she’s scurrying backwards across the bed, away from me.

My heart drops to the floor. Did I do something wrong? Did I hurt her?

“Not your fingers,” she says, still sounding scared. “You can’t.”

“Love,” I murmur, at a loss. “It will only sting for a moment. You’re so wet it won’t—”

“I don’t care about the pain!” she says, wrapping her arms around her middle. “We can’t…I wasn’t thinking. You felt so good and I was so carried away and—”

“Wait.” I hold up a hand to stop her babble, needing to know exactly what the fuck she’s talking about. “What’s wrong?”

“The exam,” she whispers, eyes wide. “I can’t…. you can’t touch me like that, Philip.”

It takes a full twenty seconds for her words to make any damn sense, and when they do, I want to break something. Or maybe throw up.

“The fucking virginity exam? At Club Rendezvous?”

She nods hurriedly. “I need to be…intact. They’ll check me before…” she trails off, and I’m grateful. I’m honestly not sure what I would have done if the wordsthe next auctionhad left her mouth.

I stare at her for a long moment, bile rising in my throat. “You still don’t trust me.”

Her eyes go even wider. “That’s not true.”

“Then why the hell do you think you’re going to need to have that god damn exam? Why the fuck would you think you’re going anywhere near Club Rendezvous on Saturday?”

“I just…” she looks close to tears, her face red and blotchy. “What if you decide not to…you know.”

“To fuck you?” I snap, not caring when she winces. I don’t think I’ve ever been this angry.

“Yes,” she whispers. “You said you weren’t going to. You said it several times, in fact. If you don’t…the contract…”

“Then I’ll just give you the damn money, Lilah!”

Her shoulders straighten, some of the pain going out of her expression, replaced with steely determination. “I’m not taking your money for nothing.”

“But you’d take it to sell me your body?”

The steely look falters, her head jerking back the slightest bit. “What’s the difference?” she asks. “You’re telling me you’ll just give me the money as if there won’t be any expectations attached? Yeah, right.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“Think about it, Philip! Let’s say I tear up the contract and take your money. Is that the end of it? You’ll want me to just walk out the door?”

“No,” I snarl. “Of course not. This…” I wave a hand at her nearly naked body. “There’s something here, Lilah.”

“So this will continue,” she says, voice tight. “We’ll keep fooling around, we’ll have sex. And then it amounts to the same thing!”

I shake my head, trying to follow this insane logic. “It’s not the same thing at all.”

“We’ll be having sex and you’ll be paying me. Tell me how that’s not the same.”

I tug at my hair, frustrated as all hell. She’s twisting this around, making it into something nasty. And it’s not. “I won’t be paying youforthe sex,” I bite out, but the distinction sounds feeble.

“But youwillhave paid me. Do you honestly think you won’t expect anything for that?”

“Of course not! The only thing I expect from the women I fuck is a damn good time.”

She narrows her eyes at me. “And I’m sure they all deliver.”