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Eighteen

Aidan

There are cracks in Maddie’s walls, but she can’t let herself give in to me. She doesn’t like what it might say about her, but she wants to. I can feel it. All she has to do is let me in.

We both know that if we’d met in any other way... if the first time she’d met me was in that alleyway, I could have had her eating out of the palm of my hand inside of a week. Even with that dramatic introduction, she was halfway to giving herself to me in the car that night. But Maddie has pride.

Don’t get me wrong, I would be entirely repulsed by a woman who had no standards or boundaries or sense of personal pride and self-respect, but it feels artificially erected. Performance art at this point.

Who is watching any of this unfold but us? Why does she need to put on a strong front, keep her guard up? For what? I have her. And eventually we will consummate this marriage.

If she were able to sway me… if I could find any warmth or mercy in my heart…

as long as we didn’t consummate, she could hold onto the tiniest sliver of hope that I’d let her out of this marriage.

I’m sure there’s some unlikely reality in which I would allow her to leave this union and go back to her life without me.

But once we seal this deal completely... once I have her virgin blood, there will be no backing out. I would never give her a divorce after that. Marriage is a sacrament, and it is forever, no matter what flighty modern minds might think about it. Don’t want that chain? Don’t put it on.

Not that Maddie had much of a choice. Still. I won’t take her until she begs me, so she does have some measure of choice, and I have made that clear. As long as she can resist me, her cage door remains the slightest bit open, and hope springs eternal for her eventual release.

We finish lunch by sharing Le Sel’s salted dark chocolate ganache tart. I pay the bill and we make our way back in the boat to the mainland. We don’t talk. We didn’t talk much while we ate either, except for Maddie’s defensive snark.

But as we walk down the boardwalk back toward the car, I slip my hand into hers, and she doesn’t pull away.

I think touch is her language. It’s mine, too.

When I try with the words, I mess it up.

And she doesn’t want to say anything emotionally vulnerable.

And who can blame her? I’m no one’s Prince Charming.

Can two people know each other even if they don’t use a lot of words? How many childhood stories do we owe each other before we can confidently say we’re close? What are the requirements for love? Is it time? Shared hardship? Telling each other secrets?

I don’t know if I can ever tell her my secrets. They would only push us farther apart. I wave Vinny away and open the car door for her myself.

By the time we reach the exclusive shopping district, Maddie has fallen asleep against me.

I nudge her. “Maddie, wake up.”

She seems self-conscious when she realizes where she is and that she was sleeping against me. She wipes the back of her mouth as if to make sure she didn’t drool all over me. She didn’t.

“Are we home?”

Has she accepted my estate is her home, or is it just a less cumbersome thing to say?

“No. I wanted to take you shopping.”

She looks suspicious as though I’ve planted a bomb in one of the stores, but she allows me to help her out of the car.

I spend the afternoon flashing my black card.

Maddie models clothes and shoes and jewelry, and I buy her whatever she wants.

At the last designer boutique, I follow her into the dressing room.

It’s a large space and the door goes all the way down to the floor and locks so nobody can look under or just walk in.

I take the pile of clothes out of her arms and drop them on the small love seat.

“Aidan…”

It’s an uncertain response to me shoving her against the wall. My mouth finds her neck easily, and she puts up only the smallest token resistance, the light push against my chest, just enough so we can both remember she “resisted” when it’s all said and done.

But when my mouth moves to hers, I’m not the one devouring and consuming. She is. I take a step back from her and pull a small black tube from my pocket.

She eyes it warily as I unscrew the lid. “What’s that?”

“Love Potion number 9.”

“Funny,” she says.

“Don’t believe me?”

Brian gave me a box of this arousal cream as a wedding gift.

It’s incredibly potent. That really is the name of it.

They use it in their training methods at The Pleasure House—a business he’s part owner of that trains willing women as submissives for wealthy men who are into that sort of thing.

He offered to train someone for me to get my mind off Maddie a few years ago, but I declined.

Then he offered to take and train Maddie, and that’s the closest I’ve ever come to killing Brian. But he couldn’t have known about my mother.

“Take your pants off.”

“Aidan…” She glances toward the door.

“No one can come in. And I won’t let you get too loud.”

She bites her lip, and I can see the moment she makes the decision and unbuttons the slinky beige pants, letting them fall to the ground. I help her step out of them.

She goes for the panties, and I shake my head.

“Keep them on. I can’t take that much temptation right now.” I’m certainly not going to deflower her in a dressing room, no matter how upscale.

I squeeze some of the cream onto my finger and slide my hand inside her panties to apply it to her pussy.

“Lock the door behind me. I’ll be right back.”

I go to the bathroom to wash the cream off my hands. Brian said it takes about fifteen minutes to reach full effect and I want her to be close to the edge before I return.

When it’s had time to work its magic, I return to the dressing area.

“How is everything in there? Is she finding anything she likes?” one of the sales clerks asks. “Do you need any other sizes?”

“Could you get us one size down in the green pants, and one size up in the white silk top?”

“Of course, Mr. Stryker.”

The sizes we got are probably just fine, but sending the attendant away with a task buys us a bit more time.

I knock on the door to Maddie’s dressing room.

“Yes?” she says, sounding very unlike herself.

“Maddie, it’s me.”

She unlocks the door and I step in, locking it behind me. She looks disheveled, her hands running over her own body like she’s in heat. All of her clothes have somehow made it onto the floor.

“Aidan, what did you do to me… what is this?”

I press her back against the wall and hold her arms over her head against the wall as she strains to straddle my leg and rub herself against me.

“Please…” she whines, “Please, Aidan I need you inside me.”

Jesus. What the fuck is in this cream? I want her, but this isn’t the ideal place for her first time, and I know that. It should be special, romantic. There should be candles and soft music… but I am so tempted. I let my gaze roam over her and what she’s offering.

And suddenly I have an attack of conscience because if I take her right now like this she’ll accuse me of raping her. And I’m not sure she’d be wrong. This might be a fun thing to play with later, but right now… I know it’s not right.

I cup her cheek. “Maddie, I can’t.”

Her eyes blaze with fury. “What? What do you mean you can’t? Get your pants off and fuck me right now, Aidan Stryker!” she hisses.

“You’re not in your right mind. It’s like you’re drunk.”

“I’m not fucking drunk, I just need…” she groans as she rubs against me.

I press my leg hard against her pussy, letting her straddle me more fully. Maybe a compromise? “Get yourself off. And don’t you dare take your eyes off mine.”

She holds my gaze as she rubs feverishly against my leg to get herself off. When she comes, I hold my hand against her mouth to keep her quiet. In the middle of it, the sales clerk knocks on the door.

“Just a minute,” I say, not taking my gaze from Maddie’s.

Her moans are muffled behind my hand as she grinds harder against me. It almost undoes me. Finally, she finishes, and I take a deep, calming breath and step away. She sags against the wall, trying to get herself together.

I go to the door and carefully block the clerks view as I take the clothes from her.

Maddie doesn’t try anything on in this store. I help her get back into her clothes and tell her we’ll buy everything. I’ll return anything that doesn’t fit later.