Page 4

Talon

I am lying in bed, listening to Delaney sob on the other side of that goddamn door, and it hurts. I did that to her, and I can’t fix it. I stole her out of her home, albeit a shitty one. I brought her here so I can force her to marry me, but I fucked her into actual pain. Real tears. I know she is hurting physically and emotionally, but I can’t fix it. I can’t undo anything without appearing to be weak. After a while, she is quiet. I can only assume she is cleaning up right now. Instead of looking like I am just laying here waiting on her, I roll to my side to face away from where she will lie. A few seconds later, she quietly tiptoes out of the bathroom.

She shuts off her bedside lamp and is undoubtedly curled up in a little ball on the very edge of the bed to stay as far away from me as she can. I can’t blame her. I’d try to stay away from me too. When her breathing evens out, I turn my light back on and gently roll to face her. To my surprise, she is near the middle and facing me. She must have rolled early in her sleep, and I just didn’t notice. I can’t imagine why she’d want to be this close to me. Not after what I did to her.

I gently brush the hair from her face and anger washes over me when I see the bruise. She took her makeup off, and now there is a visible black eye. I want so badly to be a good husband to her, but I don’t know how to do that without destroying myself. I want her to know that she is safe and Logan will never hurt her again. All I know to do is to get her the physical things she needs and be faithful. I can’t offer love, but I can learn to support her and to promote her growing stronger. I want her to be strong enough that she has the power to leave me but chooses to stay. For once in my life, I just want to be wanted.

I slowly open my eyes and find that my head is on Delaney’s chest and my arms are wrapped around her body. She has one arm under me to wrap around so her hand is resting on my upper back while her other hand is resting on my shoulder. I have one leg hooked over the top of hers. Her breathing is even, so I take a second to listen to the thumping of her heart. It’s soothing in a way that I don’t understand, and that scares me.

Before I get too lost in this, I slowly unwrap myself from her. When I go to pull my arm out from under her, she curls her face up and grunts in her sleep before rolling into my chest. She snuggles close and settles with a sigh. Fuck, that’s adorable. How am I supposed to deny her this comfort? I shouldn’t lead her to believe that I am capable of love, because I’m not. She might not ever be able to escape me, but I still want her to be happy. Why do I care if she’s happy? She is just my revenge fuck.

Damnit, Talon. No. You are not her. You are not heartless. It wouldn’t fucking kill me just to let her have this. It’s admittedly nice. Here in just a few hours, she is going to be my wife. So what if I let my wife cuddle up to me in the privacy of our bedroom? Isn’t that normal even in loveless relationships? Did Dad and Cheryl cuddle the night before she murdered him? Probably not.

“Laney,” I say softly. I noticed that she scares easily, so I’m trying not to get punched in the face because I scared her. I gently squeeze her shoulder before rubbing down the length of her arm and back up. Her eyes suddenly snap open, and she throws herself away from me.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” she says. I grab her and pull her back to me so I can cup her cheek. Her entire body is trembling, and it doesn’t faze her. It’s like the most normal thing to her.

“Don’t apologize,” I tell her. “Did you sleep okay?”

“Yeah,” she whispers.

“Look,” I say, pausing for a second to collect my thoughts. “Last night, I was extremely hard on you. I have a lot of pent-up anger from Logan, but I shouldn’t have taken that out on you. So, for that, I am sorry.”

“It’s okay,” she says softly.

“How did you get the black eye?” I ask.

“Logan,” she says. “He uh… likes his clothes hung up a certain way.”

“He punches you for not hanging his clothes up correctly?” I ask, and she nods.

“Can I ask something?”

“You can,” I say as I prop up on my elbow to look down at her.

“Logan said you were in a gang?” she asks. “I lied at dinner last night. They never talk about you. He made you sound dangerous… Deadly really.”

“I suppose you could call us a gang,” I say. “We are more like a club. Just a group of like-minded people who like to ride motorcycles. We are involved in dangerous things like selling weapons and gambling. On occasion we loan money with heavy interest.”

“Have you killed anyone?” she asks.

“I have,” I pause. “Many people, actually. Why?”

“Are you ever going to kill me?” she nearly whispers. Her eyes look up at me like some terrified puppy. It’s the cutest look on her. My eyes drop to her lips, wanting them, but I resist and meet her gaze.

“No, Little Flower,” I say. “As long as you never try to hurt me, and you remain faithful, we will not have an issue.”

“Can you really go forever only fucking me?” she asks.

“Laney, I would live buried inside your pussy if I could,” I say, making her smile brightly. Fuck, she is so damn beautiful when she smiles. She should want to run from me. “You are the only one I will ever have sex with.”

“Good,” she says. “I don’t like sharing.”

“Me either,” I smirk. “Did you want to fuck last night, or was that assault? I was so caught up in my emotions that it was hard for me to slow down and pay attention.”

“I did want it,” she says. “You seem to enjoy when I fight. At the end, I was in pain, but I kept fighting anyway. I’m sore today, but it’s not a big deal.”

“You were crying before you came to bed. Why?” I ask. She starts to shut down and no longer makes eye contact with me. “Laney…”

“Can I be honest?” she asks.

“Please.”

“I feel like you are going to hurt me,” she says. “Not physically, I don’t think, but emotionally… You’re cold and indifferent and I wish I could be like you. If I didn’t care, then it wouldn’t hurt so badly to be used.”

“You think I use you?” I ask.

“Well, aren’t you?” she snaps. “You just want revenge on Logan. I am just a warm body to fuck and a presence to keep around to serve you. You don’t want me; you want what I can do for you.”

She’s wrong, but I don’t know how to explain it. “I have a lot of learning to do, Laney. I’ve never been interested in marriage until… Well until you walked into that house. I don’t date women. I just fuck them and move on, but I don’t want to do that this time. I want revenge, yes, but it’s more than just stealing you from him. It’s taking you and making you happier than he could have ever imagined. Only now I’m learning that he didn’t care about your happiness. I don’t know what he gained by keeping you, but I do know that I want to make you happy, and I want to take care of you.”

“My parents gave me to him,” she says. “They were merging their company with his and marrying me was how they were going to accomplish that… But now… I don’t know.”

“An arranged marriage?” I ask. “That makes sense.”

“Why? Because someone like him wouldn’t pick someone like me?” she asks harshly.

“No,” I frown. “Well… kinda. He wouldn’t pick the nice girl. He would choose someone already trained to be subservient. You… are not subservient.”

“Then what am I?” she asks with an attitude.

The chuckle bursts out of me. “A brat. You aren’t comfortable yet, but when you are… You are going to push me just for the sake of being punished.”

“Why would I want to be punished?”

“Because your punishment for being a brat to me will not be how Logan punished you for existing,” I say. “You smart off to me… and I’ll throat fuck you. Or maybe I’ll bend you over and fuck you to tears. Piss me off, and maybe I’ll tie you down and make you come so many times that you pass out only to wake up with my cock buried inside of you. Really fuck up and I’ll hold you down and fuck your ass while you beg for mercy.”

She is nearly panting as I talk, clearly liking the idea of being punished. “So… I think… you should go fuck yourself then,” she says with a playful smile that grows exponentially when I smile back at her.

“Laney, you are wanted here. My reasoning might stem from my hatred of Logan, but I still want you. I want you to want me. I don’t want to have to drag you to get married today. I want you to marry me out of spite for him. I am cold and heartless, but I will never hurt you. I expect you to bend for me, but I will never break you. I will build you up and pray that you stay with me.”

“You want to be loved,” she whispers.

“But I am not capable of love. Far too much has happened to me for me to be close to someone on that level. I cannot even promise that an hour from now I won’t be an asshole to you. Just keep in mind that I will never cause you harm. I will never let anyone hurt you.”

“So… Do as you say but prepare to get fucked if I push back?” she asks.

“Yes.”

“And don’t expect you to show that you give a fuck when around others?” she asks, and I raise an eyebrow at her. “I don’t know who made you think you were heartless, but you’re not.”

“How do you figure?”

“If you were heartless, you wouldn’t care about my happiness,” she says. “You wouldn’t have clung to me all night through endless nightmares if you were heartless. Talon… I don’t know what they did to you, but I understand more than you know. I could have easily walked out of this house and far away from you last night, but I chose to stay and hold you through your nightmares. I will keep choosing that as long as you don’t hurt me. I still think you will hurt me emotionally, but I’ve been through far worse.”

I look up and see Viper standing in the doorway, leaning on the doorframe. “We should get ready,” I say dismissively as I get out of bed.

“Morning,” Viper says, making Delaney snap her head to the door and pull the covers up to her neck. “I brought you some clothing, Delaney.”

“Uh… Thanks,” she says.

“We’ll meet you downstairs,” I say to Viper. He nods and leaves the room, shutting the door behind him. Delaney gets out of bed, and I notice that she winces a bit. “Sore?”

“You have a huge dick,” she remarks. “And I’m not exactly used to getting my cervix pummeled.”

“No?” I laugh.

“Logan would… he would only hurt me with anal. He’d make me bleed,” she says. “When Vince would rape me, he would hurt me a bit, but it was mostly emotional.”

I understand her pain more than she, or anyone, knows. My nights are filled with memories of Vince holding me down and raping me while my mother laid on the bed beside us, pretending to be asleep. Logan knew what his father did to me, and instead of helping or showing he cared, he chose to make fun of me crying and bleeding. He was just happy it wasn’t him shitting out his father’s come.

These memories sometimes come in flashes and cloud my thinking. It’s hard for me to function when all I can think about or feel around me is Vince. I try to shove it all down and let it stay packed away, but standing here looking at this woman, I realize that I need to get out of this room and away from her before I make things worse. All I do is just escalate things and I never know how to come back from it. The thought of hurting her more than I already have is not something I want to consider. She already thinks I am a monster.

“Get dressed,” I say flatly, pointing to a bag in the armchair. She sighs, a frown on her face, and walks over to it to get dressed. I take my attention off her and find something to wear. Maybe if I keep pretending that Vince didn’t violate me, my mind will stop reminding my body what it felt like to be helpless.

These memories are going to destroy her and I both if I don’t find a way to process them.