Beautiful Liar Page 5

  “No. I didn’t. I mean, I wouldn’t.”

  “Take your tits out of the cup.”

  “What?”

  “You sound like a broken record.”

  My cock pressed against my jeans, and I threw my drink back.

  I’d always been a hands-on sort of guy, and the thought of getting my hands on MacKayla’s sweet little tits was one I couldn’t resist. When I stood, she made to move backward, but I caught her around the waist and shook my head.

  “Stay.”

  It was her turn to wet her lips, and she nodded, shuddering a little as her gaze followed my hands up to cup her breasts.

  “Pretty, MacKayla.”

  Her nipples hardened almost instantly beneath my thumbs, and I had the urge to lean down and close my mouth over one. When I did, she gasped and fell back a step, making me tighten my hold on her as her hands came to my shoulders. I moaned as I sucked, drawing her nipples out, the lace rough between us. I then straightened a little, met her gaze, and took each of her wrists in my hands and moved them behind her, transferring both wrists into my left hand as I leaned my head back down to lick her neck, her collarbone. She shuddered. I sucked her other breast, taking it almost whole in my mouth before drawing it out until it was just the pebbled nipple between my teeth.

  She sucked in a breath, and when I straightened, I saw she’d taken her lower lip between her teeth, and her pupils had dilated. I walked her backward with me into the kitchen, where I opened a drawer to retrieve the rope I’d stored there. She watched but didn’t struggle as I turned her around to face the counter and pushed her forward so she bent over it. My gaze moved to her lace-clad ass, and I couldn’t help but run a hand over one hip as I pressed her more firmly into the counter. That was when she did struggle, at least a little, or maybe for her the effort was great, but she was too small to make any impact.

  “Be still. You’ll be bound.”

  “No. I’ll do as you say. I promise.”

  “I don’t care what you promise, and I have no doubt you will do as I say.” I wrapped the rope around and between her wrists, tightening it but making sure it was safe. Once finished, I righted her and turned her to face me, taking the opportunity to kiss her mouth as she struggled against the bonds. “Besides, I just like to do it, MacKayla. I like to see rope around your wrists. Around your ankles, spreading your legs wide.” I leaned in close to rub the scruff of my jaw against her face. “Just be happy it isn’t your pretty little neck.” As I said it, I wrapped one hand over her throat and caressed the wildly beating pulse with my thumb. She stared up at me, fear returning to her eyes again.

  “You won’t hurt me,” she said, although from the look in her eyes, she wasn’t so sure.

  I smiled, walked her back into the living room, and placed her before my chair. I released her. “Stay.” I pointed at the modifications I’d made to the house. Two hooks hung from the ceiling. Her eyes widened when she saw them. “Or I’ll make you stay, understand?”

  She looked at me and nodded.

  “Good girl. Now, when I tell you to take your tits out of your bra,” I started, cupping the small mounds again. “I expect you to obey. This lace is too pretty to take off entirely.” It only took me a moment to bare those beautiful breasts, my fingers working to lift the mounds out and tuck the lace beneath each one. “There. Now that’s better.” I resumed my seat, took hold of her hips, and pulled her closer, the scent of her hanging between us. Reaching forward, I kissed her belly button, licking around her piercing—a rhinestone shaped like a heart—before moving lower, leaving butterfly kisses down toward her pussy, remembering the taste of her, remembering how I’d come in my fucking hand to the memory of her pussy under my tongue.

  “Now these, too, are pretty,” I said, tracing the waistband of the panties. “But I prefer them off.” I watched her face as I lowered them, letting them fall to the floor. “Step out.” She did, and I picked up the scrap of fabric, bringing it to my nose. “You’re hot for me, aren’t you, MacKayla? Hot for me to make you come?” She didn’t answer, and I tossed the panties aside. “Put your right leg up on the arm of the chair and show me your pussy.”

  Her mouth fell open, a pink flush creeping up her neck.

  “Go on, MacKayla. I want to see your pussy.”

  “I…”

  “Your boss at the club may allow you to keep on that string of a panty, but I won’t. I want it all, up close and personal. Up, girl.”

  She swallowed, then slowly raised her leg up, the lips of her pussy gaping, the scent of her arousal filling my nostrils, making me want.

  A sniffle made me look up at her face, which was a mistake. As soon as my eyes met hers, she shifted her gaze and leaned her face into her shoulder, trying to wipe away the fallen tear. I watched her as more tears slid quietly down her cheeks, and she began to tremble.

  She was a stripper. Used to having people look at her. What the fuck was this?

  “Don’t play games with me.”

  “I’m not playing games,” she muttered under her breath.

  “You’re a fucking stripper. You get naked in front of a room full of people when you’re dancing.”

  “That’s different. I’m on a stage, and when I’m onstage, I can block them all out. I don’t even see them with the lights trained on me. They don’t know me. They can’t touch me. They can’t hurt me.”

  “You asked me if I was going to rape you. Are you scared?”

  She watched me, then shrugged. “I don’t know. One minute, I’m scared, then the next, I look into your eyes, and I know you won’t hurt me, even if it is what I deserve.”

  Even if it is what I deserve.

  I’d expected her to be cold. Uncaring. To not give a shit about what she’d done. The fact that she was the opposite of those things threw me.

  “Don’t be so sure, MacKayla.” I didn’t mean it, even I knew that, but I was losing ground.

  Disgusted with myself, with my weakness, I pushed her leg off the chair and stood, taking her by the shoulders. Our eyes met and locked in a shared pain, one I hadn’t expected. One I wasn’t prepared for.

  “Get on your fucking knees.” I couldn’t stand to look at her, not at her face, her eyes.

  She shook her head. “Slater, please.”

  I squeezed her shoulders, steeling myself, and forced her down. She resisted, opening her mouth to speak, to beg, but I tugged her hair hard, making her scream instead.

  “Shut up, Mac. You owe me this.”

  “Don’t do this. You don’t want to.”

  Was it my weakness she’d seen? My desire? My fucking humanity that had her pleading? I should hurt her. I deserved my revenge. Goddamn it, I deserved something!

  “I said shut up!”

  I left her and went into the kitchen to dig through the same drawer where I’d kept the rope to find something to gag her with. I should have done this from the start. I didn’t want to hear her speak. I didn’t need to hear her beg. Only scream. I only wanted to hear her scream.

  When I returned, she looked at the strip of cloth in my hand and shook her head, keeping her lips sealed. With one hand, I pinched her nose shut, forcing her to open her mouth in order to breathe, and when she did, I shoved the cloth into her mouth and wrapped it around her head, knotting it in place, silencing her.

  “You owe me, you said so yourself.” I kicked the chair out of the way, making her jump, her scream muffled by the gag. “Get your face down. Face fucking down. Forehead on the floor, Mac. Now.” I walked to the far wall and turned away momentarily, raking a hand through my hair. “I don’t want to see your eyes. I don’t want to hear your voice.”

  Because I can’t take your crying.

  But I left that part out. What the fuck was wrong with me? This was what I was here for. What I’d been waiting years for. What in fuck’s name was wrong with me?

  She obeyed, dropping her forehead to the floor, her arms bound behind her back. I could hear her weeping, and I slammed a fist
into the wall, squeezing my eyes shut, thinking of what she’d done, of how much I’d lost. It took time, but in those minutes, she quieted, and when I opened my eyes, she watched me, her left cheek on the floor, her face streaked with tears, her eyes wide. My jaw tightened and my eyes narrowed. I returned to her, and as I did, she scrambled to rise, although where she thought she was going, I hadn’t a clue. I caught up with her before she could get up and knelt behind her, forcing her head back down, keeping one hand in her hair to keep her forehead connected with the floor. With my other hand, I undid my belt, opening it and my pants. She stilled at the sound, and I knew she held her breath in anticipation, in her expectation of a horrendous crime.

  “Now are you scared?”

  She shook her head, still stubborn even while she trembled.

  “Stay,” I said, releasing her head.

  She didn’t move, and I shifted my gaze to her ass, my hand trailing over the bumps of her spine. I could see all of her in this position, her pink cunt, her dark little asshole. Fisting my cock, I took it all in, wanting to be inside her, unable to take what she was too afraid to give, yet needing to mark her, to make her know she belonged to me. She owed me.

  “I want your cunt shaved bare next time I see you,” I said, my voice not quite even.

  I pumped my cock in my fist hard and fast, her pussy seeming to slicken as I did, even though I hadn’t touched her yet. I pushed a finger inside her. She made a noise I couldn’t decipher, but she didn’t pull away. And when my cock throbbed and I came, she stilled completely as my cum striped her ass, her bound arms and back, her hair, the floor beside her face. I came hard, the pleasure tainted with disgust at myself. I closed my eyes, the sexual release not offering the satisfaction I’d expected to find.

  I didn’t understand this woman. I didn’t understand my reaction to her. I should only want to cause her pain, but I couldn’t. I’d thought it would be easy. I’d thought seeing her would bring all of my anger to the surface, making it easy to take what she owed, but it didn’t. The opposite, in fact.

  I groaned, spent, and opened my eyes. I fell back and sat on my heels. MacKayla remained still, holding her breath. I got to my feet, my breath ragged, my balance off. I went into the kitchen, wet a handful of paper towels, and returned to where she knelt, her forehead still on the floor. She gasped when I touched her with the warm, wet towel to clean her. I wiped away all traces of myself before untying the rope at her wrists and pulling her upright so that she knelt facing away from me. I untied the gag and pulled it from her mouth before standing. She remained still, still facing away from me. I didn’t look at her face. Seeing her like this, it made me feel like the lowlife cheat I’d been accused of being. Like the man I’d become over the last three years.

  “Go home,” I barked.

  It was then she turned her face to me, confusion in her eyes. Was that hurt on her face?

  I couldn’t stomach it.

  “Go.”

  Without waiting for her to leave, I dropped the paper towels into the trash can in the kitchen and went upstairs, confused as fuck, hating myself.

  Wanting to hate her.

  I DIDN’T BOTHER getting dressed. Instead, I put on my glasses, slipped on my boots and coat, and ran home, clothes bundled in my arms.

  Was this how he would exact his revenge? Would he humiliate me like this every night? And would I continue to be aroused by what shamed me?

  But Slater was split in his task. A part of him struggled to hurt me, even when I deserved to be hurt. He had a right to his revenge. But he was the one who was hurting.

  If I told him why I’d done it, told him how desperate I’d been, would he forgive me? Did I deserve to be forgiven? How did my circumstances¸ which he had nothing to do with, excuse what I’d done? They didn’t. He was searching for something. Closure, perhaps? An ending? And I was a part of what he sought. We were bound to one another, had become so that night three years ago. I owed him. He was right. And he deserved to find peace. He was innocent, after all. Maybe the only innocent in this sordid mess. If punishing me would give him that peace, didn’t I owe him that?

  And maybe after all was said and done, when he finished with me, maybe I’d have some semblance of peace, too, a tiny shred of self-respect.

  What had happened tonight, strange as it was, gave me hope. He wasn’t able to hurt me, not really. He’d tried. But when he’d seen me crumble, he hadn’t been able to do it. Was he as lost as I? Had betrayal left him abandoned and alone?

  And now, finding himself unable to do what he’d set out to do, was he more lost than ever?

  It was three o’clock in the morning. I needed to be at the bookstore by ten. Dragging myself into the shower, I stood under the warm flow and washed away any remaining residue of his seed from my back, my hair. Thing was, he aroused me. I’d been attracted to him before, and that hadn’t changed. The thing that had changed was him. He’d laughed that night I’d seduced him. He’d held my hand. He’d been…tender. No tenderness remained now, only hardness. Hurt had made concrete out of human flesh, and Slater hurt.

  But I needed to tread carefully here. I could not think I could somehow save this man. That I could—that it was possible—to right my wrong.

  No one could help save someone who didn’t want to save himself.

  And I could certainly not hope for anything from him. That would be a mistake, me hoping for something that might never come. One that might do to me what Slater’s wife’s betrayal had done to him. It could break me like it had him.

  I switched off the water. I would give Slater what he wanted. I would let him take what he needed. And I would hope in some way for absolution for my sin, for the role I’d played in his destruction.

  In the bedroom, I saw the light in his go on. My blinds were closed, but light still penetrated. Keeping the nightstand lamp off, I climbed into bed and turned over onto my side. I thought of what he’d done, of how he’d come on me. Of how he’d put his finger inside me. I imagined how I’d looked to him like that, totally exposed, while my own fingers slipped between my legs. I imagined him pumping his cock into his hand, remembered the sounds he’d made, heard the moan as he released those hot spurts of cum onto my back, and as I did, as I imagined that last little bit, I came, squeezing my legs together and muffling the sound of my cry into the pillow.

  Sunday was quiet at the bookstore. I usually used it to load new stock, check inventory, and prep orders. I half expected Slater to walk into the place, but he never did. Lydia dropped by around lunchtime.

  “Hey, girlie. How are you feeling?”

  It took me a moment but then I remembered how I’d told her I didn’t feel well so I could leave the party. “Oh, better. Must have been a twenty-four-hour thing. How was the rest of the night?”

  “Okay, but Slater left almost as soon as you did.” She sighed and sat down on one of the chairs in the small café area. “Have time for a coffee?”

  I filed three books onto a shelf and wiped my hands on my jeans. “Yep.” I went behind the bar and made two cappuccinos.

  “He did drop by this morning, though,” she said casually, watching my face.

  “He did?” I asked, wiping down the counter before heading over with the coffee, using the full mugs as an excuse to avoid eye contact.

  “So how do you two know each other?”

  “Oh,” I shook my head. “He’s just an acquaintance. He checked on me after I left the party.”

  “Well, that was nice of him.”

  “What did he want?”

  She grinned and winked. “I think he’s interested in you. He was asking about your schedule, mentioned dropping by your work. So I gave him the address.”

  “Dropping by here? When?”

  “You’re not holding out on me, are you, Mac? I thought we had an agreement to share the juicy bits.”

  I smiled nervously and took a too big, too hot sip of my coffee, burning my tongue and throat.

  “Nothing juicy to sh
are, I promise,” I lied. What could I say? He’d stripped me, bound me, then came on me. And later I had masturbated to the image of him doing it? That I’d be going back for more?

  The thought made my ears hot.

  At midnight, I rang Slater’s doorbell. He stood in the dimly lit living room, so I couldn’t see his face to gauge his mood. He didn’t say anything in greeting but gestured for me to come inside. I did, closing the door behind me, not locking it but still feeling trapped.

  The large open space stood much the same as it had the last time I’d been here, except that this time, the television was turned off and music I didn’t recognize played softly in the background, the dark undertones lending even more weight to the already heavy atmosphere. He had also lit candles, which stood on the floor in one corner.

  Slater cleared his throat, and I turned to meet his gaze. His darkness drew me. The pull was strange, indescribable, but absolute. Was it guilt that made it so? Physically, Slater Vaughn was a very attractive man. He would be to many women, I guessed. His face, although it had hardened over time, still had that boyish appeal, a sort of all-American football hero but for the tattoos, the bike, and badass attitude that were too large to leave space for much else in the room. He appealed to me, still, considering what I came here for. My thoughts traveled to the night of the party, his big hands, the damage they could do, and even given that, I could not deny the attraction I felt for him.

  Did he feel it for me, too, or was it merely curiosity? Having a woman at your mercy—truly at your feet—what did that do to a man? I wondered, actually, if before he’d come here, before he’d seen me again, what his plan to punish me had been. This was a strange way of exacting revenge, but then again, perhaps I overestimated. He was a man, after all.

  “Do I need to remind you what needs to happen now?”

  I blinked twice, Slater drawing me out of my thoughts.

  “No.” I set my bag down, took off my coat and hung it on the hook. He remained leaning against a wall close to the lit candles. He crossed his arms over his chest and propped one booted foot up against the wall. It appeared he was going to wait and watch me undress.