Page 67 of The Two Halves of My Heart

“God, you drive me crazy,” he complained, running his lips over my jaw and up to the spot just behind my ear. “I used to hope that if I finally got to have you, that I’d stop feeling this out of control around you. But it’s just made it worse.”

His hands ran all over me, pushing my hair back, running over my chest, and back down to my legs. He was everywhere—the desperation seeping into me and making my chest hurt, and my stomach quiver.

He slipped his finger inside the edge of my knickers and ran the tip along my sensitive flesh, sending sparks of desire shooting around my body.

“Grace…” When he pleaded my name like that, it made me feel sexy and powerful, despite Maddison being the one in charge.

He manoeuvred us a few feet through into the front room where his hands twisted me at my waist to face away from him. His palm planted in the centre of my back and pressed me down. With nowhere to go, I braced against the table in front of me. The sudden and unfamiliar movement sent a shock of heartbeats through my body, quickening my pulse and my breathing. He eased me by working his fingers back inside my knickers. This time his touch was insistent, pushing inside of me in purposeful thrusts. I widened my stance, limited by the cut of my knickers to give him more room.

“Fuck, yeah.”

The sound of material and the clink of his belt filled in the blank spaces between us and joined my ragged breaths. He shoved my dress up over my hips before I felt the tip of his cock rub along at my entrance. He positioned, then pushed forward, hard, thrusting up inside of me. The invasion lifted me onto my toes, and I took a gasp of breath as I tried to lean farther forward on instinct.

We’d had sex plenty of times, and I’d learned that like everything else with Mads, he needed to control, and he liked things on the harsh side. Just like our first time, there was never slow or tender lovemaking. It was more desperate than that like he couldn’t quite control his need for me. And I’d always got off on it because it’d always been sexy as hell and left us both sated and sweaty.

But there was an edge to this that I’d not felt before. His palm stayed on my back, keeping me down while his other hand gripped at my hip, anchoring me in place. He punched his hips forward, jolting me and pushing my hips into the table, and his rhythm didn’t break.

“Mads… slow down.” I tried to move back, to ease the pressure that had shifted from pleasure to discomfort. But he didn’t hear me. He was rough and wild with his movements, which jarred against me. Harder and harder, he moved, and discomfort slid into pain. This wasn’t right, this didn’t feel good in any way, and panic flashed inside my chest as it welled up and threatened to overtake. The sound of our skin slapping together echoed around the room, punctuating the stark reality of what was happening.

I tried again to push up off of the table, but his hand kept me planted. I twisted my head to try and see him—to make him see me. “Mads!”

“Yes! Fuck, Grace.” He moved his hand from my back to grab both my hips and yanked me back into him as he spilt inside of me. He finished, pumping a few more times as the pressure on my skin released.

“Jesus,” he panted. He pulled out and rearranged himself before leaning over me and kissing my cheek. “Come on. Let’s go to bed.”

“I’ll be up in a bit. I’ll grab a shower first.” My throat choked around my words, but I pushed them out.

I waited until he was out of sight before I followed him upstairs and shut the bathroom door, hiding away. I set the water running and turned the heat all the way up until steam billowed around the tiny room. The mirror over the sink showed my ashen face looking back, with a red patch to one side where my face had rested against the table.

My hips were tender, and there was a red mark running across the top of my thighs where the table had bitten into my skin. And I felt sore. Not like our first time, but raw.

Used.

As the heat encompassed me, I went over the events and tried to identify what had gone wrong, but there was nothing. It was the perfect date for my birthday until it wasn’t. Maddison had just taken things too far, and before I realised I’d wanted it to stop, it was too late.

The heat revived me and washed away the nasty afterthoughts of the night. I crept into our room and pulled the covers back. Maddison was already asleep, but I still rolled towards him, finding my place over his heart where I felt the safest. His arms encompassed me, and I let this feeling of comfort surround me, and I vowed never to let anything like this happen between us again.

The weeks that followed my birthday returned us to our normal. Maddison wasn’t as aggressive when we made love, and my shadow of worry every time we were intimate began to fade. Except that Maddison was in a permanent bad mood. He was out of the house, training or working, but even when he was home, he was cranky and rude.

When you live with someone and know them as well as I knew Maddison, you know when there’s something on their mind or troubling them, and something was off.

He dumped his plate in the sink so hard that I was surprised it didn’t crack into pieces. Two weeks of feeling like I’d been caught in his crosshairs, and I couldn’t take it any longer. I switched the hob off and turned to face him.

“Will you just tell me what the problem is?” I moaned, desperate to an end of all the slamming of doors, grunts, and frowns.

“Trust me, you won’t want to know.” He scowled and paced out of the kitchen.

His response at least narrowed it down for me, but I wasn’t ready to give this up, so I followed him into the lounge. “Did you lose a fight?” I asked tentatively, although I couldn’t remember him coming home with any scrapes or bruising.

“No, of course not.”

“Then what is it because I’m sick of you being in such a bad mood around the house?” I was a little fiercer than I thought I could be, but everything that had happened over the last few weeks had taken its toll on me.

“I have a fight. And I want you to be there. Happy now?”

“Not particularly.” I dropped my head, realising that we’re never going to be through with this. “I assumed you didn’t need me there anymore. I haven’t seen you fight for months.”

“If I had my way, you’d be there at every fight. But you’ve made your feelings perfectly clear.”

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