Page 74 of Violent Delights

Chapter 44

Joseph

She’s still doing it. Her spell is still working on me.

Her words, her touch, all of it embraces me with a soothing warmth that terrifies me to the bone. This shouldn’t be happening. None of this.

I haven’t lost control like this in years, and it’s all because of her.

“You betrayed me,” I accuse her again. It takes all my strength not to let her tears get to me. Who knows if they’re real? Who knows if anything she says or makes me feel is real? She’s a liar.

She touches my hands, seemingly unfazed by the blood that’s running down one of them.

“I didn’t want to betray you,” she says. “I wanted to be with you. That’s why I didn’t say anything. I was scared you’d make me leave.”

She pauses, biting her lower lip, as she seeks my eyes with a pained face.

“And now you are,” she utters. “Now you want me to leave.”

I let go of her. She’s robbing me of my sanity. I need room to breathe, room to process the extent of what has happened with her.

I kidnapped a woman. I took her away from her life. There might even be a police report on her.

“People are searching for you,” I tell her. “You need to go home. You need to get away from me.”

“No!” she protests, wrapping her arms around her naked body. “I want to stay-”

“You can’t!” I yell at her. “We can’t act as if this was okay, as if it was right for me to bring you here, to make you my slave, to fuck you, to…”

I stop myself before I say something truly stupid. But she finishes the sentence for me.

“To love me,” she whispers, her eyes glistening with tears as she casts me a hurt look. “Isn’t that what you were going to say?”

I look at her, swallowing the emotions her appearance evokes within me. She has blood running down one side of her face, my blood, mixing with her salty tears. Her hair is still damp from the shower, sticking to her slim shoulders in stray strands, her smooth body exposed to me as she steps closer to me.

She’s insane. She must be, if she still wants to be with me after what I’ve done to her. There’s no other explanation. And her next words only prove me right.

“Lock me up,” she says. “In the attic. Punish me.”

“What?” I bark at her. “Are you fucking ins-”

“I don’t care how long it takes for you to forgive me,” she stops me. “But I know I deserve to be punished.”

She pauses, taking another step forward, pressing her naked body against me.

“Let me prove to you that I want to be yours,” she breathes. “Punish me. Lock me up in the attic until I’m forgiven.”

“You have lost your mind if you think that I’d actually do that,” I hiss at her. “You have lost your fucking mind.”

I put distance between us, walking backwards as if she was posing a threat to me. Her eyes follow me, dazed with sorrow and fear, and terrifyingly clear at the same time.

I can’t deal with this. I shouldn’t. She’s already taken too much from me. She needs to get out of here.

“Get cleaned up and dressed,” I tell her. “I will drive you home.”

Her face migrates to an expression of utter shock. She darts toward me, but this time I won’t let her catch me. I raise my hand, pointing my finger at her as a warning.

“Pet!” I yell at her, causing her to stop mid-motion. “Get cleaned up and dressed now.”

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