Page 22 of Ravens
We turn onto another road. It’s paved but still only two lanes, and he flips the stereo on, ignoring me again.
“Women?” I guess. “Easier targets . . . more fun when they beg for their lives, I’m sure.” His jaw tenses. “Yeah, I bet they make all kinds of bargains with you.”
He punches the dash, and the stereo cuts out.
“Close quarters.” He grits his teeth and pulls on one of the nubs at the side of his watch. A garrote wire stretches out from it, and when he lets it go, it retracts and disappears.
I fixate on the watch for a prolonged minute and clear my throat. “Do me a favor and just shoot me when the time comes.”
Barking a curse, he slams on the brakes and kicks his door open. Just when I think he’s going to get up and escape me forsome air or something, he reaches across and grabs me by the neck and hauls me across him. The pain in my shoulder flares, and I choke on a cry of pain as he wrestles me down on his thighs.
A hand slams down on my ass, and I shriek as I stare down at the road with my chest against his one thigh and my hips on top of the other. Another stings my skin through the denim, and I twist against him, seething and swearing as I fight the arm holding my upper back down.
“You son of—”
He does it again, and my stomach twists into knots as the warmth of the strikes spread across my skin. The next one sets off a little pulse of pleasure between my thighs that travels through me and leaves me blinking rapidly. I gasp when the next blow lands and snap my eyes shut.
I stop fighting him, and he starts caressing the sting away between strikes. Each subsequent slap sends its own little wave of need through me, and I let my head droop over the side of his leg as my breaths become shallow.
Grunting softly, he turns me over, and I sit up, ass sore and face warm with a sense of shame and bewilderment. He tucks my hair behind my ear and kisses the corner of my mouth.
“Watch your fucking mouth, Theresa,” he whispers.
Nodding faintly, I shift back into my seat and fasten the seatbelt. Slamming his door closed again, we pull back onto the road and carry on in silence. Being spanked outside of sex feels very different. Still good . . . Maybe even better, but different.
I scratch behind my ear absently and clock him from the corner of my eye. His hand flexes on the gearshift, and he lets out a deep breath as he focuses on the road. My gaze falls on his hand, and my cheeks warm as I bite my lip behind a curtain of hair.
Twelve
I've lost track of time when we finally stop in a mostly industrial area of Virginia. The car pulls into a warehouse, and we park off to the side. York pulls an old, dirty canvas up from the concrete floor and tosses it over the car before pointing to a sign hanging sideways on a rusted chain that saysStairs.
“Up.”
Pushing through the heavy wood door beneath the sign, I climb up the stairs with York on my heels. At the top of the first flight of stairs, I push through another door and look down a long hallway. Brushing past me, he continues down the hall and walks through a door to his left. It has a large, dirty glass window with a crack in the bottom corner, but I push it open and enter a single large room that runs the width of the building.
My footsteps echo as I look around. You’d never know this was here by looking at the outside of the building. The open loftis comfortably furnished, with leather couches and rugs. There is a kitchen against the back wall and a bedroom space at one end.
“This is the safe house?”
“In a manner of speaking.” He lays his gun and car keys on the kitchen counter.
There are no walls closing anything off—except maybe the bathroom—and the exterior wall has large, grimy windows every ten feet or so along it. Moving further in, I set my bag on the coffee table and rub my arms absently.
The kitchen is nice, modern but masculine, minimal with concrete counters and dark wood cabinets. There are no knickknacks or other decorations anywhere. A few books, an old record player—that’s it.
“Bathroom.” He points to the opposite end of the space, and I turn, seeing a solitary door. “Get cleaned up.”
Across from the bathroom door is a console against the wall, a punching bag in the corner, and some weights on the floor. I think this might be his actual house . . . or maybe just one of them. My eyes crawl over every detail as I walk through the big room and then go into the bathroom.
Everything is white and stark, from the cold marble floors to the ample tub beside the large glass-enclosed shower. My fingers trail over the fluffy towels hanging on stainless steel hooks, and without a second thought, I draw a bath. I should shower, but the thought of soaking feels better right now.
It takes me a little time to remove the bandages and then get my shirt over my head with my sore shoulder, but everything else falls to an easy heap on the floor after that. The hot water stings every bit of skin it touches as I sink down and recline, letting out a shaky breath as I settle. When the water laps up around my chest, I turn it off and sigh.
“Fuck’s sake.” His growl startles me upright, and I instinctively cover my chest.
What the hell is he doing?He sets a glass of wine next to the sink and grabs the small wooden stool in the corner, setting it down beside the tub. I watch him sink onto it, and then he’s reaching for me, and my heart starts racing.
I lean away, but he lets out a sympathetic hiss as his fingers graze my shoulder, and I look at it. The swollen skin is black and blue, and I hadn’t dared to look in a mirror yet. His hand moves down my arm, prying it gently from across my chest so he can examine my wrist.
