Page 47 of Hawke

“You’re worthless, good for nothing but this.”

Florence’s voice cut into my thoughts. As she’d often done, her equally evil friends had complete access to me during those times when I’d been drugged and bound. Unlike with BDSM, there’d been no safe words or anything that gave me the power to stop the pain. My shame only amped them up more, so I’d learned to keep it inside. In a way, I still did.

“You were wrong,” I said aloud. But was she? Florence was in jail and would be there for the rest of her life. George, too. They may be the ones in a cage, yet I was the one still stuck in a prison of my own making.

I turned my hand over, looking down at my wrist. Placing the dull edge of the blade over it, I closed my eyes, already imagining the pinch I’d feel when the tip penetrated my skin. Blood would pool at the site, and a quick slice would be all I’d need to feel something other than the numbness which consumed me. The sense of relief I’d feel with every drop released was only temporary. It’d slowly ooze from me until it stopped, breaking me from the trance-like state I’d be in.

Regret… shame… pain. All the things I’d felt since I was twelve would return with a vengeance.

The control that’d comfort me would end and I’d be back to the state of helplessness that gripped me. I dropped the knife onto the counter and scrubbed my hands down my face. While I’d come so far in my life, my past had always been, and I suspected would always be, right there with me.

I’d managed to keep it at bay for the last few years, however, until she came into my life. Charlotte Maxwell. Even though she’d been a stranger, she’d drawn me into her web in Washington, D.C., a year earlier. Perhaps it’d been fate, or simply my fucked up luck, but she was back in my life now. Her very presence brought back so many of the memories from my past that had taken me years to repress. She reminded me of those monsters, but not for the reasons one might think.

Shaking my head, I removed my pants and headed to the shower. Once inside, I set the water to its highest temperature, not even giving a damn if it scalded my skin. I leaned back against the tiled wall, grabbing my cock in my hand. My eyes closed as I started to run my hand from base to tip.

“Charlotte,” I groaned as I started off slow, imagining it was her sweet mouth wrapped around my shaft instead of my calloused hand.

Everything about her was heaven. As my thoughts drifted from that sinful mouth to her pussy, I’d never felt with anyone what I did with her. Imagining her tight, wet sheath pulsing around me had my hand moving with more urgency. My grip tightened much as she would around me, but I still couldn’t find that moment of release.

I kept on stroking myself as I thought of her in other ways. During the construction phase of Syn, I would stand to the side watching her interact with everyone around. Her smile and the way her eyes would light up when they’d cross with mine.

“Fuck,” I groaned even louder. My hand continued moving, even faster now than before.

Her fucking smile lit up the entire room. When I’d focus on nothing but her, she’d penetrate the darkness that surrounded me. My entire life had been one turbulent wave after another, but she was the metaphorical lighthouse, her purity leading me home.

But, she isn’t that for me. This is me… my life… my present… my future.

Charlotte, she was the high of those drugs that’d been pumped into me… the calmness I’d feel as my blood trickled down my chest… the foolish dream I’d once harbored. She could be anything to me except what I most wanted her to be.

Letting out a growl, I finally found the release my body demanded, but not the one I’d craved more than air. My orgasm was hollow. They’d always been and I suspected, they always would be. I found no pleasure in a climax. She’d known it. She’d felt it. And I was enough of a bastard to confirm those suspicions.

I hurt her and for what? That sort of pain did little to make me feel better. In fact, it made me feel even less deserving of her. She needed someone who could touch her in the gentle ways I couldn’t… make love to her in the ways I was unable to… but most of all, protect and cherish her in the ways I wanted but didn’t know how to.

My hand dropped to my side and I stood under the scalding spray for a few minutes longer. My eyes were still closed and I remembered the taste of her tears that night in Washington, D.C. The water continued pouring down upon me like the very tears she’d cried the last time I had touched her.

“I’ll break you, little sub.” And that was if I hadn’t already. I didn’t trust myself around her enough to let her go, so earlier I had done what he needed to in order to protect her from me.

I’d banished her from my club… my life… and now, I needed to find a way to banish her from my thoughts. I turned off the water, grabbed a towel, and minutes later was back in front of the sink. The knife I’d dropped earlier was still lying there. I struggled with the internal tug-of-war going on in my head.

Do I stay strong? Or do I give in?

I’d been mentally debating the pros and cons of each when I finally heard the loud banging on my hotel room door. Tightening the towel around my waist, I walked over to it and then flung it open.

“Charlotte?” I asked just moments before pain exploded across my cheek. She’d slapped me, and the way she drew her hand back, I knew she was about to try for a second.

32 – CHARLOTTE

Ihadn’t actually intended to attack him, but once Hawke opened the door, I smacked him. Despite the stinging in my palm, I brought my hand back to hit him again, but this time, he countered my strike, catching my hand mid-air. I yanked it away, even more fired up now than I had been on the way over to his hotel. He’d canceled or terminated my membership, essentially cutting me off from any further contact with him.

“Why’d you do it?” I asked, inwardly cursing the shakiness of my voice.

“Do what?” Hawke either didn’t know that I knew, or else he was a damn good actor. Whatever it was, I intended to give him a piece of my mind. He stood there silently until he finally added. “What the hell are you talking about, Charlotte?”

“What am I…” I started to ask, the rage inside reaching its boiling point. “You know good and damn well what you did. How could you have my membership at Syn revoked?”

He almost seemed relieved at my question and that notorious smirk of his reappeared.

Had he done this on purpose so I’d come running to him? Was this another level in this sick game he liked to play?

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