Page 41 of Descent
I’d known this moment was coming, the day of reckoning when he’d enable me no longer. Allow me to withdraw no more.
Rafe rose to his full height and waited for me to slide my hand into his. The instant his warm palm welcomed mine, I felt my breath hitch. Anxiety rose in my throat, and the burning tingle behind my eyelids threatened to ignite. I didn’t want to give him my tears. I never wanted to cry again. Crying meant feeling.
I never wanted to feel again.
The birds seemed to fall silent as he led me inside the cabin, and maybe it was an omen because he halted at the bottom of the stairs.
“It’s time to face it, sweetheart.”
I shook my head, yanking on my hand that refused to budge from his grip. “I don’t want to go up there.”
“We can’t sleep on the couch forever.”
“Please, Rafe. Don’t ask me to do this.”
“I’m not asking, babe.” Tugging on my arm, he all but dragged me up the stairs.
Light shone through the skylights, bathing the loft bedroom in natural light. The comforter had been changed, and so had the sheets. There was no evidence of Zach in this room anymore—no spilled clothing from the drawers, or his untied boots taking up space on the floor. My gaze settled on the gown hanging on the back of the bathroom door.
My wedding dress.
I failed to breathe. “Where did you find it?”
“In the bottom of the armoire.”
I blinked.
One, two, three…four times.
As many times as it took to ward off the burn of pain behind my eyeballs.
“Let it out,” Rafe said, squeezing my hand.
“I can’t.”
“You can.” Letting my fingers slip from his, he pulled his shirt over his head. As the muscled contours of his bare chest confronted me, the world fell away. The rest of the island faded, leaving him and me and the intimate space between us.
I lowered my attention to the outline of his cock behind the zipper of those stonewashed jeans I loved so much. When it came to me, it didn’t take much to turn him on.
“It’s too soon,” I whispered. “I just stopped spotting yesterday.”
“This isn’t about sex.” He stepped forward an inch, bringing us that much closer. “But you are going to take off your clothes.” The demand in his voice was unmistakable, but underneath it I detected an edge of gentleness reserved for the tender moments between us. It certainly wasn’t a tone he used for punishments. Even so, I was certain a punishment of some sort was coming. If not a punishment, then a snap-out-of-it session with his belt.
My attention lowered to his waist again, and I was dismayed to find the thick strap of leather I hated most sitting on his hips. That belt stung something fierce, and in my present state of mind, it would be the perfect amount of brutal to make me crack.
And that’s why I knew he planned to use it.
Fingers curling around the hem of the thigh-length tee I’d slept in, I pulled it up my body and tossed it on the floor before facing him, hands at my back and head lowered in respectful capitulation.
No amount of trauma or distance could break that dynamic between us.
He strode across the room, hand going to the key around his neck, and returned with two bundles of soft-looking rope. “I know trusting me again won’t be easy, but I want you to try.”
“I never stopped trusting you, Rafe.”
“Maybe not up here,” he said, tapping his head, “but in your heart where it matters most, I think you’ve lost faith in me. And hell, baby, I don’t blame you. I left you here—” He cut off with a hard swallow.
“I understand why you did it.”
“That doesn’t change the fact that I left you to face Zach alone.”
The mention of his name wrenched a reaction from me, making me flinch, and I couldn’t hide it as I wrapped my arms around myself. Rafe tried wiping the pain from his face, but I still saw it as he moved toward me with that rope.
“Being patient with you isn’t working. You need more, so I’m going to give you more.” He pushed me to the end of the bed and directed me to stand there, my back facing the mattress. One strong, tattooed hand wrapped the rope around my right wrist, and I followed his movement as he tethered the other end to the bedpost. He did the same with my left hand, then a boot nudged my feet apart.
Our eyes met and held.
“I want your tears.”
“No.” It felt good to say no. Maybe if I’d said no sooner, had found a fucking backbone years ago, I wouldn’t have lost my child.
Except…I didn’t really believe that, because if I’d said yes to Zach when he first brought me up to this very place—if I’d let him fuck me without a fight—he wouldn’t have sent an electrical current through my body that put my baby at risk.
