Page 47 of The King (Masterpiece Duet 1)
Brennan would have kissed me on my birthday. It would have made me feel safe. I know without trying that Damon’s kiss wouldn’t make me feel that way.
Damon sits on the edge of the bed, in the same way Daddy did. When I would have a screaming nightmare after Mama left. When he would comfort me.
There’s nothing comforting about this.
And Damon, though they inhabit the same dark world, he’s nothing like Daddy. He has complete control over himself, over the people around him. In fact the only person he can’t control is Jonathan Scott. Maybe that’s why it’s his obsession to hunt him down.
He uses that control now, a subtle direction as he leans forward.
And I find myself canting forward.
He would never be as crass as to give orders. Never be as rough as to drag me by my hair. But it’s an order all the same, one my body responds to as surely as physical force.
“You’re really young,” he remarks, sounding casual.
Only his eyes show the truth of him, the lust and frustration that swirl in the black depths. There’s something else, too. A kind of desolation that can only be seen when he’s inches away.
How many other people get this close to him? Not many, I’m guessing.
It’s no coincidence he prefers his women dancing onstage, him in the shadows.
“If I’m so young, why are you here?” I ask, unable to tear my gaze away, hardly able to blink.
He laughs. “I don’t fucking know.”
And maybe he was right, before, when he called me a baby. That’s what I had been, with Brennan. Using him as a security blanket. Even when I thought I might have sex with Damon, when I imagined it, it was some theoretical construct. The curve on a graph, its every point carefully plotted and explained.
Real life could never be that pure. Who would want that?
For the first time, my body becomes aware of him as a man. Of myself as a woman. Birthdays have never felt like big occasions for me. Mathematically one day out of three hundred and sixty-five isn’t significant. Except I’ve never felt like this before. Whether it’s because I turned sixteen today or because Damon is looking at me with pure hunger, I feel ready for him.
“I know why,” I whisper.
“Of course you do.” The words are condescending, but the way he says them isn’t. There’s a quiet confidence in him, almost pride, as if he likes me being smart. As if it affects him the same away his crisp suits and beautiful smile affect me.
Everything about him in his moment invites my secrets.
Like this one: “I dream about you.”
His breath catches. “Don’t tell me that. What I’ll do to you—”
“Do you dream about me?”
“Never,” he says, his voice harsh.
In the heartbeat that follows my world crumbles. I’m standing in the rubble when he runs a hand through his hair. When he says, “I could never let myself. Not if I wanted to leave you alone.”
My hand reaches out, before I’ve really planned it. Before I’ve really thought through what it means. To touch him. To feel him, his heat and his heart. Two fingers pressing against the perfectly smooth fabric of his shirt. He’s so solid beneath those white dress clothes. As strong and as wide as I would have dreamed my wild boy would be, grown into a man.
“I’m afraid to be alone.”
His eyes burn. “You will never be alone. I swear that to you. I would never let that happen. But you deserve to have a normal life. That’s what I want for you.”
“Does what I want matter?”
He laughs. “You don’t know what you’re asking for.”
I don’t know where the boldness comes from, but there’s too much of it. I’m overflowing with the desire to ask for what I want, to demand what I need. Is this what sixteen feels like? “A kiss.”
A rough sound. “What?”
“I’m asking for a kiss.”
“Christ,” he mutters. “You’re so innocent.”
Challenge simmers around us, sparkling and hot. “Then do it. What will it hurt?”
“It will hurt,” he says, capturing my face with careful movements, his hand cupping my whole jaw. He tilts me only the slightest angle, but it changes everything. Thirty degrees to the right. That’s all it takes for me to open for his kiss. Made ready for him, my whole body brimming with anticipation.
He leans close, his gaze a dark promise.
One millimeter away from me, so close it hurts to be apart. Like our lips are magnets, trembling with an unseen force. His hand holds me away, that small amount. “Say no,” he murmurs. “Scream. Fight me. Cry for me to stop.”
“Is that how you like it?” I whisper, the words brushing my lips against his.
Only the smallest shake of his head. “I like you moaning and needy and begging me for more.”
