Chapter Five

Colleen

 

A while later—during which time I just lie there, going over the events of this evening with a dreamlike feeling—the door opens and he steps in holding a plastic bag in one hand and a pile of clothes in the other. He drops the clothes onto the chair in the corner and then hands me the plastic bag. I take it, the smell of burger and fries drifting over to me. Dinner was interrupted before I got a chance to eat, and anyway, Alma is strict when it comes to burgers and fries and anything tasty.

 

Gabriel drops into the other chair and folds his ankle over his knee, watching me with silent, brooding eyes. I suppress the feeling that rises up within me. Lust. Crazy, uncontrollable lust; it grips my body like a traitor, making me curious about this man who I should only fear. It’s too twisted and messed up, the way I feel about him. I tried to kill him, for God’s sake!

 

“Are you going to watch me eat now?” I say, hoping that I can keep him at a distance by snapping at him.

 

“I am,” he says, unfazed.

 

“Why?” I take the food out of the bag and unwrap it. Immediately onion, ketchup, and burger rise into the air like a promise. “Is this how you get your thrills?”

 

“I get my thrills by looking at your legs,” he says, again unfazed. I keep waiting for the moment when he’ll show some shame for the way he’s speaking to me, but he never does. It’s like he doesn’t even understand the concept of shame. He wants what he wants and he isn’t afraid to talk openly about it, which is—I have to admit—refreshing after a life spent with Alma.

 

“They’re just legs,” I mutter, but I can’t deny the flood of warmth that attacks me every time he compliments my body. A man has never spoken to me like this before, and certainly not a man as handsome and tough and scary and cool as Gabriel. “They’re nothing special.”

 

“Eat your food,” he says, “and then you can get changed. You probably won’t want to spend the next few days in that dress, I’m guessing.”

 

I glance at the clothes: sweatpants and a black hoodie, as well as some thick socks. The central heating is blasting hot air, but even so, the iciness of Staten Island, especially this close to the water, penetrates. I want to get changed now, but I can’t with his eyes on me like this. I’ve never been naked in front of a man. My sex aches, my clit twisting almost painfully. I bite down on the burger, hoping to bury the sensations in the smoky taste. I can’t let myself feel this way. It’s wrong; he’s the enemy.

 

“Aren’t you hungry?” Gabriel asks when I’ve been eating for a couple of minutes.

 

“Yes,” I reply, confused, dabbing my mouth with the napkin.

 

“So you always eat like a squirrel, then, picking at your food little piece by little piece?” He’s smiling.

 

“My mother always told me that a lady should never eat with reckless abandon; that’s how she described it.”

 

“She sounds like a great lady.” He laughs gruffly. “If you’re hungry, just eat. Goddamn. Look.” Without warning, he leans across and grabs a handful of fries. He stuffs them in his mouth and chews quickly, gesturing with his hands like a teacher demonstrating an important lesson. “See?” he says, swallowing. “How hard is that?”

 

“We’re not all animals like you,” I mutter, continuing in my usual way.

 

I eat the rest in silence and wash it down with the can of soda, and then I go into the en-suite and swill my mouth with mouthwash, another habit Alma instilled in me from an early age. I do it on autopilot, the same way I have since I was very young. When I return to the bedroom, the food is gone and the door is closed. Gabriel stands in front of the closed door, his chest rising and falling heavily, his eyes locked on me; on my legs, and then my breasts, and finally, my face.

 

My body screams out as he stares, my sex pulsing warmly, my clit throbbing. My nipples are hard and my cheeks are hotter than they’ve been all evening, even in the car when he was staring obviously at my legs. It’s like my body is betraying me. Intellectually, I know this is bad, wrong, and yet my body does not care. My body prods at me, urging me on. But I just stand here, stunned and captivated.

 

Eventually I whisper, “What?” Because it’s all I can think to say.

 

He stares on for a while, his dark blue eyes roaming over me. Then he takes a step forward, slowly unclenching his hands. They’re shaking, I note in surprise. “Come here,” he says, in a tone of voice that will not allow for argument.

 

“Why?” I ask, my heartbeat thumping loudly in my ears.

 

“Just come here,” he snarls. “I won’t ask you again.”

 

His gaze is implacable, his back straight. He looks powerful and relaxed at the same time, like a resting lion ready to pounce. I find myself doing as he asks; walking barefoot across the room and standing within inches of him, so close the heat of his body radiates against me.

 

“What?” I ask, looking up at him and resisting the urge to bite my lip. “Why are you staring at me like that—”

 

He grabs my shoulders hard and then kisses me harder. I’m so stunned, I don’t even react at first, my mouth almost closed as he presses his lips against me. He tastes of whisky and his lips are rough, but then my body responds without my input. My lips part, his tongue slides between them, and then my tongue goes forward to meet it. They touch, quickly, and electricity buzzes up my tongue and around my mouth. I have only ever kissed a few boys, back in high school, and it was never like this. He growls gruffly and pulls me closer to him, his groin pressed firmly against me. I feel him, the hardness of him, through his jeans against my belly. He breaks it off quickly and stares at me with those penetrating blue eyes.

 

“I’ve wanted to do that since the moment I saw you,” he whispers, his breath caressing my cheeks.

 

I open my mouth to speak but no words come out. Instead, I make a sound that is something like a gasp, something like a moan. My breathing is out of control, coming far too fast for me to handle, my chest expanding and contracting like the belly of a wild animal. I open my mouth again but this time he intercepts me, kissing me with even more force. He wraps his arms around me and then slides one hand down my body to my ass. The feeling is unknown to me, but the second his hand grips onto my ass cheek, a strange warm tingling feeling travels all over me, down the backs of my legs to my feet and around my belly and up to my breasts.

 

He squeezes viciously, hurting me a little, but also urging on the lust. My sex gets even hotter; my clit throbs with more urgency. Then he grabs my other ass cheek and lifts me off my feet, carrying me to the bed as our lips and our teeth slam together. My hands are in his hair, I realize after a moment, running through it continuously. There are nerves, too, but I try to bury them deep down where they cannot disturb me. He tosses me onto my back. I bob up and down on the mattress, and then settle, lying there and staring up at him, unsure of what to do.

 

“Take off your clothes,” he growls, watching me with the eyes of a hunter. “I want to see that fucking ass.”

 

I swallow, nerves attacking me in force now, but a large part of me wants to do as he says. I edge to the side of the bed and slide out of my tights, and then—with a big deep breath of courage—I pull my dress over my head, revealing my underwear. The nerves get so bad now that my first instinct is to cover my bra with my forearms, turn my leg inward to hide my sex. But Gabriel is having none of that; he grabs my hand and pries it loose, nudging my leg aside with his knee. Then he reaches around behind me and unclasps my bra. My breasts bounce free as my bra falls to the ground.

 

“Fuck,” Gabriel whispers, staring down at them. He moves suddenly, darting down and catching one nipple between his lips, massaging the other breast with his hand, palming the flesh. I stare down at him in disbelief and mad, frantic pleasure, his tongue feeling like a hot poker on my nipple, his hand leaving red marks all over my pale skin. “Fuck,” he repeats, sliding his hand down my belly toward my sex, which nobody has ever touched apart from myself in guilt-filled alone moments. His fingertips come to the very top of my panties, about to slide down to my clit, when my nerves finally fail me.

 

I throw myself back with a reflexive hiss, scrambling to the corner of the bed.

 

“What are you doing?” he says, more in confusion than anything else.

 

“I—I can’t!” I gasp, grabbing the sheets and pulling them up around my breast. “Not that, Gabriel! I just … I can’t, okay?”

 

“You seemed pretty damn into it,” he says, moving around the side of the bed with his hands up. “The fuck happened?”

 

“I’m a virgin!” I snap. “Okay?”

 

“You’re a … you’re twenty-one years old!”

 

“Yes, so?”

 

He pauses for a moment, and then half-turns. “So if you’re a virgin that means I’m in deep shit if I take your virginity, eh? It’ll reduce your value.”

 

“I’m not a piece of meat!”

 

“I know that!” he barks. “But your fucking family doesn’t! Fuck!”

 

He’s trembling with lust, a man possessed. He turns back to me and stares at me for a long moment. “Drop the blanket,” he commands.

 

“I can’t—”

 

“I’m not going to fuck you. Just drop the blanket.”

 

I should say no, end it here, but I want him to see my breasts; that glint in his eyes is the most intense way any man has ever looked at me. I drop the blanket, freeing my breasts again.

 

“Fall to your knees,” he says, voice low, gruff. “Right now.”

 

No, I should say. This is wrong. I won’t do it. But I do. I want to. I climb to my knees and look up at him. He walks calmly around the bed, stepping over the blanket, and then he unzips his jeans and takes out his penis. Wow! I gasp at the sight of it. I’ve only ever seen one in the porn videos my wayward high school friends showed me, but this is even bigger than them. It must be eleven inches, maybe more, and thick. An odd mixture of fear and excitement courses through me.

 

“Open your fucking mouth as wide as you can.” He steps close, bringing it near my face. “Now.”

 

I stretch the skin of my lips, the corners hurting, and then he grabs the side of my head and jams it into my throat. There is nothing romantic about the way he does it, nothing considerate. He forces it deep right away, the tip choking me and forcing me to breathe out of my nose. I hardly know what’s happening, only that I should be hating every second of this and I’m not. In fact, the tingling that captivated my body before gets even crazier now, my nipples pulsing as though in unison with his thrusts; his cock slides deep into me, pressing firmly into the very back of my throat. I gag, cough, and Gabriel growls and moans low. He fucks my face for around a minute, seemingly unaware of the spit and pre-come that spills out of my mouth, my gagging noises, and my occasional gasps when I get a quick break from it.

 

Finally, he pinches down on my nose and comes inside my mouth; it shoots out quickly, salty, onto my tongue as he pulls out of me. I fall back, swallowing on instinct. Salty, thick come slides down my throat and into my belly. I lie on my back, gasping, breathing heavily, trying to get some kind of bearing. I feel like I’ve just been attacked but also—and confusingly—I want more; I want him to grab me again, flip me over, spank me, bite me. I want him to use me again.

 

He’s putting his penis away. He looks down at me for a moment and then shrugs, turns away, and leaves me lying there, red-faced and sweaty.

 

The door closes. The lock clicks. And I’m left alone, feeling used. Abused. But also excited, which is probably the most bizarre thing I could be feeling right now.