Chapter Twenty-Five
As we’re heading up the stairs, I realize he’s taking a different path to the box. Except we’re not heading toward the box anymore.
“Gabriel?”
He pushes open a door to a dark room and turns to face me. “After you?”
My eyes are wide as I take in the strange shapes of shadows inside. Props. This is some kind of storage room for theater equipment. We aren’t supposed to be in here. And there’s only one reason Gabriel Miller would want to take me somewhere private.
There’s a tremble reserved only for him, only for sex. I know it’s going to happen between us. A thousand different positions, a million different ways. And all of that before he even takes my virginity, strictly speaking. Knowing it’s inevitable doesn’t take away the fear. How much will it hurt? How much will he make it hurt, on purpose, to humiliate me?
“Inside, little virgin.”
He has infinite patience even though intermission only lasts for fifteen minutes. How many did we spend at the painting? Five minutes? Ten? He doesn’t look rushed, though. He looks like a man assured of his power, a king standing at the back of the board while his subjugates fight the war.
I step inside, breathing in the scent of cedar and linen. And something else, something metallic. Maybe rust. There’s a collection of strange things in this room. I can make out the shape of an oak tree in the corner, its limbs spreading wide. On the other side there’s a row of bleachers, like a high school football game would have. A Native American tepee and a lemonade stand.
Gabriel closes the door, draining even that faint bit of light.
He stands behind me, a solid presence. Unyielding.
“No stairs this time,” I whisper.
He moves me as if he can see in the dark. I’m blind, blinking into the blackness, dust stinging my eyes. God, what if we run into something? What if we trip and fall? But his hands guiding my arms are firm and sure, his movements focused on a single goal.
When I finally feel something plush and unmoving hit the front of my thighs, he stops. A large hand covers my back. Then he pushes me forward. I’m bent over something rounded. My hands feel smooth leather and tufted buttons. A sofa. The sloping kind that a psychiatrist would use.
My ass is in the air, completely vulnerable to him, something that becomes painfully clear when he flips up my dress. Large hands smooth over my panties before tugging them down.
This is happening so quickly, too quickly. My breathing comes faster and faster. The dust fills my lungs. I’m going to suffocate like this. Oh God.
“Breathe,” he says, his hands stroking my sides.
I’m a horse and this is my flank. It’s embarrassing how well it works, how easily I calm under his touch. Some people have that effect, I’ve heard. Some instinct that tells us we can trust them. My very own virgin whisperer.
Except that instinct is a lie. This man bought me at auction for one purpose only: to break me.
My breathing has calmed, and I lay my cheek against the cool leather.
“That’s right,” he murmurs. “This isn’t going to hurt. So afraid of pain, aren’t you? Why do you always expect the worst, little virgin?”
Because you’re a monster!
Is he, though? The time on the spiral staircase didn’t hurt. Maybe every time will be like that—intimate and filthy. And pleasurable, yes. He made me climax so hard I felt it for hours. All night long.
He’s saving my virginity for last, though. And like he said, I play chess. I know how to move the pieces around the board, plotting and planning for the final strike. How to lull your opponent into a false sense of security. Or like he so eloquently put it: how to use a pawn. It will hurt in the end. That’s the only way he wins. And a man like Gabriel Miller never loses.
He runs his hand over my bare ass, gentle and sure. “The chili juice. That one really did a number on you, associating sex with pain.” He gives a rough laugh. “And I thought I was kinky.”
I flinch in the dark, because what Daddy did wasn’t kinky. It couldn’t have been kinky, because it involved his daughter. He did it to me. “He was trying to protect me.”
Two fingers slip between my legs, seeking the wetness between my folds. “And how did that work out?”
Horribly, since he’s now pinching my clit. I press my lips together, fighting back a moan. But his fingers are relentless and skillful, playing me until I’m panting, whimpering. “Oh my God!”
“That’s right,” he whispers. “It doesn’t have to hurt. All you have to do is give in.”
I can’t give in. Giving in means living in the Labyrinth, losing, dying here. It means letting go of the string that’s my only way out. Maybe the chili juice did mess me up. The masturbation. Waiting until marriage. But since the auction it’s been Gabriel Miller messing with my mind, making me want things I shouldn’t. “Please.”
“I ought to spank you for this, for fighting me.”
“I’m not fighting,” I say, my jaw tight. Of course he’s right. I’m fighting him, but not with punches or kicks. I’m fighting to maintain hold of my sanity.
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you? A spanking? I could bruise you for days. Then you could paint me as the big bad wolf.” I hear a zipper from behind, but his hand on my clit doesn’t pause. “I’ll just have to make you come instead.”
A chime sounds from far away, signaling that intermission is almost over.
“We have to go,” I gasp out, pushing to get up.
He doesn’t even have to hold me down. It’s only his fingers on my clit that keep me pinned to that sofa. It’s merciless, the way he circles them. Not too hard, not painful. He knows that wouldn’t work. Instead he’s patient, endlessly patient, while my body winds tighter and tighter. All my muscles clench, bearing down on the arm of the sofa, rocking against his hand. I want this despite myself, and his low baritone laugh tells me that’s the point.
I feel something else, a rocking motion in time with my own. His hand, I realize. He’s jerking himself off. At the same time that he circles my clit, the same tempo. It will be like this when he’s inside me.
Even then I can’t come, my body tearing itself apart. It hurts like this, and I’d rather come just to finish it. My muscles are spasming, mouth open on a helpless, silent scream.
“Come, little virgin,” he says, his voice choked.
There’s a splash of something hot on the backs of my thighs. His come.
The orgasm overtakes me like a tidal wave, turning me upside down, filling my nose with saltwater, making everything dark blue and blurred. I tumble with no idea which way the surface is, my lungs burning with the need to breathe.
When I break the surface, Gabriel has collapsed on top of me. He pants into my hair, muttering, “Jesus. Jesus.”
My hands are fists against the leather, which is slick with our sweat. The smell of sex scents the air, like ocean water and dark spice. We remain molded together like clay, breathing together, coming back to life together.
He pushes up and uses something—a handkerchief?—to wipe his come from my legs. Even when I stand, I can feel the hardening residue of him there. I’m marked.
There’s only a few frantic seconds to pull up my panties and push down my skirt.
Then he’s opening the door.
I emerge like some newborn deer, unsteady on my legs, blinking at the blinding sun after being in the womb. I would have collapsed on that thin magenta carpet except for his hand around my waist, his other under my elbow.
We pass a man, and I duck my head, trying not to meet his eyes.
Until I hear his voice sounding strangely familiar. “Well, Gabriel. Look at you making good use of your purchase.”
I look up to see the gray-haired man who’d had a beautiful blonde on his arm at the auction. Today it’s a different woman, this one with glossy auburn hair. How many different women does he buy? He smiles at me, knowing and cruel. Shame curdles my stomach.
“Evening,” Gabriel says, guiding me past him up the stairs.
The show has already started. They shouldn’t even let us into the theater now. It’s against the rules. But of course this is Gabriel Miller. He owns a box. An usher opens the door and gives a polite smile, as if we aren’t disheveled and panting, smelling of sex as we stumble into the space.
I take my seat as quickly as possible, but there’s no avoiding the stares and whispers. They interrupt the lovely ballroom dance that’s happening onstage. I stare at the whirling people, the oversize decorum as if I have no idea that everyone’s talking about us.
Finally I chance a glance at Gabriel. He’s leaning back in his seat, slouched like a king surveying his subjects. He looks satisfied but still dangerous. A lion in the jungle. Anyone who looks at him like this would know that he just had sex. Maybe not literal sex, but close enough.
But then they’d know that from just looking at me. A little bird in a gilded cage.
Why keep one except to hear her sing?