“No more than a minute. I thought you’d be asleep.”

I’m trying to decipher the tone of his voice as I sniff for displeasure. “I don’t . . .”

“What?” he prompts.

“I haven’t been sleeping well.”

“No? Come on. Back to your bed. You’re free.”

My laugh is unnatural and base, something I’ve never heard from my mouth. “Free?” I ask. “I don’t think you know the meaning of the word.”

“I’m trying, Cataline.”

The sincerity in his voice that halts another snippy response. “I know,” I say. “It’s just that down here or up there, it’s all the same.”

“Why am I not surprised,” he mumbles to himself, “that after all this, you’re still fighting me?” His voice rises, an indication he’s now speaking to me. “I’m beginning to wonder if you even want me to be nice. Tell me, do you prefer me cross?”

“Nice,” I say. “I want you to be nice.”

“So then come to bed.”

My face flushes hotly; it sounds like an invitation, and I immediately picture the one time I’ve seen his bed. A woman on her hands and knees for him. There’s a pang low in my belly, something sharp and electric.

“Christ, it’s not like I’m inviting you into the pits of hell. You’ve been down here a sufficient amount of time to reflect on your behavior. Now it’s time to go back to your room.”

The heat recedes just as quickly as it flooded. For a moment I was there, at his mercy, just like her, scared but excited, pushing and pulling against him.

Hands under my knees bring me back to the moment. He pulls me from the wall and lifts me against his solid chest. His nose touches my temple as he inhales. “You smell awfully nice for being locked up over a week.” My shiver is a result of his breath near my ear and the insinuation that he knows of Norman’s and my indiscretions.

He carries me as though I weigh nothing at all. When we’re out of the basement and crossing the foyer to the staircase, my gaze shifts imperceptibly. Light hurts my dark-soaked eyes, but I can’t resist following the line of his strong jaw. I inspect the stubble shadowing his olive skin and the dimple in his chin before drifting to the hollow of his cheek. He’s always been incredibly handsome, but this close I can see the art in his beauty. We stop on the third floor landing.

He looks down, and cautiously, uncertainly, I reach up to pinch his glasses by their frame. They slide off into my hands in slow motion. Brightness still floods my vision, but now my world is an unearthly shade of green. His eyes are looking at my mouth, his own mouth slightly parted. I’m not only curious about how he tastes, but I want to know, and that thought catapults me back to reality.

“Put me down,” I demand in a hoarse whisper.

“We’re almost there.”

I’m upset, with whom I’m not sure. I push against his wall of a body. “I can walk.”

“Relax.”

My momentarily forgotten anger crashes over me all at once like a set of mad ocean waves. “Go to hell, Calvin. I mean it. I don’t want your hands on me.”

“Struggle all you like. It just turns me on.”

“You’re sick,” I say, stabbing my elbow into his chest.

“Sick?” he echoes, and his body vibrates against mine. “You’re the one who wants to sleep locked up in the basement by yourself.”

“Because in the basement I’m a prisoner,” I say. “Up here, I don’t know what I am. Am I your whore, your hostage, your toy?” My body pulsates from the tears I’m trying to keep inside. “I can’t live like this,” I continue, “not knowing my fate.”

“Do you want to be my whore?” he asks as he shoulders my bedroom door open.

“I just want to know what I am, whatever it is.” My voice breaks as heat pools at the edges of my eyes. “I don’t understand why I’m here.”

He stops mid-step when I break into tears, clutching his t-shirt to my face. His arms squeeze me even closer. “Cataline . . .” he says softly into my hair. “Don’t cry. I—”

“Stop,” I scream so loudly that he jerks back. I push against him with the entirety of my strength, and his immobility only infuriates me more. “I can’t take this back and forth. I don’t know who you are. Put me down. Now!”

“You want down?” His snarl stills my body. “I’ll put you down,” he says, “and that’s where you’ll stay until I’m finished with you.”

“Finished?”

With a stride forward, he tosses me so I bounce on the mattress. My pearl nightie bunches around my waist, and he’s staring between my legs, eyes riveted as his hands rip impatiently at his belt.

I gasp and slide off the bed, darting to his right. His arm shoots out to catch me, yanking me so my back is pressed against his front. He walks us to the bed until my thighs are flush against it.

“Get off me,” I screech. His hand pushes my upper back so my breasts mash against the mattress. His calm, controlled movements serve to remind me how easy it is for him to manipulate my body. He lifts my nightgown, exposing me as the sound of ripping fabric ricochets through me.

“What are you doing?” I reach up and claw at the sheets, trying to escape by pulling myself out, but he grabs my arms and forces them behind me. He secures my wrists at the base of my spine, and coarse lace digs into my skin as he winds my thong around them. He gives the fabric a hard tug and lets go, leaving me fighting against it, wiggling underneath him like a fish on land.

His hands slide between the mattress and my body, where they grasp my breasts roughly through the satin. He pulls me upright until I’m flattened against his body. “Relax,” he commands.

“No,” I say through gritted teeth.

He grips my hair in a ponytail and guides my head to the side. “Turn around.” When I don’t respond, he tugs so I have to swivel and face him. “Lie down,” he says.

“Calvin, please,” I say.

“Down,” he barks, and I flinch. I sit tentatively, pressing my thighs together so hard that they begin to perspire. I ease back onto the bed, my hair spreading everywhere, my eyes searching the ceiling. His hands push up the fabric of my nightie until it circles my waist. Firm fingers trail down my belly before parting my legs with little effort. The slide of his skin against mine pulls so deeply inside me that when it leaves, there’s a void, some dull, endless ache.

“It gets me so hard just thinking about touching you.”

My nightgown rides up underneath my breasts when he pulls me to the edge of the bed by my upper thighs. His hips find their place against me, and I feel the assault of his coarse pants between my legs.

“That feels amazing,” he says. “Don’t stop squirming.”

His words only bring my attention to the fact that my body is out of my control. The more I try to still myself, the harder my hips protest against his firm hold.

His eyes remain fastened to me as he removes his belt all the way. Metal clinks on the hardwood floor with finality. He leisurely continues undoing his pants while I snake myself backward against the mattress. I’m almost out of reach before he grabs one ankle and pulls me back. “I suggest you calm down, and try to enjoy this,” he says. “It will suit you best to relax.”

His pants drop, and with one hand holding my hips, he takes himself in the other. My whimpering is drowned by his long groan as he skims his crown slowly up my opening to brush my clit and then slides it back down. He squeezes himself between my ass cheeks and the bed, the length of his shaft rubbing my anus. After a split second of nothing, there’s considerable pressure between my legs.

“Spread wider.”

My legs shake in the air, unmoving. He grips my knees and forces them apart. He retreats with a large stride backward. “You should see yourself now.” His voice drips with amusement. “Hair all over the place, hands locked behind your back, tits in the air. Legs wide open for me.” He pauses to lick his upper lip. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a sweet, pink pussy, Sparrow.”

My mouth dries with mortification, and just as I try to close my legs, he catches them.

“Do not, under any circumstances, close your legs unless I tell you to do so.” He lets go, and they hang there, trembling. “Very good,” he murmurs and crouches down. I feel his fingers pulling at my folds, opening me. He pushes one inside, pulls it out and when he inserts it again, it slides in more easily. “Getting nice and wet for me.”

He stands again and without warning, the pressure is back but it’s harder now as he pushes into me. He exhales, waiting there.

I take my bottom lip between my teeth, and my eyes squeeze shut. My legs are still suspended; they’re beginning to shake harder, but I barely notice because it’s taking all my concentration not to give in to the beg of my hips. My insides want this, to pull him deep and keep him there. But I don’t. “Please don’t,” I whisper. “I’ll do anything. I’ll be better.”

He anchors my hips to the mattress and thrusts hard, burying himself in me. I cry out just as suddenly, wiggling into the mattress, straining against my restraints.

“Oh, God,” I bawl. “My virginity.”

“Mine.” He stares down at my face as his chest heaves with deep breaths. My body adjusts to this thick piece of him that feels both foreign and familiar. When the pain lessens, I yearn for a soothing touch to replace it; hands on my face, a kiss, anything. He’s watching me so intensely that I think he might give me what I want, but his hips drag back instead and when he slides back into me, his abs flex.

“I’ve never had such a tight pussy.” He draws back again and thrusts harder. I squeal with each pinch of pain. As his rhythm increases, he falls forward onto extended arms. “I’m going to ruin you for every other man,” he says with gritted teeth. “You hear me?” His eyes fix on my chest, watching my breasts bounce with each contact of our hips. “Lock your ankles behind me.” It’s with relief that I rest my legs at the base of his back. “That’s it,” he groans. “God, I want this. To fuck you so bad.”