Chapter 24

CHAPTER 24

AURORA

I sat back and waited. My muscles were tense, ready to bolt. My hand shook as I reached out to poke him in the chest. "Roman?" Nothing. I poked him again. "Roman?" Nothing.

I let out the breath I had been holding. My head spun as a rush of dizzying fear and excitement coursed through my veins. I gingerly climbed off him and pulled the belt from around my throat, tossing it onto the seat of the chair.

For several minutes, I paced back and forth in the small room. Holy shit! I couldn't believe I'd actually done it. Knowing I didn't have long, I snapped out of it and sprang into action. I wrapped my hand around his left wrist and lifted his arm up a few inches off the mattress. I then studied his face for any reaction. There was nothing. His eyes remained closed. His mouth was soft in repose.

I stretched his arm and secured it in the leather cuff restraint. Emboldened by his lack of response, I reached over his body and secured his right arm. I then tossed his trousers off the bed, out of reach, and secured both his ankles. I stepped back and surveyed my work. I tested the tightness of the restraints several times before I was finally satisfied. Taking a deep breath to calm my nerves, I shrugged out of the tattered remains of my hospital gown.

I was sitting in the chair wearing his dress shirt when he finally came around. Since it was a dose meant for me and I was half his size, I knew it wouldn't take long.

Roman immediately tried to sit up, but the restraints prevented him. He pulled on his wrists. "Goddammit, get these off me, Aurora."

I lifted his belt and stretched it between my hands. I folded it in half and snapped it. "No."

Roman roared his frustration and violently shook the bed as he wrestled with the restraints.

I held my breath, but the restraints held. Thank God. I knew he wouldn't call out for the attendant, either. The great Roman Winterbourne would not want to be caught in such a compromising position as this.

Roman breathed heavily through his nose as his fingers curled into fists. "I'm warning you, Aurora. If you don't unbuckle these cuffs?—"

I raised an eyebrow, mimicking one of his favorite gestures. "You'll what? Trap me in a relationship with you by taking all my money? Frame me for attempted murder? Lock me up in an asylum?" I tapped a fingertip on my lips as I frowned. "Wait, no, that can't be right. We've already played those games ."

"Aurora…" Roman seethed through his clenched teeth.

I approached the bed. I lowered my arm and let the curved edge of the folded leather belt slip between his stretched-open legs and caress his naked thigh. "And that's all it is, isn't it, Roman? Games."

His breathing slowed as the belt inched closer to his cock. I watched as his shaft thickened. I smiled and licked my lips. Just to taunt him, I lifted the belt and ran it over his taut, muscled abdomen before running it down the inside of his other thigh.

"You haven't answered me yet, Roman." I lifted the belt and swatted his inner thigh. A faint red mark appeared where the leather connected with his flesh. Roman's eyes glared daggers as his lips thinned. His angry expression belied how his engorged cock bounced against his thigh after the strike.

I was exciting him. Just like all those times he'd aroused me with a decadent and depraved mixture of pleasure and pain, desire and punishment.

The corner of my lips lifted. "It looks like two can play this game after all," I purred.

"When I get out of these restraints, I'm going to fuck your cunt so hard you'll taste my cock in the back of your throat."

I lifted my arm and struck the skin on his other inner thigh. "Promises, promises," I teased with far more bravado than I felt. Inside I was absolutely quaking. I couldn't believe I was actually taunting him like this. It was as if I were taking a stick and poking it between the bars of a lion's cage. Only worse. Unlike the lion, Roman was eventually going to be set free.

Roman let out a guttural moan as his back arched, then fell back onto the bed. The head of his cock was almost purple as it pulsed with blood.

I climbed onto the bed and kneeled between his legs. I set the belt to the side, but still within reach. I then ran my palms up his calves and over the tops of his thighs before inching toward his cock. As I got closer, it bobbed and moved. I trailed my middle finger up the shaft, lightly pressing in with my fingernail. "Let's talk about your games, Roman."

His eyes narrowed as he fixed his gaze on me with dark intensity. He remained silent.

I leaned down and licked the glistening pre-come off the top of his shaft. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched as his right hand opened and flexed, then curled back into a fist. I knew he was itching to grab me by the back of the head and push my mouth deeper down onto his cock. I swirled my tongue around the ridge. Roman closed his eyes and groaned.

"You see, I don't mind getting down on my knees and playing the whore for you." I sucked the head between my lips and then let it pop back out again. "The problem is, at some point, the game has to end."

Roman bared his teeth.

I swirled my tongue around the head again. "I understand your need for control. I know why you need to dominate all those around you, including me. I understand all too well the inner demons who build walls inside your soul. Those demons are not something to be afraid of. They are protecting you, but at some point, you have to relent. You have to stop fighting and let someone in."

I wrapped my hand around his shaft and pumped it up and down before leaning over and wrapping my mouth around the head and lowering it almost to the base, then back up. I repeated the erotic gesture several times. "My fear is you will never rein in those demons." I blinked back the tears. "That we will be stuck in this perpetual game. That I will forever be playing the whore just to be near you."

Roman remained silent. I couldn't tell if I was getting through to him or not, but I had to try.

I straddled his hips and reached between us. I grasped his cock and placed it at the entrance to my already aroused pussy. "Tell me what I need to hear, Roman."

"Aurora," he warned. His tone was low and dark. I could tell he was losing patience with my game.

"Say it, Roman. Say it just once. Tell me you love me ."

He jerked his hips upright, trying to thrust inside. Sex was always the answer for us, but not this time.

I rose up on my knees, preventing him.

"Dammit, Aurora. Let me in," he ground out.

I smirked. "You first."

"What do you want to hear? You want me to say I love you?" he spit out viciously. "It's a bullshit weak emotion. Fucking is more honest."

"No. Love is the one thing in this entire world your wealth can't buy me," I bit back.

He pulled on his restraints as he roared, "You left me!"

The pain I saw in his eyes took me aback. He always seemed like this almost godlike figure to me; strong, intelligent, dangerous. To see such a raw human emotion from him was devastating.

I shook my head. "Baby, I didn't leave you."

"Only because I sabotaged your plans. You've tried before and you'll try again. You want me to bare my soul and say I love you to a woman who is only staying by my side by force?"

"I wouldn't try to leave you if I knew you loved me. Say you love me, Roman, " I begged.

He clenched his jaw and refused to speak.

My heart broke.

I let go of his cock and sat back on his thighs. I turned my head to the side, swiping at the tears that flowed down my cheeks. I sniffed. "I'm sorry, Roman. I don't think there is any hope for us then. We have nothing between us."

I started to climb off the bed, but his soft words stopped me.

"Your music," he whispered.

I stopped, not sure I'd heard him. "What?"

He averted his eyes and spoke slowly and carefully, measuring each of his words. "When I first saw you, I was struck by your innocence and beauty, but truth be told, the world is full of beautiful women. But then you played, and there was this magnificent transformation. Your command of the music was exemplary, but it was more than that, so much more. Somehow, someway, this small slip of a girl was capturing Beethoven's pain and ecstasy, his dark passion and torment. It was intoxicating watching you. Never before had I heard such anguish, such experience, come from someone so seemingly unaware and almost na?ve. You were playing with such pathos in the middle of a park on that silly little plastic keyboard. In that moment, I wanted nothing more in this world than to capture that essence for my own. I had to possess you. It wasn't a matter of if, but when."

I refused to look at him. I knew if I did, my resolve would melt. I slowly shook my head as I kept my gaze trained on the wall next to the bed. "Music isn't enough. Music isn't love."

He was silent for so long, I didn't think he would respond. Then he finally spoke. "I love getting dressed together."

It was such an unexpected response, I couldn't help but turn and look at him.

"I love seeing the curve of your back as you sit at the vanity table putting on your makeup. I love knowing that I'm the first person to smell your perfume as it warms on your skin. The reason why I choose what you wear half the time is because I'm picking gowns you need me to zip up in the back just so I can touch you at that moment. I love the quiet intimacy of having you all to myself before being forced to share you with the world."

I placed my hands on his chest and splayed my fingers out, feeling the hard beat of his heart beneath my fingertips. "Don't stop."

He wasn't saying he loved me in so many words, but with a stubborn man like Roman, you had to take the small wins. He was telling me he loved me in his way.

"I love how you only eat the yolks of your and my eggs, leaving me the boring white part. I love waking up in the morning with your hair tangled around my fist. I love how when we are walking in a crowd, you naturally move closer to me for protection."

I shifted my hips as I grasped his cock and slowly lowered my body onto him.

Roman groaned.

"Keep talking," I breathed as I rotated my hips, taking him deep inside me.

"I love how you tap music notes out on your thigh when you are nervous and how you pretend to be shocked at the scary parts when we are watching a movie I haven't seen, but you have."

I set the pace as I slowly rocked up and down on his cock, bracing my hands against his chest. We'd never had sex like this before. With me on top, controlling him.

"I loved how you first ate the fish and then the breading when I took you to the park for fish and chips."

I raised my hips high and pressed down on him, shifting my body forward so his shaft teased my clit. I moaned as a surge of pleasure raced up my spine.

"I love the sweet mewing sounds you make when I fuck you."

"Oh, God, Roman…"

Just then, there was a horrible screeching noise like metal grating on metal.

Roman had raised his knees, breaking the restraints. There was another shattering sound as he raised his arms, breaking his wrist restraints. He wrapped his arms around me and flipped us until I was held under the weight of his body.

My mouth dropped open. "You could have gotten out of those at any time, you cheat!"

The dangling chain of his restraints tickled the undersides of my arms as he linked his fingers with mine and raised my arms over my head, pinning me to the bed. He thrust as he claimed my mouth.

I wrapped my knees around his hips, pulling him closer.

Roman moved his lips over mine. "Say you'll never leave me again."

I breathed his air. "Convince me to stay first."

I had learned to become just as stubborn as he. I knew I was playing with fire, but after all, our relationship was based on these twisted games of dominance.

Roman slowed his hips. He thrust in gently, but deeply with each word. "I love you, Aurora."

I leaned up and gently bit, then licked his lower lip. "I'll think about it."

Roman growled as he released my hand to bury his in my hair. He pulled my head back by my hair, exposing my throat. He licked a path back to my mouth. "I'll just have to try harder to convince you." He punctuated the statement with a hard thrust that sent me over the edge.

Our love could be vicious and cruel, but it was ours.