A Feast of You (34 page)

I wanted gentle and tender and loving William, and sex that would heal. I wanted to touch him and show him that I loved him. But he needed to be in control, to be able to do anything he liked to me without me stopping him. His life must have felt so chaotic at the moment, and I was what he could control right now, if I surrendered to him. “Ok,” I whispered. “Don’t stop.”

The hand between my legs coaxed them open, and I moaned when his fingers brushed my sensitive sex. We hadn’t been together since the night he’d returned from Japan, and I’d missed him. Even as I tried not to panic and my mind fought against being taken this way, my body welcomed him.

His mouth reached the top of my boatneck T-shirt and he yanked it down to expose my breasts. The rip of the material was loud amidst the sounds of our labored breathing. “William!”

“I’ll buy you another,” he growled. “I’ll buy you a hundred.”

He hadn’t shaved, and the stubble on his cheek brushed over the tender skin at the curve of my breast. I withdrew from the pain even as he deliberately chafed my skin. His mouth soothed the hurt with light kisses. He repeated the action on my other breast—pain then pleasure, working his way closer and closer to my hard nipples.

When he brushed his stubbled skin over my aching point, I cried out in anguish.

“Shh,” he said softly, though there was an unmistakable dark tone in his voice. “This is always about pleasure, Catherine, never about pain. I won’t hurt you, but I am going to push your limits. Trust me. I’ll take care you. I’ll always take care of you.” He raked my nipple then, and the hand between my legs brushed over my sex. I tensed in arousal as his fingers found my clit and then abandoned it, found it and abandoned it.

“You’re wet for me,” he said, his tone accusing. “So fucking wet. You like this. Sometimes you like it rough, don’t you?”

“Yes,” I moaned. “But please,” I begged again. “Untie me. I want to touch you.” I might have protested further, but his lips closed on my nipple, taking it into the warm heat of his mouth. His tongue lashed the abused skin, and two fingers delved inside my slick channel.

He was right. I was wet for him. But it wasn’t playing on the edge that aroused me. It was him. It was always him. Pleasure or pain, I would take either because I loved him.

His mouth worked my nipple hard as his hand worked inside me. He thrust in and out, his fingertips pressing against all the most sensitive places inside me. I was on the verge of coming in seconds, my walls clenching around him.

“That’s right, beautiful girl. Give it up for me. Let me hear you.”

I climaxed fast and hard, reveling in the release and crying out. I closed my eyes and sank back, sated. I’d barely come down when his cheek brushed my other nipple. I hissed in a breath at the abrasive movement on the tender skin, and his fingers moved inside me again.

“No,” I moaned as he stroked rhythmically. “William, I want
you
.”

“You have me.”

Did I? Or did I have pieces of him here and there but never the whole?

His lips closed over my tight peak, relieving the hurt. Between my legs, the heel of his hand pressed firmly against my clit. His fingers slid into me, finding my G-spot and stroking.

Pleasure and pain, pleasure and pain even as I spiraled into another climax that was almost uncomfortable, following so closely on the first.

“Enough,” I panted when the waves of pleasure subsided and I was able to speak. “William, untie my wrists. I need to touch you.”

“I’m not done touching you.”

“Please.” My voice trailed off into a moan when his damp fingers circled my clit. “Let me touch you.”

“Not yet.”

Not yet. Hadn’t it always been
not yet
with him? He held himself apart, stripping me bare to the core while he kept himself at a distance. Even now, after the revelations about his father, he wouldn’t let me comfort him. He wouldn’t allow me in to witness his raw pain, his hurt, or his weakness. He shut me out, and I didn’t know how to reach him. I didn’t think he’d ever
let
me reach him.

And if he never allowed himself to be truly vulnerable with me then how could
we
ever survive? How could we get through every trial and tribulation bound to come into our lives over the years? I wanted to be his partner, but I couldn’t hold his hand if he kept me bound.

Something happened then. I shut down. William continued to stroke and play with my body, but for the first time, I didn’t respond to his demands. When his fingers couldn’t bring me to climax, he put his mouth on me. His tongue flicked and sucked, and I should have been arching as orgasms slammed through me. But I didn’t feel anything except a coldness where the bonds, literal and figurative, held my wrists.

He knew me so well and could tell something was wrong, but he only worked me harder. When his mouth failed to get me off, he slid his cock over my raw skin.

My breath caught when he spread my legs wide to stroke my clit with the head of his hard member. And then slowly, slowly, he filled me.

I tensed against the invasion. This wasn’t how I wanted him.

“Let me in, Catherine,” he demanded.

“You let me in, William.”

He made no reply, and I didn’t know if he understood or not. I was soaked with arousal, and he thrust inside me, burying himself to the hilt. His hands lifted my hips so I was more exposed as he thrust in and out, his pubic bone grinding against me with his every inward push.

I didn’t fight the first stirrings of pleasure, but I didn’t welcome them either. He fucked me relentlessly, and still I didn’t come. He positioned me roughly, his hands shifting my hips and then raising my legs so my ankles were locked on his shoulders.

The new angle allowed him to penetrate me even deeper. He stretched me, stroking every tight muscle and ridge inside me. He knew the rhythms I responded to, and he moved his hips in motions I couldn’t resist. A bead of sweat from his brow dripped on my breast.

“Fuck it,” he said, voice hoarse. “Come. Let go and come.”

There was no pleasure in his voice and no pleasure in the orgasm that wracked my body. There was only the peak and the fall and then feel of him spilling himself into me.

When it was over, he pulled out and wordlessly untied me. I reached for him, but he was already out of the bed and leaving the room.

M
y phone chimed the next morning as I tried to force down a piece of toast. I felt like shit. William hadn’t been in bed when I woke up. I’d looked for him throughout the penthouse but came up empty. I’d tried his cell, which went straight to voicemail. I’d even called down to Rajesh and asked him to check if William was in the gym working out. He hadn’t been.

Rajesh had told me the doorman had pulled the Range Rover out front for William just before five a.m. I had no idea where he was, and I hated that he’d left without saying goodbye. We’d talked about that once upon a time, but maybe it didn’t matter now. Hell, I didn’t even know where William had slept last night, and visions of being alone at Casa di Rosabela came flooding back. I hadn’t handled being alone, being kept in the dark, very well in Napa in January, and I wasn’t doing much better this time around.

It was lonely and scary not knowing where William had gone, given his state of mind. And how could he leave me after what he’d done to me in the middle of the night? Tying me up while I was sleeping? Fucking me senseless, then leaving? Things hadn’t been right between us since The Webster, and we were on the verge of spiraling out of control. I could feel it, and I knew he could too. So how could he leave me now?

I grabbed my phone, hoping the chime was William calling me. Only Beckett’s phone call would have been more welcome at the moment. I needed my best friend, but I didn’t want him to come over if William was going to come home at any minute, so I hadn’t called him yet.

The caller ID read
Hutch Morrison.
I leaned a hip against one of the barstools and stared, unseeing, at the stark kitchen. “Hey,” I answered, trying my best to sound normal.

“Hey, yourself. How’s my favorite girl?” Hutch asked in his familiar drawl.

“Hanging in there. How’s my favorite chef?

“Pretty good. I just finished up a helping of coconut brioche donut holes with Tahitian

Vanilla jam that would make your eyes cross.”

“Coconut, huh?” I sipped my coffee, but it tasted particularly bitter this morning and my stomach roiled.

“Not your favorite?”

“If you’d said peaches, I might have swooned.”

“You might swoon anyway. There was white chocolate banana bread French toast too. Delicious.”

I had to admit, that did sound heavenly. “And did you share this feast with anyone?”

“As a matter of fact, I did.”

“Really?” I leaned forward, resting my elbows on the counter. Had Hutch finally broken his celibacy streak? “Tell me everything.”

“I shared it with Fiona Joy.”

Fiona. The designer who’d asked Hutch to come to Paris to cater her Fashion Week dinner. I knew where this conversation was headed. I still hadn’t given Hutch an answer about going with him to photograph his role in the event. I tried to deflect as my stomach tightened.

“Isn’t she already in Paris?” With everything that had happened with Elin, I wasn’t sure if Fashion Week had started or not. Hell, I didn’t even know what day it was.

“She is. We had to have breakfast on different continents. But she was double checking that everything was set for the dinner, and she reassured me that you were welcome to photograph any part of it. She’s very much looking forward to meeting you.”

Hutch paused, and I knew he was waiting for me to speak. “That’s your cue, darlin’.”

“I don’t know, Hutch. Paris is a big trip.” I was stalling and we both knew it. This opportunity had come at the worst possible time. I wanted to be here with William.
But where was William?
On the other hand, I’d agreed to do the cookbook project for Hutch. I signed on for the job—the job of a lifetime—and going to Paris was part of that job. Plus, I did want to go. I’d be crazy not to.

But wasn’t my place here with William? He needed me now more than ever, and I needed to be here for him.

I closed my eyes, readying myself to tell Hutch
No
, when the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. I sensed without looking that William was behind me

“I’d like to give you more time,” Hutch said, breaking the silence, “but we fly out tomorrow. This is clutch time, Miss Catherine. Are you in or out?”

I turned around and looked at William. His stormy eyes were a brilliant ice blue. On first glance I would have said that he was pissed, but the longer I looked at him the more I realized that his eyes looked vacant and sad.

“I need an hour,” I told Hutch. “Please.”

On the other end of the line Hutch let out a disappointed breath and I knew I was trying his patience. No matter how much he liked me, this man was my boss and here I was acting like a millennial intern.

“I’ll call you back in an hour. That’s how much I want you on this trip with me.”

I managed a “thanks” before hanging up, never breaking eye contact with William. As I took the phone away from my ear, I prepared myself for the fight of a lifetime with the man I loved.

Except it never came.

“You should go,” William said.

I stared at him in disbelief, all the things I was prepared to say to him evaporating out of my head.

“William, I’m not going to Paris with everything that’s going on here. I would never...”

But he cut me off. “There’s no reason for you to stay. After yesterday, we both know where this is headed.”

“What do you mean ‘where this is headed’?” My voice was breathy and tight, belying the panic that was about to overtake me.
William wanted me to go.

He lifted his hand and absently ran it through his hair. “My father, Catherine. You saw it for yourself, you heard Charles tell me what type of man he was. And look what he attracted. Even from the grave his mistakes have ruined my life and they’ve almost ruined yours. That’s my family’s legacy. I will ruin your life. I want you to leave.”

“No.”

“Catherine...”

“No,” I said again, cutting him off. “I won’t leave you now.”

“I’m telling you to go. We shouldn’t be together. Go to Paris. Stay away from me.”

Suddenly the room felt too warm. A wave of dizziness washed over me as the acid started to rise in the back of my throat. William’s words were like a punch to the gut from a prize fighter, and I felt physically ill. This was the man who’d told me that I was his and that he never wanted to lose me. Yet here he was pushing me away and shattering me into a million pieces in the process.

“William.” His name was barely louder than a whisper when I said it, tears clouding my vision. “You said we would get past this.”

“That was before I knew what being with me would mean for you.” His voice was flat and dull and emotionless. A shiver ran through me, and the tips of my fingers started to tingle. I couldn’t believe this was happening. I was the one who ran away when things got bad. I never expected to be the one who was told to leave.

“I thought you were going to protect me,” I pleaded.

“This is me protecting you.” His resigned response was almost cruel because it was so totally and utterly wrong.

“I thought you loved me...” My voice trailed off. I looked at him then, willing the tears not to spill down my cheeks.
Please, please, please
, I begged silently.
Don’t do this
. 

I waited for him to say something, but he didn’t. He wouldn’t meet my eyes, and I watched as his head bowed forward as if he was in deep thought or simply defeated. I didn’t know which, but the silence that loomed between us was heavy and ugly and awful. He loved me. I wasn’t wrong about that. But what more could I do to convince him to stop shutting me out, to let me in?

And then suddenly the answer presented itself as clear as the light of day:
nothing
. If after everything we’d been through William didn’t love me enough to open himself up to me, there was nothing I could do. He’d asked, no,
demanded
, that I trust him until finally, I did. I trusted him implicitly and I’d opened myself to him completely because I loved him. And I loved him now with every fiber of my being. He knew the worst about me—about Jace and the accident and maybe even about Jeremy—but he’d told me none of it mattered because he loved me and I’d believed him. That he wouldn’t open himself up to me in the same way was devastating. If right now he didn’t trust me to love him no matter what, he never would. And nothing else really mattered.