Because He Breaks Me (3 page)

“You cannot live with me. I need to make sure I exercise precise control to make sure this will work.”

I took in a deep breath. “What else?”

“You would wear what I said. Talk to only who I said you could.” A muscle in his jaw twitched, and I wondered if he was thinking about Dean. “You would eat what I said. You would give yourself to me, and in return, I will keep you safe. You will be available to me in any way I desire, sexually, spiritually.” A devilish look moved over his chiseled features. “Physically.”

I twisted my t-shirt harder, so hard that when I finally looked down, my skin had begun to turn red and I could feel my fingers started to tingle.

Callum reached out and gently loosened my grip from around the fabric.

“Hey,” he said softly, rubbing the pad of his thumb over my chin. “I know it’s a lot.”

I nodded, and a lump rose in my throat.

Callum reached for me, picking me up out of my chair and sliding me onto his lap. I wrapped my arms around his neck and buried my face in his neck, inhaling his scent. He smelled woodsy and with a lingering note of whatever cologne he’d been wearing yesterday.

I pulled back and ran the palm of my hand over the smooth planes of his chest. “If I say yes,” I said slowly. “What does that mean?”

“It means you’re mine.”

“I know that,” I said. “But what does it mean as far as…” I trailed off, the words catching on my tongue, not sure exactly how I wanted to phrase it. “Does it mean you’re my boyfriend?”

He sighed. “We shouldn’t get into labels.”

“Why not? You want to label me yours, so what’s the difference?”

“It’s not the same, it’s…” he trailed off and I buried my face against him again, feeling his arms tighten around me. “I don’t want to make you any promises.”

“But you want
me
to make
you
a promise that you’re going to own my entire life.”

“It’s what I need to move forward with this,” he said. “And I want to, Adriana. I want to more than anything.” His hands were tangling in my hair, pushing the strands back from my face, his fingers moving up under the edge of my shirt, sliding the material over the bare skin of my hips. “Please, say yes.”

He cupped my chin and tipped it up so that I was looking into his eyes. The sexual energy between us crackled, invading my veins and taking over my entire soul. The way he was looking at me, like he saw me, really
saw
me, like he wanted to get to know every part of me, caused my pulse to race and my heart to thrum against my ribcage. I had never felt anything so amazing, so intense, so perfect.

It went beyond lust, beyond a physical connection. The thought should have comforted me – I
wanted
something more than just sex, than just physicality. And yet our deep connection scared me more than it provided comfort. This man had demons, had secrets and scars and a history. The fact that he had a problem with alcohol should have been enough to make me pause, and when you added in his history with Rose, that he was basically taking care of (enabling?) her, and his penchant for expressing love by whipping me, you got a huge army of red flags that should have sent me running for the hills.

Yes, the way I felt went beyond sex, even though I’d never experienced anything close to the kind of ecstasy I felt when he was playing my body. But all that meant was that he had the ability to hurt me even more.

If I were just in this for the sex, it would be so much easier. I could give myself over to him, I could trust him with my body and my heart, because I would know that even though I might be disappointed if it didn’t turn out to be forever, he would never be able to destroy me.

But if I gave him that kind power, with the way I felt now, he wouldn’t just have the ability to break my heart. He’d have the ability to shatter it. He was already so in my head, I couldn’t imagine what it would look like if we took this even further.

“Adriana,” Callum said. “What are you thinking?”

“I’m thinking that I don’t understand.”

He brushed his lips against mine. “Do you understand that?” he whispered.

I nodded.

“Do you understand this?” He kissed me again, his tongue parting my lips, his hands slipping up under the back of my t-shirt and over the small of my back. I shivered and he pulled me closer, his kiss becoming more intense.

I felt him harden against me, and he grabbed my ass and slid it across his lap, pushing my legs apart until I was straddling him, my pussy right against his dick.

He took my hands and placed them on the chair arms, and then he began kissing me again.

I reached for him, wanting to feel him, to touch his chest, his face, to feel the back of his neck, to run my hands through the soft locks of his hair. But he placed his palms over the top of my hands.

“No,” he growled. “Hands here.”

His fingers pushed my panties over to the side.

“Adriana,” he breathed into my ear. “Say yes. Let me own you.” His lips sucked my ear lobe into his mouth, and my body flooded with desire.

I tipped my head back and he licked a soft line down over the pulse point of my throat, his hand twisting my panties and pulling them away from me, causing my center to clench in anticipation.

“Callum,” I said, and pulled my head back up. I touched my nose to his, and we froze like that, staring into each other’s eyes. I felt as if I was standing on the edge of a cliff, and he was pulling me over the side, insisting I come with him. And I wanted to come with him, I did. I wanted him to own my body, to surrender to him, to submit to him, to let him take care of me and make decisions for me. I wanted to feel safe with him.

But how could I do that when I knew that the only thing he was promising me was heartbreak?

“Say yes, Adriana,” he commanded gruffly.

Say yes,
I told myself.
Just do it. Say yes.

But I couldn’t.

I couldn’t do it without a promise.

“Why can’t you just say you’ll be my boyfriend?” I reached up and brushed a strand of hair off his forehead, and he flinched. “Why, Callum? You said you can’t stay away from me. I’ll do whatever you want, I’ll sign the contract, I’ll live wherever you want, just…can’t we say we’re together? Or at least that there’s a possibility of that?”

He reached up and took my hands, grabbed my wrists and pulled them away from his face. “I can’t,” he said. “It would be a lie.”

He held my gaze for a long time, and I held my breath, waiting for him to give in to me. Even then, I would know it wasn’t real, that I couldn’t trust it. I wanted to be with someone who wanted to be with me, not because I was forcing him to, but because he wanted to.

“I’m sorry,” I said, the lump returning to my throat. “I can’t.”

His hands tightened on my wrists and he pulled me toward him as hard as he could, my breasts flattening out against his muscular chest. I looked into his eyes and saw the urge to dominate flash there, to punish me for defying him, for not giving me what he wanted. But this time, he was somehow able to get control of it, and he let go of me.

He pushed me off his lap gently until I was standing in front of him.

He stood up and began clearing the plates from the table, even though we hadn’t finished our breakfast.

It was over.

His walls were back up, his stony façade completely obliterating any chance we may have had to go deeper with each other.

“Callum,” I tried.

He didn’t answer me.

Instead, he strode down the hall back toward my room, and when he returned, he was putting his keys in his pocket, sliding his shirt on. He dropped his sneakers on the floor, slipped them on.

“So what, you’re just going to leave?”

He nodded. “There’s nothing left to say, Adriana.”

“But can’t we… I mean, why can’t we just…” I trailed off. I wanted to tell him that we could just go back to doing what we’d been doing, but that made no sense. How could we keep doing what we’d been doing when what we’d been doing was so insane?

He crossed the room and kissed me softly. “I won’t bother you again,” he whispered. “I won’t. I promise. Take care of yourself, Lemon.”

And then he turned and walked out the door.

I
thought I would cry
, thought I would collapse into a puddle on the floor, weeping uncontrollably until Nessa came home and discovered she was going to have to scrape me up.

But I didn’t.

Instead, I swallowed around the lump in my throat, gratefully accepted the numbness that had begun to wash over me, then took a shower and got ready for work.

On my way to the train station, I ducked into Starbucks and treated myself to a venti caramel latte, sipping the steaming hot drink as I rode the subway to Midtown.

There was a gnawing pain in my stomach, the kind of gnawing pain that let me know something was wrong, but it was like I was feeling it through some kind of haze, as if my body was disassociating itself from what had just happened.

He can’t stay away from you.

He’d said it himself.

He would text me, I was sure of it.

I pulled my phone out of my bag and clutched it in my hand, just in case.

But by the time I got to work, I hadn’t heard from him.

I’d planned on telling Kiersten about Dean Bellingham’s invitation as soon as I got in, but her office door was closed, and so I headed to my cubicle and checked my inbox. Sure enough, Kiersten had sent me some changes Callum had requested for his tour, along with a slew of edits to the catalog copy for Jojo Kye’s book.

I was done with all of her requests by lunch.

I spent my break with a chicken cobb salad and an iced tea from a Café Metro, somehow scoring one of wrought iron tables on the sidewalk. I pushed the salad around on my plate and flipped the top of my iced tea around on the table absentmindedly.

I still hadn’t heard from Callum.

I missed him.

I reached into my bag and pulled out the contract he’d left sitting on my kitchen table, took a deep breath, and slid the pages out of the envelope.

There it was, all laid out in black and white.

The expectations he’d had for me.

T
he Submissive Agrees To
:

L
ive in an apartment
of the Dominant’s choosing, to which he will have access to at all times. Said apartment will have at minimum two bedrooms, and it will be up to the Dominant’s sole discretion whether or not he sleeps in bed with the submissive.

T
he Dominant will keep
the kitchen stocked with foods of his choosing, and the submissive will eat only from these provided foods, unless she has the prior permission of the Dominant.

T
he submissive agrees
not to consume any alcohol or be in places where copious amounts of alcohol are being served.

T
he submissive will wear only
the clothes that the Dominant has preapproved. She will be provided with a clothing allowance of twenty thousand dollars per month.

T
he submissive will allow
the Dominant to do whatever he pleases to her sexually, and will be ready and willing to provide for the Dominant’s sexual needs as he requires. This includes being shaved and ready for the Dominant at all times.

T
he Dominant will use
any toys, ropes, whips, cuffs, or bondage equipment which he deems acceptable and conducive to his pleasure. The submissive agrees that she will not push the Dominant into sexual situations that invoke an emotional response in the Dominant, and that there will be no expectation of any romantic overtures from the Dominant.

It went on for pages and pages, but I stopped reading. My stomach rolled on itself, a sick feeling that gnawed at my insides, this time bitter and raw, with no filter.

How could Callum have asked me to sign something like this? The contract I’d signed in Florida had been one thing. But this was a whole other level of twisted. To expect me to give up my whole life, to let him take control of me, and for what? Just so he could use me sexually? It was messed up.

Reading the words in black and white just solidified the choice I’d made when I’d told him no this morning. Because the truth was, Callum Wilder was not capable of loving anyone.

And the sooner I got that through my head, the better.

T
he afternoon passed in a whirlwind
.

Kiersten had left the office while I at lunch, but she began emailing me nonstop, firing off instructions at me rapidly – a dinner reservation to be made at Pastis, a sample publicity plan she’d uploaded to the server that needed to be forwarded, a list of bloggers that needed to be vetted and approved.

Every time I emailed her back, I wondered if I should tell her about Dean Bellingham. But there wasn’t really a seamless way to do it, and I decided I would wait until she was back in the office and I could tell her in person, hopefully tomorrow.

I was in the elevator on my way out of the Archway offices at the end of the day, pressed in with about fifteen other people, when my phone buzzed.

Callum.

I checked it, my heart hammering in my chest.

But it wasn’t Callum.

It was Nessa.

U out of work? Sephora run?

I didn’t want to go home. I didn’t really want to hang out with Nessa either, not because I didn’t want to see her, but because I knew she was going to ask me about Callum, and I wasn’t sure what I was going to tell her. But I couldn’t avoid her forever – she was my roommate. And I knew there was a good chance that being with her would take my mind off things.

So I texted back.

Sure! Twenty minutes?

“Hot date?” a voice chirped in my ear.

I jumped. “What?”

I turned to see Bailey, the girl from yesterday, standing in the elevator next to me. I’d been so caught up in my thoughts that I hadn’t even noticed her.