Because You Are Mine (Because You Are Mine #1)(99)

“Yes, but I thought . . . over the past few weeks, it seemed as if things had been changing,” she said weakly. Her heart plummeted when he shook his head slowly, his stare never leaving her face. He unbuckled his seat belt. “I want to possess you, Francesca. Dominate you. See that stubborn streak in you submit to pleasure . . . to me. That’s what I offered you. You insisted upon interfering in my world, so now you can stop deluding yourself with a girl’s fantasies. That’s all I can offer you,” he said, pointing in the direction of the bedroom. “Now go in there, take off all of your clothes, and wait for me.”

For several seconds, she just stared at him, still reeling from the wound his words had inflicted. She was about to refuse when she thought of the stark, concentrated pain on his face when his mother had begun to randomly attack him. His wounds were so much deeper than hers. Perhaps it would help him, to feel in control after experiencing so much helplessness and pain? Didn’t people act out their anguish all the time during sex, using the intense physical act to ground themselves in the midst of chaotic emotion?

Yes. She could be there for Ian in that way. She understood that his anger stemmed from his pain at being so exposed . . . so vulnerable.

She unbuckled her seat belt slowly.

“All right. But I’m only doing it because I really have fallen in love with you. And I’m not a naive little girl. I think you love me in return and are just too proud and stubborn—and hurt about what happened with your mother today—to have recognized it.”

A spasm of pain flickered across his rugged features ever so fleetingly, and was gone. He said nothing as she stood and headed to the bedroom.

Chapter Sixteen

Ian entered the bedroom ten minutes later. His body immediately tightened with lust when he saw her sitting nude at the corner of the bed. She’d piled her hair onto her head and fastened the rich glory of it somehow. Her pink nipples were mouthwateringly erect, and not, he suspected, from arousal, but from chill. He’d known there was no robe in the bathroom. It’d been wrong of him to make her wait while she was exposed. Nevertheless, something about her pale, naked body struck him as potently vulnerable and almost painfully arousing.

“Stand up,” he said briskly, refusing to soften at the exquisite vision of her. Would he ever meet a more beautiful woman?

Would he ever be affected by another female the way he had been by Francesca? A volcanic brew of emotion had begun boiling in him when she’d blurted out those incendiary words.

It made me love you about a thousand times more.

It’d been too much for him. He’d already been slain by the news James had given him just after the attendants had carried away his raving mother, that Francesca was in the morning room . . .

. . . that Francesca had witnessed everything that had happened.

He experienced an untenable need to punish her for seeing not only his mother when she was so vulnerable, but himself. He’d spent a good portion of his life guarding Helen from prying, horrified gazes. Somehow, knowing Francesca had witnessed the full extent of his mother’s madness felt exponentially more painful than a stranger’s observance of it.

He went over to the bureau and unlocked a cabinet. A jolt of excitement went through him when he saw her eyes widen as she stared at what he carried a moment later. “Yes. I keep only a few items here on the plane, and not the ones you’re used to. We’ll start with your punishment and then move on to other ways to make you squirm.”

Her cheeks turned pink at that, but he couldn’t tell if her reaction was from arousal or anger at his words. But he did want to see her squirm, he thought as he picked up the black elastic flesh plumper. He wanted to see Francesca squirming in regret and undiluted lust; he wanted her to beg him through those pink lips that haunted his dreams . . .

. . . he wanted to hear her say she loved him again.

The thought was banished almost as quickly as he had had it. He maneuvered a padded chest that sat at the end of the bed toward the center of the room.

“Step into this,” he told her a few seconds later, approaching her, holding the elastic restraining strap. Standing this close, he could the smell the clean, fruity fragrance of her shampoo. “Hold on to my shoulders to steady yourself.”

“What is it?” He tried to ignore how soft but sure her grip felt through his dress shirt.

“It’s a band that will bind your legs while I punish you, restricting you. It might be a little uncomfortable, but it will give me great pleasure.”

“I don’t see how,” she said, her face grimacing as he stretched the black, five-inch-wide, circular elastic band, pulling it up until it rested just below her buttocks, binding her thighs tight and plumping her ass over the edge, displaying firm flesh for his hand and paddle. He reached out and molded a buttock in his palm. His cock jerked.

“Now do you see?” he asked her pointedly, reluctantly letting go of her plumped ass. The elastic binder achieved the equivalent of what a bustier did for breasts, fully showcasing her ass, even as it bound her.

“Ian!” she exclaimed in surprise when he suddenly lifted her into the air, carrying her toward the padded bench.

“I have to carry you, with your legs bound,” he said, lowering her knees onto the cushion. “Stay on your knees for a moment. Don’t move.” When he returned, he carried a pair of handcuffs. Unlike the soft leather ones he typically used with her, given her sensitive skin, these were metal. “Wrists at your lower back,” he said. He frowned after he’d fastened her hands at her back. “I don’t want you struggling against those cuffs, Francesca. You might bruise yourself.”