Feathers and Thorne Series Books 1 - 3: The Complete Collection

Chapter Twenty-One

Isabella

Carter makes himself at home in my tiny apartment. He fixes a cup of coffee and peruses my cabinets for breakfast foods. I doubt he has any real desire to eat the food he had sent over to my apartment. He’s made for expensive steaks on the West side.

I’m content with the packaged sandwiches from gas stations.

Although the ice pack has helped, I move it off the back of my legs, trying to strain and get a closer look at the phantom in my kitchen. He hardly glances over toward me at first, sipping his black, warm coffee while admiring the views outside my windows.

I think of him ripping his belt off and pushing me against Frances’ desk. My stomach falls.

“What did you need to talk to me about, Carter?” I hum. “You mentioned a meeting?”

He looks up from the streets below, from his distracting, stale coffee. “Yeah, I was just going to go over the work terms with you,” he replies. “I sent off Jacob’s check to buy out your contract. That’s going to be an issue, though. Because of paying him off, I’m going to have you work off that money. Just as a trial period for the company.”

“Trial period?” That sounds like I’m working for free. Something I most definitely cannot afford. “What are you saying, then? I won’t get a paycheck?”

“Not the first month,” he states, his voice solid and stoic again.

It’s not at all like it had been the night we first had sex. It was deep and rooted in emotion; some of them good, most of them bad, but it was better than this stale gasp of a tone he parades around with now.

“Thirty days free, just so I can be sure you can handle working for me.”

“Why wouldn’t I be able to handle it, Carter?”

He glances over in my direction, my knees clenched, and my body tired. I’m still so uncomfortable under his gaze, even though it has seen me at my most vulnerable.

“Well, you’re not much of a receptionist for me,” he explains. “If I ask for files at two in the morning or if I need you to meet me at my club downtown on short notice, then you’ll be there. I will burn you out, dove. I just want to make sure you stay around longer than a few weeks.”

After last night, I’m not sure I even want to do that. But the salary after the thirty days—that’s what I really need. So I will stick around and pay my dues. It’s only fair for breaking my contract with Jacob Lacey.

“Despite what Jacob said,” he groans, “you are not a sex toy, Bella. I don’t always expect you to be sexual with me, and after what happened at the mayor’s office, with the bruises, I understand if you don’t want to anymore. Just say the word, and I’ll stop.”

Mercy. It seems so foreign of a word.

“It’s the weekend. You aren’t required to work today,” he breathes. “I’m actually surprised you weren’t already at the hospital visiting with your father.”

I can only assume he checked there for me first. “I was going to, but…” I shake my head, unwilling to explain the discomfort I felt, and still do feel, after last night.

It was like meeting an entirely new man.

Carter Blackthorne—my boss with expensive taste, with paid drivers in suits, and with odd little cufflinks that resemble roses in the right lighting. He’s tall and attractive and demands attention in every room.

Then, there is Carter Blackthorne. He’s a sexual beast with the needs of an angry, savage lion. He is cold, calculating, and more dangerous than anything I’ve ever known. He keeps me up at night, leaves bruises on my ass, and is enticed by the marks he makes, like trophies he has earned.

The difference between these men is so hard to define.

“I can give you a ride,” he offers, nodding toward the front door. He sets his mug in the sink and hardly gives me a choice, taking my hand while walking me into the hall. “Take your time, dove. No rush here.”

I bite my lower lips as I walk, feeling every strike like it just occurred. Carter watches me and leads me but doesn’t seem remorseful about any of it. This is the Carter Blackthorne I am most afraid of. Not the one who shoots and kills a man in the mayor’s office.

The one that brushes past me to open my door, his hand grazing the back of my leg like he needs to feel the warmth of my wounds once more. I slip into the backseat, and he does the same, waving his driver forward without verbal instruction.

He turns, his hands finding my hips as he slides me across the leather seats. He swivels me over his lap, forcing me to face him while I sit oddly on his lap, my heart racing into my throat.

One of his hands finds my chin, pulling our lips to meet while the other hand brushes up the back of my skirt. I shudder with his light, sensual touches. It’s nothing at all like last night.

He breaks the kiss first but pulls me closer, pressing me into his lap so I can feel his warm exhales on my cheek. “Say it, Bella.”

My brows furrow. “Say what?”

“Say the word,” he growls, his palm kneading my sore ass. I hiccup a noise, hissing a breath while he attempts to make me tap out. “Come on. Say it. I know you want to, so just get it over with.”

When I stare into the oceans in his irises, I see something different. He wants me to back away, to fear him… and to reject him. Why would he want me to say mercy? He knows what will happen, and it would undoubtedly upset him.

So why is he begging to be let down?

“Say it!”

I wince, his hand coming down against my bare ass a little harder than I anticipate. I hiss a breath and push off his chest a little, leaning back to accommodate the new, burning-hot handprint he probably left on an already tired bruise.

“Dove, just say it,” he growls, begging now. “Just say it. Get it over with and end this. I see that you want to. If you say it, I’ll never hurt you ever again like I did last night.”

I swallow. “And if I don’t say it?”

He cocks his head like a curious, playful puppy. “I can’t promise you won’t feel pain, but I can promise you’ll always be pleased by me, Bella.”

I weigh my options, knowing we will be at the hospital soon. I have to answer. Either I take a spanking from now on and don’t complain or ask questions about it, or I walk away and return to my life as a hapless, sexless receptionist for some construction company I don’t even like.

With Carter, I can see the opportunity and the adventure. If I have to sleep with an ice pack to make this deal work for the both of us, then I will make it work.

I curl forward, pressing myself into his chest while his arms wrap sensually around my shoulders. I feel tiny in his grasp, I feel owned by him now, and I don’t mind it all that much.

“Say it,” he whispers in my ear, his tone deathly cold to my heart. “Tell me you want me to stop. Tell me I’ve hurt you, and you don’t want to be fucked by me anymore, dove.”

Holding my breath, I cave into his embrace and his offer without hesitation.

“If I said that, it would be a lie, Carter.”

“Stop the car under the bridge,” he snaps at his driver.

Carter finds my hair, pulling it back so I can sit up more, his eyes drinking down every part of me, especially the skirt that is too short when I’m straddling his long, muscular legs. With his free hand, he pulls the waistline of my skirt all the way under the point of my breasts, making every part of me very visible to him now.

I regret not wearing panties.

I don’t regret not saying the word mercy.