Claimed by Tara Crescent Read Free Book Online Page A

a sweater and at that moment, I cursed the denim. I needed to feel his warm fingers against my bare skin.
    “Can we help ourselves?” His voice mocked the both of us and the secrets that we hugged tightly to our chests. “ Complicated seems to be our default setting.”
    “No more,” I said quietly. “Perhaps we’ve just forgotten the underlying truth and we’ve let it get murky. One day, almost four years ago, I walked into a bar and wanted to go home with a guy. It was that simple. Just desire.”
    “I don’t think the desire has ever been the problem, Ellie.” His fingers pressed at the seam between my legs, and I almost parted them for him.
    “I need to say something first.” My voice suddenly felt very loud. I gripped at the stem of my glass and took a sip for courage. “I’m not happy about the way you pushed me away after Hanoi.”
    He looked troubled. “Was that not the right thing to do, Ellie?” he asked me, a thread of sadness in his voice. “Should I have asked you to stay when there was so much of your own life to discover?”
    It had been the right thing to do, but the day he’d walked out of the door was still among the most painful days of my life. Even now, my heart ached at that memory. “No,” I replied. I looked at him steadily. “But I should have made that choice, Alexander. Not you. You can’t make my decisions for me as if I were a child. You should have asked me what I wanted to do that day.”
    Emotions flashed over his face. Regret, sorrow, finally resignation. His lips curved into a wry smile, one that did not reach his eyes. “I wanted to be so different from my father,” he said. “My entire adult life, I swore to myself that I wouldn’t be like him. Yet in the end, I wasn’t that far away from him, was I?” His expression turned bleak. “He imprisoned you and took away your choices. It seems I did the same.”
    “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” I snapped. “That wasn’t what I said at all, so stop putting words in my mouth. If I thought for even a second that you were anything like Dylan, would I be here?” I glared at him. “I’m not a fool, you know.”
    He chuckled at that, a warm sound that caressed my skin. “Fair enough,” he acknowledged. “There might have been some unnecessary pathos in my speech.” He gave me a straightforward look. “You are right and I’m sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have made that decision without checking with you. But I wanted to keep you at my side so much that day that I had to let you go precisely for that reason.”
    “To prove to yourself that you weren’t Dylan.” I’d suspected as much. Now, my hunch was being confirmed. “You were never Dylan.” I closed my eyes. The entire situation was ridiculous. We were playing games with each other instead of just being honest. It was time for that to end.
    “Are you seeing anyone?” My heart was in my throat as I voiced that question.
    He laughed in disbelief. “You have got to be kidding.”
    The weight over my heart lightened. “And you know that if you try to take my choices away once more, I will knee you in the groin?”
    He nodded solemnly, though he was struggling to repress his grin. I was biting my cheeks to keep my own smile from spreading across my face. His hand was stroking my thigh and with each touch, I felt a flutter of heat. It had been eighteen months. Some answers could wait for a few more hours. The time for talking had passed. I swung my legs off his lap and slid to my knees on the floor. “Sir,” I continued, my voice softer than it had been just a few instants ago, “I need you.”
    His hands wound in my hair, and each prickle of pain in my scalp zapped directly to my pussy. “Do you tell me when to fuck you, Ellie?”
    The games were beginning. I kept my eyes downcast on the floor. For eighteen long months, I had only memories to keep me warm at night. Now I was in Paris, in Alexander’s home and with the playroom only steps away.