Flesh: Part Eleven (The Flesh Series Book 11) (3 page)

“
I've
been busy, Amy.” I can hear the frown in his voice.

“
Busy?
Busy! Really, Lucian?” I quirk my head back. “Busy is
when you get backed up for a night and can't respond to me until the
next morning. You haven't been busy. You've been completely
unresponsive.”

He
approaches me, and I cower against the cross, hating myself for
showing vulnerability, especially since there's no point in it.
Nothing is going to stop him from doing what he wants. Nothing ever
has.

He
reaches out to take me by the shoulders, and I slap one of his hands
as hard as I can before recoiling. By some miracle, he gets the hint
and drops his arms to his sides, giving me a quizzical look.

“
I'm
glad that you're here, Amy.” He tries to touch me again, this
time my face, and again I slap his hand away, quickly side stepping
him to get out from beneath his intimidating frame.

“
I
doubt you care that I'm here.” I hug myself tightly.

“
You
know that's not true.” He casts a weary glance over his
shoulder.

“
I
hate this place.” I look around the room, feeling sheer disgust
boiling inside of me. I can almost smell the sex coming off of the
furniture, see the writhing bodies like shadows, hear the muted
screams of pain. It seems more like a dungeon in the medieval sense
than the pleasurable sense. The dungeon where Lucian has kept my
heart captive and slowly tortured it to death. “I hate this
place almost as much as I hate you.”

“
Are
we really going to do this again?” He rolls his eyes.

“
We
wouldn't have to do this again if you were a decent human being. That
doesn't matter anymore though. I see you for what you are.” My
body tenses as I glare at him.

“
A
man who doesn't have redecorating his home as a top priority?”

“
A man who is
bad business, both professionally and emotionally. I came here today
to tell you that I'm done with you, Lucian. In every sense of the
word. I'm done. So past done.” I suck in a deep breath to keep
my tears at bay. The wave of emotion that has hit me from saying
those words is completely unexpected. I absolutely loathe that I'm
showing him far more raw emotion than he deserves. Even more so that
he's not taking it seriously.

His mouth is still
quirked into an infuriating grin. He holds his arms out and crosses
the room towards me. I step back, trying to avoid him. When he
attempts to pull me into his arms, I kick him as hard as I can in the
shin and then slide around him to put space between us again.

“
Ow.” He
nearly doubles over to rub his injured leg. The smug expression he
was wearing only seconds ago is gone, replaced by what appears to be
confusion with a dash of anger.

“
Ow.” I
mock him. “Oh woe is you. Your poor little leg,” the
words sound like venom spilling from my mouth. I can feel the heat in
them, my tongue practically burning my lips. “That bruise will
heal in a week. My heart, on the other hand...” my voice trails
off, and I have to swallow back another wave of emotion from breaking
to the surface.

“
I never had
any ill intentions towards you.” He straightens himself. Now
he's being completely serious. There's no lust or amusement.

“
That may be
true, but you've hurt me more than any man ever has. And I'm done
with it.” There's a strange sense of satisfaction in knowing
that I'm finally standing up for myself. That I'm getting all of this
out into the open. Coming here was a good idea after all. It feels
like a heavy weight is slowly being lifted from my shoulders. The
burden of pining over a man who never cared for me. The weight of my
own naivety and illogical desire.

“
How have I
hurt you?” He cocks an eyebrow.

“
Are you
really asking me that?” I gesture into the air erratically.

“
Yes, I'm
really asking you that,” his voice is clipped, as if he's
offended by the notion that I think he purposely set out to hurt me.

I still for a
moment, trying to figure out how to word what I want to say. The
thought of gushing my feelings—my true feelings about him—is
painful. I don't want him to see how deeply he's wounded me, because
I think that he won't care. But I need to do this. I won't be able to
heal properly if I don't. I'll only create more regrets that it will
take me even longer to get over.

“
I
like you Lucian. A lot.” It's a pathetic start, but it's a
start. I wait for him to respond, but he doesn't. He simply stands
there, staring at me patiently. “I told you I don't fuck and
run. I've told you that time and time again. And I knew from the
beginning that's the type of guy you are. I knew you were bad for me,
but I just...” I turn my gaze to the floor. “I'm so used
to sweet, charming, loving men. The guys who buy you flowers and wine
you and dine you. Part of me hoped you'd eventually become like that.
Because I know that's what I need.”

“
If
you know that's what you need, then why did you keep coming back?”
his tone is cold, as if this whole thing is my fault. It only makes
me feel worse.

“
I
didn't plan to keep coming back. You kept pulling me in. This is your
fault, not mine.” I look up at him, my eyes full of all the
bitterness that I feel inside. “You kept seducing me with your
slick words. You made me believe things that weren't true. You made
me feel things I never should have felt for you.”

“
What
did I make you believe that you think wasn't true?”

“
That
you actually cared.” I hug myself tighter. “When you told
me about your wife and son. When you told me that you were scared
about the things you were feeling. It was all lies so that I wouldn't
leave.”

“
You
assume way too much about me.”

“
What
am I supposed to assume? You're hot one minute and cold the next. All
over me for days, and then I don't hear from you for an entire week.”

Lucian lets out a
sigh and glances away. He sucks his bottom lip into his mouth and
releases it with a small hissing sound. “Amy,” he
hesitates. “I don't know how to do this.”

It's so vague that I
can't even grasp any meaning from it. “You don't have to do
anything, Lucian. As I said, I'm done with you. I just needed to come
here and tell you. Tell you how much you hurt me. Tell you how you
damaged me, how it will probably be a really long time before I trust
another man again. Maybe I won't ever trust a man again. I don't
know.”

“
Amy.”
His expression sulks, and I finally see a twinge of remorse behind
his eyes.

I
hold my hand out to stop him from saying anything more. “I'm
telling Tyra to take me off of your project. I don't care what she
assumes. I'm not even sure you had any intentions of completing it.”
I furrow my brows at him, searching for an answer in his expression.

“
I
did. I just got caught up in other things.” His gaze falls to
the floor.

For
several moments, the room is silent. I expect him to say something.
Anything. He doesn't though. And I'm quickly growing tired of
standing here with my nerves on the edge.

“
Goodbye,
Lucian Reddick. You're the worst thing that ever happened to me, and
I pray to God that no girl ever has to go through what you put me
through.”

CHAPTER TWO

“
Amy,
wait.” Lucian's voice is pleading, but I'm already headed for
the door.

I feel his hand on
my wrist, and I reflexively turn and slap him as hard as I can. The
pain of my throbbing palm drowns out the aching in my heart for a
split second. He winces but quickly reaches for my other wrist to
hold me captive.

We've played this
game before. So many times. And I've always given in. Not this time
though. This time, I'm going to fight him tooth and nail to get out
of the room if I have to claw his stupidly beautiful eyes out.

“
Lucian,
let me go.” I flail in his arms, and when he doesn't
immediately release me, I start kicking.

The first successful
blow hits him in the thigh. He cries out and pulls back, dragging me
with him. His grip around my wrists is like iron.

I kick at him again
and miss. He pulls me roughly to him, wrapping his powerful arms
around me like a vice. I scream and stomp on his foot, and then we
both go down.

My heart is beating
one hundred miles per hour. It feels almost like I'm trying to escape
a legitimate attacker. I don't believe he'd truly hurt me though.

I manage to land a
blow between his legs, and he curls into the fetal position. I take
the opportunity to crawl away. His recovery is astounding though.
Before I have a chance to make it to my feet, he's on me again,
turning me around. I go for another nut shot, but he has wised up to
my attacks. He pulls my hands above my head and uses his body weight
to keep my legs pinned to the floor. Since I can no longer escape, I
scream and scream and scream, hoping that it will annoy him enough to
make him let me go.

“
Rape!”
the word comes out of my mouth repeatedly until my vocal cords are
sore. When that doesn't work, I start screaming, “Fire!”

Lucian
doesn't budge. He simply lays there on top of me, his heart drumming
against my chest while he catches his breath.

“
Amy.
Are you done yet?” he asks when I don't feel like I even have a
voice left.

“
I
hate you.” I give one final struggle before going limp beneath
him.

His
eyes rove over my face, and that familiar heat returns to his gaze,
the kind that's gotten to me every single time. Not this time though.
I'm so mad that if I could shoot flamethrowers out of my eyes and
catch him on fire, I would. I'd bite off his dick if he stuck it
anywhere near my mouth.

He
leans down to kiss me, and I turn my face. Almost instantly, I feel
his hand grabbing my ponytail, jerking my face forward. His lips meet
mine, and I mumble protest into the kiss. Then I use my last defense.
I bite him. Hard.

Blood
fills my mouth. He gasps and pulls away, a small trickle running down
his chin. There's a flash of anger in his eyes, but it goes away just
as quickly as it came.

“
Damn
it, Amy, can't you see that I'm infatuated with you.”

“
Infatuated,”
I let out a strangled laugh. “Yes, you're absolutely,
mindlessly infatuated with me. That's why I haven't heard from you in
an entire week.” I spit his blood in his face, hoping it will
make him get off of me. Never before have I been this nasty to
another human being. I can hardly believe myself, but I'm so crazy
with rage right now that there doesn't seem to be any filter between
my mind and my actions.

He
closes his eyes, absolutely shocked. He holds the expression for a
moment before wiping his face on my arm and smirking. “You're
kind of violent.”

“
And
you're a rapist. Now let me go.” I struggle again to no avail.

“
A
rapist? Really?” This seems to amuse him even more. “You
think so horribly of me.”

“
Because
you're a horrible, horrible man. As soon as I get free from here, I
should call the police.”

“
For
what? My only crime is being scared of my feelings for you. That's
why I haven't spoken to you. I'm not the kind of guy who gets
feeling, Amy.”

I want to feel
something from his words, but I don't. All that's flowing through me
is bitterness and anger. “Then let me go and I can put more
distance between us.”

“
I don't want
that. I can see that now. I want you to belong to me.” His
words are strong with conviction.

“
That ship has
sailed, Lucian. You've screwed up too much to have me. You don't
deserve me.”

He looks away from
me for a moment as if he's thinking. “You're right. I don't
deserve you.”

Then I feel his
weight lift off of me. He sits Indian style a few feet away. It's
such a strange thing to see, all the fight leaving him, especially
when he had the advantage. I'm grateful though. This has been far
more dramatic than I had anticipated. I said what I came to say, now
I just want to leave.