Having Her: Lies We Tell, Book 2 (13 page)

She stopped, frozen to the spot as their eyes met. And locked.

What the hell was he doing here? Her heartbeat began to race, adrenaline singing like a choir in her bloodstream. There it was. The fizz, the spark. The dizzying rush of desire. All the missing pieces of the puzzle that if the world had any justice, should have been there with the man she’d wanted to go home with tonight.

But they weren’t.

“What are you doing, Kara?” Vin didn’t move, leaning against the car with his arms folded, relaxed almost. But he wasn’t relaxed. The ferocity of his gaze and the leashed energy in his posture told her he was angry. Very, very angry.

Her own anger flared. “I could ask you the same thing.”

“Why do you think I’m here? I was looking for you.”

“Well, now you’ve found me. What the hell do you want?”

“Kara?” Lincoln had begun walking back down the pavement toward her. “What’s going on?”

Vin’s gaze flicked to the other man then back to her. And her breath caught. He knew. He knew what she’d been going with Lincoln to do.

Something ignited inside her. Part anger, part fear, part excitement. She held his gaze, determined not to look away. Determined to let him see the boundary she was putting between them. That in the bedroom she may be his slave but she wasn’t out of it.

“Hey,” Lincoln said as he came closer. “Who’s this guy?”

Kara opened her mouth to say no one in particular but Vin cut across her. “She’s mine,” he said with complete and absolute authority. As if stating an incontrovertible fact.

The words died in her throat unsaid. He’d claimed her in the privacy of her apartment but out here, in front of someone else, it was a whole other story. No one had ever said she was theirs, not publicly. She’d never belonged to anyone.

“Hey, she’s not yours, mate,” Lincoln said. “She’s got a mind of her own.”

Slowly, Vin pushed himself away from the Corvette. “She’s mine,” he repeated in the same hard voice. “And she’s coming with me.” He didn’t come any closer but then he didn’t need to. A cold anger radiated from him, leashed violence in every line of his body. “Get in the car, Kara.”

She didn’t want to get into the stupid, freaking car. She couldn’t let him and her own ridiculous desire win this. But the word no seemed to have vanished from her vocabulary the instant he’d said
she’s mine
.

Lincoln looked at her and the expression on her face must have given her away because he said, “Kara, if he’s bothering you, I can—”

“He’s not bothering me,” she managed to get out. “And I’m sorry.” Because she knew, she fucking knew with every single cell of her being, that she couldn’t go home with Lincoln. Couldn’t take her clothes off in front of him. Couldn’t have sex with him. Because at the sound of Vin’s voice something inside her had gone quiet and still. Like prey going limp in the jaws of a predator, knowing it was caught. That fighting was useless.

Lincoln frowned. “You’re not going home with me then?”

“No,” Vin said. “She’s not. Now get in the car, baby.”

And she found herself turning and moving toward the Corvette, not looking at Lincoln. Drawn by the other man standing beneath the streetlight.

Vin opened the car door for her, standing aside as she got in, and soon as the door closed behind her, the unease vanished and relief flooded through her veins like a tide. She fought it, tried to hold onto the anger instead. Because, God, she’d gone ahead and meekly obeyed him without even an argument. What the hell was wrong with her?

The driver’s side door slammed shut, the interior of the car filling up with Vin’s intense, electric presence. She could almost taste the anger in the air between them, like sparks from a firework.

“What the hell, Vin?” she demanded. “Giving up construction and trying stalking instead?”

He put his hands on the steering wheel, his knuckles white. “You were going to go have sex with that bastard, weren’t you?”

“What? Lincoln? Yeah, as a matter of fact I was.” She threw the words at him like stones. A challenge. Part of her wanting to see what he would do, how far he would go.

Slowly, he turned to look at her. His blue eyes were almost black. “No.” The denial was flat, hard. “I don’t want you sleeping with anyone else but me.”

“Like you get a say. I’m not your girlfriend. I can sleep with whoever the hell I want.”

He stared at her and it felt like he was peeling back the layers of her anger, opening them up to the core of aching vulnerability that was at the heart of her. She swallowed, her heart racing, wanting to run, get away from him.

“Go on then,” he said. “If that’s what you really want, do it.”

It was like he’d pulled the ground out from under her feet. She’d been expecting him to get all possessive and forceful, and part of her was longing for it, craved it like a woman living in the dark craves a small taste of sunlight. And he
was
being forceful in that he was forcing her to make a choice. A choice she didn’t want to have to make.

Don’t you want me after all? Don’t you want to fight for me?

Her lips clamped shut on the words. No, she wouldn’t say that. Wouldn’t be so pathetic. “I’m not your girlfriend,” she repeated instead.

“No. You’re my slave.”

The breath caught in her throat. “Not outside the bedroom, Vincent.”

“So is that what that prick was for?” He gestured out the window to where Lincoln had been standing. “A show of independence? A punishment for crossing the line this morning?” There was lightning in that dark gaze of his. Jagged lightning. “Get this straight, Kara. While you’re sleeping with me you’re no one else’s but mine, so if you want to play games and screw around, you’d better find someone else to play them with.”

She found she was shaking. Jesus, what was the matter with her? “What does it matter to you what I do? Why should you even care?”

“Like I told you, you’re mine. Not his. Not any other bastard’s. You’re mine and I’m not sharing you.”

“So why did you tell me to go just now?”

“Why did you tell me no tonight?”

She blinked, anger tangling up inside her, knotting with the relief and the weird thrill his possessiveness sent straight down her spine. And the truth spilled out of her before she could stop it. “Because I needed some goddamn distance, Vin. And because you needed to hear the word no.”

“You can tell me no anytime.”

“Oh sure, and you won’t track me down and stand under a streetlight beating your chest and marking your freaking territory.”

He didn’t look away, didn’t flinch. “It’s why I’m telling you to go if you want to. You always have a choice with me, Kara.”

“Yeah, well what if I don’t want to have to make a choice? What if I want someone else to make it for me?”

“You wanted that guy to make it for you?”

“Sure, why not?” She tried to sound defiant, ignoring the hollow sound of the words.

“Then why are you still sitting in the car with me?”

Oh shit. Of course Vin would realize. And know what it meant too. Her defiance was a sham. A façade. Because she wasn’t going to get out, wasn’t going to go chasing off down the sidewalk after Lincoln. She wasn’t going anywhere.

She couldn’t. There was only one man she’d ever give control over her choices and that man was in the car next to her. She trusted him in a way she’d never trusted anyone else.

The thought scared her and she looked away so he wouldn’t see the fear, out the window to where the crowds around the nightclub heaved, people calling out and screaming, laughter and shouting.

Until Vin’s strong fingers took her jaw in his hand and forced her head round so she met his steel blue eyes. “No other men,” he ordered, his voice hard. “Not while you’re sleeping with me.”

She wanted to jerk her chin out of his hands, wanted to pull away, but his fingers were warm on her skin and she couldn’t control her shiver of reaction. “Yes,” she said hoarsely, unable to give him any other answer because, shit, there wasn’t any other answer she could give. With another man she’d have to be Kara, and she couldn’t be Kara. The slave was what she had to be and there wasn’t anyone else she trusted enough to be that with. “But the same goes for you. No other women.”

His thumb moved on her jaw, a stroke that set every nerve ending she had alight. “Possessive, baby girl?”

She met that gaze. Held it. “Fair, asshole.”

That jagged lightning flashed in his eyes, the anger she’d sensed in him still there. Still just beneath the surface. But the thumb that caressed her was gentle and the contrast made her nearly tremble. “I’m always fair. You know that.”

Of course she did. Yet she wasn’t going to give in so easily. “Say it.”

He didn’t hesitate. “I would never screw around on you,” he said in the same, flat, hard voice. “Why would I? When I have everything I need right here.”

Oh, bugger him. Sometimes he said stuff that made her want to punch him and sometimes he said stuff that undid her completely. Her eyes felt dry and tight. Like they were going to fill with tears. But of course they wouldn’t because crying wasn’t something she was able to do anymore.

So instead she blurted out the words she’d never meant to say. “Why did you find me?” Her voice had gone husky. “Because if you’re into slave kink, you could have gone to one of those clubs. You don’t need me.”

Silence fell in the car. And she wished she hadn’t said anything, revealed so much.

But he didn’t take his hand away, his thumb keeping on with that maddening caress. “I’m not into slave kink. That only works with you.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know,” Vin said, the rough edge to his voice pronounced. “Probably because you’re so fucking oppositional all the time and having you do what I say for just one goddamned minute is such a relief.” Then his gaze slowly lowered to her mouth and that maddening thumb moved to trace the outline of her lower lip. “But mostly because apart from this Corvette, you’re the only thing I have that’s mine.”

The dry, scratchy feeling behind her eyes intensified. God, she was so pathetic how that got her off. How desired it made her feel. Wanted and, Jesus Christ, safe. It had been so damn long since she’d felt safe…

“Vin,” she began, wanting to pull away, the old need to protect herself kicking in.

But his fingers tightened on her jaw, holding her still. “No. You don’t want to have to make any choices? Then put on your seatbelt, baby, because tonight you won’t have to make any.”

The apartment door shut behind them and Kara turned to shrug off the bag she wore on her shoulders, dumping it on the hallway floor. His hands itched to grab her, pull her close but he kept them by his sides. That would be giving her what she wanted right away and he wasn’t going to give her what she wanted, not right away. Not after tonight.

A cold, clear anger burned in his blood. He’d never been a possessive sort of guy—protective, hell yeah, he’d kill for those he loved—but the sight of Kara going off with that prick at the club had ignited a jealousy he hadn’t realized was in him.

Shit, during the day she could do what she liked, but going off with other men while they had this thing going on between them? No fucking way. She
was
his. And maybe he shouldn’t have revealed so much by telling her what that meant to him but part of him wanted her to know. So she’d understand it was important to him. That he didn’t consider what was happening between them something he could get anywhere else. And because, he’d sensed, she’d needed to hear it.

But he also needed something for himself. And tonight he was going to get it. Tonight he was going to show her how completely his she was. Make her feel it. Make them both feel it. So she didn’t go off with some other fucker again.

Kara didn’t speak, just tipped her head back and looked up at him. Her hair was pink and blue striped today, glittering piercings in her eyebrow and nose. She wore a tight black dress, ripped tights and combat boots. An aggressive look to match the purple contacts she wore in her eyes.

He didn’t wait, got straight to the point. “Get naked. But don’t put on the slave collar yet.”

Uncertainty flickered in her eyes. “I’m not doing this without the collar.”

“Didn’t I tell you that you didn’t get a choice tonight?”

Her beautiful mouth opened, the uncertainty deepening on her face. But he held her gaze, daring her.

“Vin—” she began.

“You think I’d ever hurt you, slave? Is that what you think?”

Her throat moved. “I… No.”

“No,” he echoed softly. “So I gave you an instruction. Now go do it.”

Her gaze slid away from his, dark, mascaraed lashes fluttering down. She was still and he found he’d curled his fingers into fists at his sides.

Give this to me, Kara. Please.

A couple of seconds passed. Then she turned and went down the hallway to her bedroom without a word.

Thank fuck. Relief caught him by the throat, a thrill of primitive satisfaction pulsing down his spine.

He hadn’t realized how much her willing submission had meant to him until now. Until he’d seen her nearly walk off with some other man. He’d said she didn’t have a choice but that was a lie. She always had a choice because he’d never force her into this if she didn’t want it. And that made him as vulnerable to her as she was to him.