Descended (The Red Blindfold Book 2) (13 page)

I must have slept
because I woke at three in the morning, going rigid with terror
before I remembered where I was. I rolled over but Marc was gone, the
sheet thrown back as if to emphasize that I was truly, terribly
alone.

“Marc?” I called
quietly, thinking he was in the bathroom.

When he didn’t
answer, I got up. Candlelight wavered from the dark living room down
the hall. I found him sitting in a chair by the window, watching the
lights of Paris glow dully through a faint mist.

He heard my footsteps
and turned. “You’re up,” he said. “You okay?”

“Yeah. You couldn’t
sleep?”

“No.”

I sat on the rug at his
feet. He wore only black boxer briefs, leaving bare his hard-muscled
chest and stomach. In his hand was a highball glass filled with dark
amber liquid.

“Single-malt Scotch,”
he said, tilting the glass to one side. “Want some?”

“No, thanks.”

His face was pale and
grim. He looked older, which somehow made him even more beautiful. In
the candlelight, his eyes were a ghostly shade of silver-gray.

“What is it?” I
asked. “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing.”

“Please. I want to
know.”

“Let’s not worry
about me, all right?” he said, staring out the window. “You’ve
been through hell today.”

“So have you. Tonight
was awful.”

“But it’s over now.
And I’m glad I could be there for you. It’s just – forget it.”

“Marc. Look at me.”

He sighed and dropped
his gaze to my face. “It was inevitable, wasn’t it?” he said
quietly. “Something like this?”

My stomach was ice. “I
don’t know what you mean.”

“I’d actually begun
to hope that what happened with Lydia was a fluke, and I was free of
it. But you can’t outrun who you are or what kind of family you
come from. It’s pointless to even try.”

“This isn’t your
fault any more than it is mine,” I said, slipping my hand around
his calf. “It just happened.”

His smile was tight.
“Nothing just happens in this life. There’s cause and effect, and
there are choices. Take me out of the equation and Trevor never came
to Paris. You never spent an entire day tied to my bed.”

“There are a lot of
parts to this. For one thing, I should never have told Julia about
us.”

He shook his head.
“Come on. If you weren’t with me there’d have been nothing to
tell. How many times am I going to make the same mistake? How many
lives can I fuck up before I get the message?”

I could feel him
pulling away, walling himself off the way he’d done for so long.
“You haven’t fucked up my life, Marc. Not even close.”

“What an
accomplishment,” he said with a caustic laugh. “You’ve known me
less than a month and I haven’t ruined you yet. Give me time. I’m
sure I’ll figure out a way.”

He sipped his Scotch
and looked at me, his forehead wrinkling. “Forgive me. You’ve
been through enough, you don’t need this, too. I just think –
well, obviously, we can’t go on as we were.”

My entire body went
stiff. “As we were?”

“You neglecting your
life, submitting to a man like me. And the worst part is how much I
want you right now. There was something about untying you from the
bed earlier, rescuing you, that made me want to fuck you so much.
Even when you don’t mean to, you give off this aura I can’t
resist.”

“It’s okay,” I
said, going up on my knees. “It was a strange situation.”

“It’s not okay.
It’s despicable. It’s something Sade would feel.” He leaned
forward, his face dark and drawn. “Don’t you get it? This whole
thing is a warning. We have to pay attention.”

My eyes brimmed with
hot, stinging tears. “You’re punishing me because of what Trevor
did.”

“I’m doing the
opposite. I’m protecting you.”

“I don’t want to be
protected,” I said, laying my hands on his tightly-muscled thighs.
“I want what we had before.”

“You think you do. So
did Lydia.”

I drew back. The candle
wavered from some unseen current of air. “Don’t, Marc. I’m not
Lydia.”

“No, but I’ve had a
negative impact on you, just as I had on her. For Christ’s sake,
the police were here tonight. You spent all day roped to a headboard.
How long can we keep doing this?”

His face was filled
with a hundred unspoken emotions. Had he destroyed me and I just
couldn’t see it? Was I so wrecked with desire for him that I would
overlook anything?

“None of it was your
fault,” I said, knowing I’d never convince him.

“Fault is a very
tricky thing. I didn’t tie you to the bed but I made it possible.
I’m not going to hurt you like that again, no matter what I have to
do.”

The words broke over me
with sickening clarity. “No matter what?”

It makes sense now,
doesn’t it?” he said, his voice cracking. “Everything I’ve
said from the beginning? This isn’t a surprise. It was just a
matter of time.”

A tear trickled across
the corner of my lip. “I don’t know why we can’t just put it
behind us.”

“Please, Sophie.
Don’t make it harder. It’s brutal enough already. My willpower,
when it comes to you –” He stopped and drank the rest of his
Scotch, wincing as he swallowed.

“I wish you’d look
at me,” I said.

“Why? So you can
break my resolve the way you always do?” He looked at me anyway,
his mouth set in a hard line. His eyes were wild, sleepless and
tormented. “I won’t change my mind again,” he said. “I
can’t.”

I stood up and stared
down at him, my nails tearing at my palms. “Okay, so...would you
like me to leave right now? In the middle of the night?”

“That’s not what I
meant at all,” he said with a pained look. “You know that. I’m
just saying –”

“I understand what
you’re saying,” I broke in. “And it’s exactly what Trevor
wanted all along.” I went back to the guest room, shut the door,
and got into bed.

For three hours I lay
in the tangled sheets, anguish and tears alternating with
determination.

I would not stay where
I wasn’t wanted. As wrong as I believed Marc was, I wouldn’t try
to talk him out of it. I wouldn’t be Lydia, clutching at him in
desperation, literally going insane with love and desire. It would
only make him pity me, and I would not be pitied.

Though it wasn’t
quite dawn, I got up. I stole past Marc, who was asleep on the couch
with his arm over his eyes and an empty snifter beside him on the
coffee table. Closing drawers and closets quietly in the master
bedroom, I packed my suitcase. I left behind the dresses and shoes
Marc had given me, and folded the lingerie in an empty drawer.

Instead of a note, I
left the beautiful crystal bottle of perfume in the middle of his
dresser where he couldn’t miss it. It had once been a token of how
deeply he understood me – now it was a reminder of what happened
when I let my guard down. I’d tried it once. Never again. I might
spend the rest of my life isolated and unhappy, but it was better
than this.

Stealthily wheeling my
suitcase to the front door, I managed to leave without waking him. I
took a cab to the Hotel du Fort across town and ordered a room
service breakfast, which I choked down despite my lack of appetite.
Eating, unpacking, planning out my last restaurant review – I did
everything mechanically, with an instinctive numbness that let me
function with almost no feeling.

I wouldn’t think
about Marc or Trevor or anything else. Not yet. There would be plenty
of time for that when I flew home in a few days.

Bruises covered by a
long-sleeved blouse, I went to the lunch I’d missed yesterday. I
had no smile for the hostess, only a request for a table near the
back. I’d been avoiding my phone all morning but looked at it once
I was seated, hoping for a message from Marc. Nothing but a blank
screen.

By now he’d found me
gone. Obviously he wasn’t wondering where I was or how I was doing
after one of the worst days of my life. He sure knew how to end a
relationship – wait until things got messy, mumble a few half-assed
excuses, and blow me off.

At least he’d waited
to dump Lydia until she was out of the hospital. With me, he hadn’t
even waited until morning to act like he was bailing for my own good.

It was my first day
without lingerie, a beautiful dress, and heels in what seemed like
months. In my simple gray pants and blazer I felt like the modest
person I used to be. I’d been so willing to give her up and disown
her. As I picked at my lunch I quietly mourned the Sophie I’d been
with Marc – the free spirit, the sensual coquette, the woman who’d
taken pleasure and risked everything, living as if this time would
never end.

I had no idea when I’d see her
again. I wasn’t sure I ever wanted to.

Just after nine that
night there was a knock at my door – turn-down service, despite the
Do Not Disturb sign hanging from my knob. I closed my laptop and
pulled on jeans, prepared to send the maid away using ad-libbed sign
language.

I peered through the
crack wearing an apologetic smile, but jerked back as soon as I saw
who it was.

Please God, no. This
morning I’d begun the agonizing process of trying to get over him.
Now I would have to start all over again.

“Sophie?”

I tried to shut the
door but Marc blocked it with his foot.

“Let me in,” he
said. “We need to talk.”

“We’ve talked
enough. I don’t want to see you.”

I shoved the door as
hard as I could but he pushed from the other side, forcing his way
in. Using all of my strength, I slammed my hands against his powerful
chest but he didn’t even take a step backward. He kicked the door
shut with the heel of his boot and stood in front of me with his arms
crossed, a wall of defiant, muscular strength.

I pounded against his
shoulders. “Get out!”

He grabbed my wrists,
restraining me so easily I was almost embarrassed. “No. Not until
you listen to me.”

“Just what I need,”
I said, trying to twist free. “Another controlling jackass who
won’t leave me alone.”

“I’ll be happy to
let you go when you calm down.”

Writhing, I glared at
him. “Are you kidding? This
is
calm.”

It took all of my will
to stop struggling. When I finally did, he dropped my wrists.

“That was quite a
greeting,” he said, running a hand through his hair. “Hello to
you, too.”

“How did you know
where I was?” I demanded, straightening my sleeves.

“You stayed here
before.”

“And they let you
come up to my room?”

“The owners are
business acquaintances of mine.”

I smirked. “In that
case, I’m checking out.”

Marc’s shoulders
dropped. “Are you going to fight me all night or can we have a
conversation?”

“You want to have a
conversation? Fine. Start talking. You have three minutes and then I
want you to leave.”

I strode across the
room and climbed back onto the bed. My half-eaten room service salad
sat withering on a plate next to the television. I was unshowered
with dark liner smeared under my eyes and I didn’t care. Let him
see me at my worst, my ugliest and most exposed. None of it mattered
anymore.

He started to sit on
the bed beside me but I gave him a deadly look. “Over there,” I
said.

He sat in the
upholstered chair near the dresser, his legs wide apart. Wearing
battered motorcycle boots, faded jeans, and a white turtleneck
sweater, he looked so good it felt like a creative form of torture,
devised to make me as miserable as possible.

“Are you feeling
okay?” he asked.

“Under the very
shitty circumstances, yes,” I said, drawing my knees up to my
chest. “I’m just great.”

“How are your
wrists?”

“How do you think?
They hurt.” I rubbed them, pressing on a deep black bruise below my
left thumb. The cut I’d gotten at the M Society was an angry,
swollen red.

He looked as if he
wanted to come over and comfort me, but didn’t dare. “I woke up
this morning and you were gone,” he said. “Why did you leave
without saying goodbye?”

“Is that why you’re
here, to say goodbye? You could have done that over the phone and
saved us both a lot of trouble.”

He sighed. “Come on,
Sophie. I’m here because I can’t stop thinking about you. You had
a traumatic experience yesterday and I made it a hell of a lot worse.
It was indefensible and I’m sorry.”

I shrugged and said
nothing. I no longer cared about apologies or explanations. It was
way too late for I’m sorry.

He sat looking at me,
his stunning, dove-gray eyes rimmed with dark circles. Like me, he
couldn’t have slept more than a few hours.

“I want you to know
something,” he said, every word deliberate. “Trevor and I used
the same rope, but that’s where the similarity ends. Everything you
and I did, we did together. With love.”

I cringed. It was the
first time either of us had mentioned the word, and the timing
couldn’t have been worse. “Is it love to break my heart over and
over again? To pull away every two days under the guise of protecting
me?”

“Yes, it is,” he
said, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. “If you
didn’t matter so much to me, I wouldn’t care if I hurt you. I’ve
been that man, Sophie. I know how to use a woman and discard her when
I’m done. But I’m not like that anymore. You wouldn’t want me
to be.”

I got up abruptly, too
consumed with frustration to sit still. “Have you really changed
that much? First you all but throw me out and then you force your way
into my hotel room. You can never make up your mind – actually,
scratch that. You make up your mind three times a week and every time
you want the opposite of what you wanted before.”

He watched me pace the
carpet between the bed and the closet. “You’re right,” he said.
“I’m torn between wanting you and shielding you. Those instincts
are equally strong.”