Hurting To Feel (Carpool Dolls) (25 page)

Her
head pounded. She had no one. Nathan rejected her. She pressed her hand to her
forehead. God, she couldn't think of him right now.

First
thing she needed to take care of was herself. If Curt Stewart could come after
her or her business, she had to prepare.

Pushing
everything out of her head, she opened the box. She blinked. The room compressed
in on her.
Oh, my God.

Several
pictures lay on top of her mother's items. She looked away, not able to
understand what she was seeing. Her stomach rolled. She covered her mouth, and
ran for the bathroom.

The
images stained her thoughts. She hung over the toilet, gulping air, fighting to
stop the dry heaves after losing the contents of her stomach.
Oh, God. Oh,
God…

The
memories of her mother in business suits, her hair severely pulled back into a
low bun, and her stern mouth were the opposite of what the pictures depicted. She
pulled herself to the sink and turned on the tap. The cold splashes of water on
her face refused to take the sight of her mother, stripped and kneeling on the
floor.

The
red marks marring her body repulsed her. She covered her face with the towel
and tried to breathe through her nose. There was some mistake.

The
woman in the pictures was not her mother.

She
walked back into the room, carrying the towel. She wrung the corner of the
material as she paced in front of the box. The pictures were old and made with
a Polaroid camera, but there was no doubt that it was her mother.

Just
not the mother she knew and remembered.

If
someone told her to think up the wildest sex adventure for Carly Flint, she'd
laugh and say her mother was more likely to hold a whip and beat men to death
rather than cower to anyone. Her mother's opinion of the opposite sex lacked
compassion and respect.

Sure,
she had business dinners and meetings with other men, but she never brought
anyone home. Addison stopped in front of the box, closed her eyes, and hoped
she could look again without throwing up. Not once had her mother dated or
loved someone else.

Even
her mother despised her father to the point of obsession after Curt Stewart
claimed Addison was not his child.

"Oh,
fuck, fuck, fuck," she muttered, falling to her knees and scooping up a
handful of pictures.

She
ignored looking straight at her mother's body and studied the pictures. One
after another, she rushed through each Polaroid shot. Nothing she was seeing
made any sense.

She
went through the pictures again, looking in the box to make sure she checked
out each one. Finally, she threw them all in the box and sat back more confused
than ever. Not one picture had Curt Stewart in view.

Of
course, he could have been the man behind the camera. She leaned her head back
against the bed. Then who was the man in the picture with her, and where were
the shots taken?

Nothing
looked familiar. She heaved herself forward, and fished out the cardboard box.
Maybe the other papers would clue her in on what went on in her mother's life,
not that she had a desire to learn more. She only knew that she had to find out
where her father fit into her mother's life.

Because
either she held evidence that would save her life or she'd discovered why Curt
Stewart wanted her dead.

Chapter
Twenty-Eight

Three
fucking days.

Nathan
stood on the porch of Addison's house at two o'clock in the morning. He edged
closer to the door. After working long hours to distract himself, going to Billy's
and boxing a few rounds every night, and  trying to catch a few minutes of
sleep while sitting in his chair at the office, and failing, he accepted that
standing here made him feel better than he imagined.

Knowing
Addison was on the other side of the door, snuggled in her bed and safe, put
his mind at ease. He grabbed his shoulder, working out the stiffness. From
Antonio's reports, she'd gone to work every day and straight home all week.

No
doubt, she was pissed at him for keeping a tail on her. He pulled out a pick
and slipped it between the door and the locking device. With a flick of his
wrist, he tripped the bolt. Adrenaline rushed through his body the same way
breaking and entering always brought him a high.

 The
click of gaining entrance into Addison's house interrupted the silence of the
night. He silently slipped inside and shut the door. There was no hesitation.
He'd come for one thing.

Whatever
he had to do to bring Addison back into his life, he'd do. If she wanted to
take the chance on him, take what he'd give out, he was willing to try. At the
first sign that he was doing her more harm than good, he'd be the first to make
sure she received help and cut himself out of her life.

He'd
come to the conclusion, once he realized he was miserable without her, that
he'd painted everything in black and white. He'd fucked up, and instead of
working with Addison, he railroaded her.

In
the past, controlling the situation worked. Never emotionally invested in
others, he hurt them because he enjoyed causing pain. With Addison, he found
himself out of control and obsessed. He needed more from her, and he wasn't
willing to live without her. She'd wrapped herself around him, hung on, and he
missed the constant contact.

Not
only physically, but the sight of her brought him calmness. Her smile warmed
him when the outside world was bitter cold. Hearing her laughter, her teasing,
made him safe in his own environment.

He
only hoped he hadn't damaged what they'd had, so he could reconstruct their
relationship. It was the fear that caused the slight tremor in his hands, a
weakness that never happened on the job or around other people, only with Addy.

A
clatter came from upstairs. He took the stairs three at a time, and found the
light on in her bedroom.
What the fuck?

Addison,
on her hands and knees, arranged pictures on the floor. He stayed in the
doorway. All of her attention riveted to whatever she was doing, she had no
idea he'd came inside the house.

Before
he could think about alerting her to his presence, she scrambled off the floor,
flopped down on the bed and typed into her laptop. He frowned.

Wearing
an oversized T-shirt, her hair wild around her shoulders, and make-up free, the
darkness around her eyes stood out. The stress evident in the way she scowled.
He clenched his teeth. What was so urgent she was up in the middle of the
night?

He
walked across the room and stood at the foot of the bed. "Addison?"

She
screamed, falling to her side and blinking in surprise. "Nathan! Shit! You
scared the hell out of me."

Her
face relaxed, and then instantly she put on a mask of indifference. His fingers
curled. His actions had caused her to hide her feelings from him.

"What
are you doing here?" She scooted off the bed and crawled around the floor,
sweeping the pictures into a pile and picking them up.

"I
want to talk," he said.

She
walked to her dresser, opened a drawer, and dumped everything inside.
"Now? It's late."

"What
are you doing up?" He hooked his hands in his pockets.

She
ignored his question, studying the room. He tilted his head, following her line
of vision, trying to understand why she was jumpy. Anger over him breaking into
her house hadn't hit, so something else bothered her.

"Addy,"
he said. "What's going on?"

Her
gaze whipped back to him and she processed what it meant to have him in the
house. "Get out."

He
shook his head. "We need to talk."

"Talk?
It's over between us." She marched across the room and pulled her robe off
the inside of the closet door. Shoving her arms in the sleeves, she said.
"If you have something to say to me use a phone like a normal person or
come by my office during working hours."

"I’m
here now," he said, sitting down on the mattress. "Come here."

"No."
She crossed her arms.

"Addy,
come here," he said.

She
shook her head. "Out."

"No."
He tapped down his amusement.

"Yes."
She pointed to the door. "Go."

He
couldn't help chuckling. He'd missed her. "You're adorable."

Her
brows lowered. "I am not."

"You
are," he whispered. "There's something about you believing in
yourself enough to think you can put me in my place and order me to do what you
wish that I find incredibly sexy. Of course, I won't give in to you and leave,
but your attempt pleases me."

Her
mouth, which had come open while he talked, snapped closed and she glared. He
crooked his finger and motioned for her. "Come here."

"Nathan…"
she whispered. "Please, don't do this."

He
wanted to drag her underneath him and fuck her until she realized it would do
no use denying him what he wanted. He'd take everything with or without her
permission. But, this was Addy.

He'd
barely survived three days without her and right now, he'd take what she'd give
him freely. He patted the mattress.

"Sit
beside me." He leaned forward, braced on his elbows, and clasped his hands
together to show her he wasn't going to harm her. "Please."

She
wrapped her robe tightly around her middle, crossed her arms, and stepped over
to sit beside him. He inhaled deeply, catching the fruity sweet scent from her
hair. Where his chest loosened in relief of having her close, his gut tightened
in male awareness. A heady reaction he wanted to last longer.

So
close to her, at this moment, he believed there really was a heaven and he'd
died. But, she kept space between them, even pulling her robe tighter and
shoving her hands between her legs to keep from touching any part of his body.

"This
is my one and only time I'll bring this offer to you, so listen carefully, and
think about what I'm asking of you before you speak," he said.

"Nathan,
I—"

He
held up his hand. "I'm not angry. I was. I couldn't understand why you'd
need more from me and I took your pleading with me as an attack. I got
defensive. No one—he paused—I can't think of one time in my life someone became
angry with me or demanded I change."

That
confession was an understatement. No one dared contradict him. He stared at the
floor. Maybe when he was a small child and believed his mother would protect
him, he'd answered to someone else. But, he had no memory of that time.

"Professor
Frank once asked me why I enjoyed hurting others— and that went for men too,
although it's never a sexual rush with the same sex. I just like to fight.
Women…dominating them, seeing the welts and the blood, the helplessness in
their expression and the fear that they can't stop me gives me security. A
security I've never known, but crave. It's almost a fight or flight response.
As long as I'm in control, I stay alive. I do receive pleasure knowing I'll
survive another day."

Fuck.
He was screwing this up and not making any sense. How could he expect her to
understand him if he rambled on about unimportant shit?

"Will
I die if I stopped?" He glanced at her. "Probably not, but I'm not a
nice person, Addy. It's like a drug. I've been addicted to dominating my life
since I was young, and it's the only way I know how to handle myself. I've
tried to stop, and the anger bottled up until I exploded…until I wasn't safe. I
knew no limits, and when I get that way, I could kill without any regret."

Addison
sucked in a breath. He ran his hands down his thighs. She deserved the truth.

"Yes,
I've killed before." Even to his own ears, he lacked compassion.
"Men, not women. Never a woman. These were men on the streets, fighting
just like me to keep a dry spot on the ground as their own and food in their
stomach."

Today,
those men would thank him for putting them out of their misery. The reasoning
behind his behavior was something Addison would never understand. The streets
were an ugly place. People committed suicide every day. Others were too chicken
to take their life, and made life miserable for everyone around them, begging someone
to do the job they couldn't manage to do on their own. They stepped into his
life, and he answered their pleading.

"When
you begged me to keep you, it wasn't fair of me to ask. You knew nothing about
me and I realized I was hurting you. I went about everything the wrong way. I
showed you articles on the web, and that gave you an idea of why you are the
way you are, but me…I can't be classified. I don't seek out relationships,
clubs, or want to play at flogging, beating, pleasuring a woman the way doctors
explained. It's not a kink, it's not a passing interest, and it's not the
enjoyment of humiliating a woman the way it is for some people. I don't even
have the ability to love, because I lack that particular emotion."

He
inhaled deeply. "I'm not the creation of two people who were in love or
enjoyed sex after having a dinner date, Addy. I'm a product of rape, and that's
no excuse for my behavior, but I am who I am."