Blood Ties (Dinero de Sangre #2) - Lana Sky Page 0,59
again.
I could deny I ever gave a damn about him. Spit in his face. Lie.
Instead, I strain his grasp until I’m staring directly into his eyes. “I wanted the person I thought you were; I have no shame in admitting that,” I confess, feeling my upper lip pull back from my teeth. I’ll get nothing out of sinking down to his level, but I don’t care. It feels strangely good to speak this openly to him. Damn mind games and verbal tricks. “I wanted the Domino I considered brave and honorable. I would have given that man anything. My body. My heart. My soul. You can laugh at me for that if you want. Joke and make taunts. That doesn’t matter. The truth is still this—you never had to brutalize me, Domino. You could have told me anything, and I would have believed you. You didn’t need Alexi to get to Tristan. I would have told you whatever you wanted to know. I could have been yours with so much less effort, and if you played your cards right, you would have never needed to spin a lie for Jaguar or anyone else. Wholeheartedly, I would have trusted you. That makes you the fool, not me.”
His eyes darken as he processes that speech, and I expect him to scoff in disbelief. Deny it. Make another low dig at my expense.
Instead, he tilts his head thoughtfully as if giving serious consideration to every alleged claim. It’s so surreal being on the receiving end of one of these appraising glances. Usually, he’d look at my father this way while trying to figure out how to best implement one of his many orders.
“Maybe you think you’re telling the truth,” he deduces finally, in a voice like sin. Hell itself. “Maybe… But it’s my turn to let you know something, Ada-Maria.” He strokes down to my throat and toys with my windpipe, applying varying amounts of pressure. Soft at first. Then harder. Harder… “Maybe I didn’t want to be put on a pedestal based on your childish, unrealistic expectations. What if I wanted more than that? What if I needed to shatter your fantasy of me and make you squirm, see how you react under pressure, get to run that smart fucking mouth with no regard for the paparazzi or your daddy’s wishes. What if I wanted to see you despair at your rock bottom to know if you were even wort—” He bites off the rest, and I can sense the tension in what he doesn’t want to say.
“Worthy of what?” I demand.
He shoves me back so hard I go flying. Only the wall can break the momentum, and breathless, I brace my hands against it, struggling to get my bearings.
He advances on me slowly, sizing me up with a ruthless, raking glance. He comes toe to toe with me, palming the wall on either side of my body, using his weight as effectively as prison bars to keep me boxed in.
When his mouth finds my ear again, he bites down on the lobe. Hard.
“That you were worthy of being the only woman on my fucking mind for the past five years.”
My throat goes dry, thoughts utterly blank. This man doesn’t sound like Domino, or even the monster I’ve been faced with since coming here. No, he is a new creature entirely, one who radiates possession in every single word ripped from his throat.
“That you were worthy of having me wonder what you taste like. What you fucking smell like. I’ve obsessed over this body, Ada-Maria. What I would have you wear when you were mine. How I would bathe you. Fuck you. Command you. I’ve imagined a million goddamn times how that ass would feel in the palms of my hands. The look on your face when you finally realized you were mine. Always mine, meant to be claimed since the moment I first saw you in Don Roy’s office. Or maybe I just like toying with you,” he adds in a guttural rasp, bringing one of his hands to my throat. Cold, his eyes spear through me, as violently as that blade he carries. “Maybe I like seeing that fragile, pathetic hope bubble in your eyes that you might be something more than the warm, wet hole Roy Pavalos could pimp out to further his own aims. You make it so fucking easy.”
I gasp. Or maybe it’s a sob? By now, I should be so accustomed to his mind games that