Moonshadows Ch 06

Author's Note: Just a forewarning that this chapter contains some non-consent undertones, though nothing particularly violent. Also, for the purpose of plot advancement (and at the risk of being slightly spoiler-y), I didn't have an organic way of working a whole lot of sex into this chapter. So, while there are definitely sexual vibes going on, those looking for something more straightforward should probably peruse the previous installments. Thanks for reading!

~~~

Hindsight definitely has its place. It can serve as a tool in finding resolution or vindication about what's passed, or as a way of getting a sense of the scope of things. It can educate and warn. But there are a lot of times too, when it's just a bitch.

For example: in hindsight, I probably should not have forgotten about Cassian Grey.

Well, not so say that I

forgot

about him, it's just that pretty much my every waking thought was somehow involved with Rafe and the world-altering secret he'd shared with me. And really, in my defense, it's not every day that a girl learns that not only do such a thing as werewolves exist, but it happens that her own boyfriend is one.

Sometimes I couldn't get my head around it; I was convinced it was all some sort of bizarre, stress-induced dream. Others, it made so much sense. All the times he'd responded to seemingly nothing, he must have been scenting things in the air. Or the way he had, from the very beginning, seemed so lupine. And those nights when he couldn't come over, couldn't see me: it took me an obsessive fifteen minutes with a calendar and Google to determine that almost all of them had been on a full moon.

Still, maybe if I'd kept in mind the catalyst to this whole revelation, things might have played out differently.

In any case, despite thinking about him almost constantly, I made no move to see or speak to Rafe for several weeks. Maybe it was cowardly. Certainly it was selfish, and I knew I wasn't being particularly rational either. After all, would knowing what he was suddenly change the way he treated me? The wonderful way he made me feel? He had insisted he'd never hurt me, and I knew both intellectually and instinctively that it was true. Yet every time I held the phone in my hand, fingers poised to dial his number... I stalled out.

I tried to sit myself down and think about my block logically. Was I afraid? If I was honest, the answer was yes, though not of him, per-say. Chalk it up to more female insecurity, but not only was I struggling with the the shifting of what I knew to be reality, but this revelation that he was not even the same species as me made him all the more unattainable. I was paralyzed by the confirmation that he was definitively special, and couldn't help but think that I was simply far too ordinary to keep his interest for long. Wouldn't it be simpler to just let things go now, on my terms, before his inevitable disinterest resulted in my total devastation?

So for three weeks I went about my business, going to work, attempting to write, avoiding addressing the thing that was most on my mind. Cara wondered aloud once when Rafe was going to come over again, but seeing my expression, didn't press when I said only that we'd sort of had a fight. She didn't bring it up again.

***

I scowled down at my bike. It was dark, the late autumn air was uncomfortably chilly through my blouse, and my shift had been a long one without much of anything to show for it. And now this.

The front tire was flat.

Of course.

I muttered a tired curse.

Resigned, I started rummaging around in my purse for my cell phone. I had all the stuff at home to fix the flat, but I'd need Cara to come get me tonight, so hopefully she was available. If not, I'd have to hitch a ride from one of my coworkers, and I was grumpy and antisocial enough that I wasn't about to resort to that unless absolutely necessary.

I was just attempting to recall the exact location of the tire-patches and pump in my apartment when all of a sudden, I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand up sharply. My throat constricted in instinctive anxiety and I whirled around to face the parking lot. It only took my eyes a second to focus on the lean shadow that was my worst nightmare stalking smoothly toward me.

"Miss Dalton," he said, his voice like frozen honey, "Good evening."

I felt all the blood drain from my face as I took an unsteady step back, away from him. A quaking started in my hands.

Cassian tilted his head slightly and smiled a horribly gentle smile. His cold, black eyes fixed with mine and I couldn't look away. Thoughts of my coworkers, Cara, even the cell phone in my purse were submerged under sudden, visceral dread. I don't think I could have called for help even if I had been able to think clearly enough to try.

"You're so silent." He said. "Have you no greeting for me in return?"

"Good evening, Cassian." I said immediately, and my own voice frightened me as much in its steadiness as in forming the words all on its own. The shivers spread to my arms and torso as terror gripped the rest of me.

He smiled wider and I caught a glimpse for the first time of white, white teeth. His tone held a refined amusement, a soft satisfaction. "I see you are no longer standing on formality. What a pleasant surprise. For you see," he took a step nearer to me and bent his head conspiratorially toward mine as if to share a secret."I too desire to speak candidly."

"P-plea–" I stuttered out before he silenced me with his finger, resting softly on my trembling lips, burning me with his icy skin.

"I must confess, I find myself rather fascinated by you, Selene." His finger trailed idly along the edges of my lips, that same horrible, unnatural pleasure from before making me press them together as I fought for control. "And that doesn't happen very often. Not often at all."

His words slid smoothly across my consciousness, but the rest of my attention was on fighting the twisted response my body was having to his simple touch. If my teeth weren't clenched so tightly together in concentration, they would have chattered from the combination of icy fear and arousal. The realization of the latter made me sick.

"That isn't to say that you aren't lovely in your own right, for you are," he continued as his fingertips moved to casually trace the line of my jaw and tuck a strand of hair back from my cheek. I shuddered from a place deep within, revulsion and desire mixed. "But it isn't your beauty that interests me; it merely sweetens the situation. No, I am intrigued by something rather more fundamental to your character. Something that makes you unique."

He leaned closer and even the puffed breath of his words on my face was chilled. His eyes were like polished obsidian, his touch light on my face, immovable, trapping me.

"Kiss me, Selene."

I nearly did. Without thinking, my body shifted forward, my eyes sliding closed. But inside I recoiled at the command, and I jerked my face to the side at the last second, my breath rushing out in a hissed, "

No

."

I stumbled backwards another step before opening my eyes, my heart pounding and fists clenching in fear of Cassian's reaction. But I found him smiling smugly.

"That, my dear, is precisely what I mean," he said, and his manicured tone was exultant. "You are positively refreshing."

"Go away," I whispered. "Just leave me alone. Please." I knew though, even as I said it, that he wouldn't. He wouldn't be going anywhere. My response had seen to that.

It came to me that I was in very deep trouble.

Cassian shook his head, but the smile never left his pale lips. "Ah, Miss Dalton. You and I are going to have a great deal of fun."

He extended one elegant hand. "Come," he said. And despite every impulse in me, I placed my hand in his and I followed.

***

I swear I tried my best to pay attention to the way we went. I struggled to keep track of the simple forks and turns, the inconsistently-illuminated, familiar streets that I should have been able to recognize, but every time I thought I started to get my bearings, Cassian would give my hand a gentle squeeze and it all tumbled back into confusion.

My restraints were not visible ones. To the casual eye, nothing more tangible could be seen than my hand sitting loosely in his as I followed him along, seemingly passive. In my head though, I was screaming. Willing my body to action, to flight, to some sort of resistance, but whatever trick I'd used before to break his hold over my body –however briefly– evaded me now. So I drifted next to him, anchored by his long, frozen fingers that were wrapped so easily around my own.

Cassian, for his part, seemed content to travel in silence. Either that or he could sense the panicked struggle inside me and thought it wiser to keep me quiet. Every now and then, he would gaze over at me, a smooth satisfaction coloring his disturbingly attractive features. And there was something else there too that made me tremble and flail all the harder at my unknown restraints: anticipation. Hunger.

After a little while, we reached his car. It was navy blue, low the ground, clean like the rest of him. And, also similar to its owner, it was initially inconspicuous. However, as he opened the passenger door, I saw that the interior was all leather, and many gleaming lights on the dashboard quietly sang

expensive!

But all this only occupied a small piece of my mind as the majority of it was consumed by a new degree of fear.

I knew if I got in the car, my chance of escape shrank dramatically. Wherever he intended to take me, it was likely far from here, and if I didn't get away now...

He guided me to he plush bucket seat, as courteous as an old-world gentleman, as graceful as a viper, slipping my purse from my shoulder. "Allow me," he murmured, placing it neatly away in the back seat. Out of reach. I drew a sharp breath and a strangled whine creaked from my throat.

Cassian paused as he was about to close the door, a small smile curling one corner of his mouth, and leaned in again enough to rest his cold palm against my cheek. A concussion of sick horror shook me, but I was once again transfixed.

"Do buckle up now, my dear." His smile grew sly. "We wouldn't want you to come to any harm, now would we?"

Wordlessly, I drew the seatbelt across my chest and clicked it into place. He withdrew with a satisfied nod to walk around to his side of the vehicle.

I can't remember much about the drive, only that the city quickly flashed away through the deeply-tinted windows and soon we were surrounded by trees, dark and uniform. It felt like we drove for a long time, but I didn't bother trying to scream anymore, and we were going fast enough that even my fear wasn't enough to prompt me to try bolting from the moving car. I occasionally tried looking ahead for some sort of landmark or sign to indicate where we were, but after accidentally meeting Cassian's glance in my direction, I kept my face averted to the passenger window like a coward.

The waiting was horrible, but it was still too soon when we slowed and turned to climb a narrow, freshly-paved driveway. The house stood near the top of the hill, nestled close against the earth behind it. A one story, modern construction, warm light poured from its floor-to-ceiling windows in a mocking imitation of a welcome. The apparent cheerfulness of the sight somehow made my captivity that much more awful. Who would guess that someone who lived in a house full of windows would have so much to hide?

Cassian parked neatly in a two-car garage next to an SUV-type vehicle bearing a splatter of mud and grit that was shocking in the space otherwise as tidy as a surgical theatre. I gripped my seat so hard that I think my nails might have actually gouged the soft leather, but when he touched my hand to assist me out of the car again, my body relaxed against my every wish and I stood to follow him inside the house. I cast one last look back at the car, where my purse and cell phone remained, before he drew me across the threshold into the house itself.

The furnishings were sparse, all clean lines and meticulous placement, and the whole place had the unused, sterile impression of a show room. Cassian paused only long enough on our way down a short hall to press a quick command into a keypad built into the wall, and panels slid almost silently from where they rested in the corners of the room until they blocked every one of the tall windows entirely. They locked into place with a small hydraulic hiss, yet another escape route blocked.

We came to the end of the hall, and Cassian guided me into a room too dark to make out, my feet quiet on what felt like a thick rug. I heard the door shut behind me, and my stomach dropped when he turned on the lights, revealing his spacious bedroom. An enormous, four-poster bed dominated the space. Thick, satiny drapes in a deep amber were tied back against the posts to showcase the plush bedding. I swallowed, nauseated, even while another part of me tingled in uninvited anticipation.

Cassian released my hand and stepped back a moment, studying me thoughtfully. I quivered in disgusted longing. "Remove your clothes," he said at last.

My response was immediate and instinctive.

"Fuck off."

His soft, delighted laugh slid over my skin like an icy touch and his black eyes glimmered with something I thought might almost be admiration.

"Ah, Selene," he shook his head in that terrible, smiling way and reached up to grasp my chin in his fingers. "You are such a delight. Still..." His expression focused and I had the terrifying impression of being firmly taken hold of, though his fingers on my chin were light. "Do not move."

As he released me, I thought to run, because I knew where this was going. But my body was paralyzed, as immobilized as if his coldness had frozen my muscles. In fact, I found I could hardly breathe and began to panic. My eyes, seemingly the only part of me that wasn't locked down, darted around the room wildly.

He chuckled quietly to himself as his long fingers reached out and began unbuttoning the front of my work-blouse. I couldn't quite see his progress with my neck as fixed in place as the rest of me, but I could feel the chill of him through the thin material of my shirt and felt, keenly, as he carefully unfastened each of the buttons on his way up my torso. My pulse beat furiously, roaring in my ears and small spots began to dance in front of my panicked eyes as my heart fed out oxygen faster than my lungs were able to take in.

"Calm yourself, my dear. I will be done momentarily. Though, I must say, I would not have had to resort to such measures if you were a little less reluctant. Ah, well... The price of your rarity, I suppose. There."

Finished, he brushed the sides of my shirt away with satisfaction and his touch on the skin of my chest made me twitch, despite the unnatural paralysis of my limbs.

His gaze swept over my bared skin, lingering on my breasts in their modest bra then again, longer, somewhere around my neck. With a violent shudder, I regained enough command over my body to take in a large gasp of air, and to wrap my arms around myself defensively. My legs were still rooted to the ground, completely uncooperative.

A small smile curved Cassian's thin lips. "I had wondered how long that would hold you. And I think I begin to perceive what that werewolf sees in you, though he perhaps doesn't truly understand what he has stumbled upon."

I guess, in retrospect, it's kind of silly that I should have been surprised by much of anything at that point. Things had been so far outside of the realm of normal for so long that my shock must have been almost comical. Cassian certainly seemed to think so. His genteel laugh made my heart quail in fear and despair.

"Oh, Miss Dalton. Surely you didn't imagine I was unaware of your companion's nature? After all, you can hardly delude yourself to thinking I myself am... What's the trite, modern term? Normal?" He chucked again, dark, low, and distinctly predatory, and leaned in, trailing a finger intimately along my clavicle. In a perverted, converse response to the ice of his touch, the unnatural pleasure surged again as a heat between my legs.

"In fact, I would wager you already know what I am, my dear. You are very intuitive."

"Crazy. You're crazy..." My voice came out as a strangled whisper and my mind raced. Subliminal clues seemed to be falling into place; things I had noticed, or tried not to, came back in a horrible rush to point to a conclusion out of a nightmare.

"Try again..."

His dry, glacial lips found the corner of my jaw, that place that drove me to such delight when Rafe kissed it, and I nearly swooned with pleasure. As he kissed down along my neck, so, so slowly, my pussy clenched in desire and my stomach roiled with revulsion. His hands easily slid my useless shirt from my shoulders. I dimly heard it fall to the floor at my feet.

No, no, no! Help, HELP!

Suddenly, as I felt my knees go weak under the unwelcome assault of his mouth on my skin, I realized my legs were mine to control again. Without thinking, my palms shot out to slap against Cassian's chest. I don't know if I managed to push him off balance at all, or if I just propelled myself away, but I didn't wait to look. I bolted for the door, running as if my life depended on it. Which, in fact, it did.

Then I was there, my hand on the doorknob, my heart in my ears, drowning out all other sound. I wrenched at the handle, pulling at the door frantically, and...

My vision tipped and struggled to right itself. I became aware of a dull pain in my cheek where it was pressed, against all reason, to the smooth mahogany of the door. Slower to register was the burning cold grip on the back of my neck holding me against the wood, or the firm length of another body pressing against my own from behind.

"Now, now. None of that."

Chilled breath at my ear. A metallic, unsettling scent in my nostrils.

Cassian turned me around effortlessly, dazed as I was from his lightning-fast response. He didn't look angry, but his fingers wrapped around my upper arms like iron and he studied me. "Perhaps restraints are in order after all. You do seem to have a way of wriggling out my commands. Come." He began walking me towards the great bed and my brain seemed to catch up with the situation at last. I dug in my heels like a little kid and whimpered in horror.

"Stop... No! Let me go!"

He looked at me slyly from the corner of those obsidian eyes and smiled. "I think not."

He threw me to the bed with enough force to knock the wind from my lungs. Before I could react, my arms were jerked above my head and cold, silky material snaked around my wrists to fasten them in place. A wail threatened to tear from my throat as I realized the knots were far too secure to undo or slip out of, but all my attention was diverted when I felt Cassian swiftly undoing the buttons on my jeans.

With a surge of desperate anger, I kicked at his face savagely, but he caught my foot with ease and simply removed the shoe and sock while kneeling on my other leg, containing it effectively. Stubbornly, I tried again to hurt him as he switched to remove the footwear of my other limb, but my efforts were just as useless and I soon sagged back into the mattress in despair. His smooth smile was triumphant as he began quickly undoing the buttons on his immaculate dress shirt.

I watched him with all the intensity of cornered prey animal, my emotions a violent mix of rage, desolation and incredulity. I couldn't believe this was happening. I couldn't believe how fast he was, or how my own body, even now, was throbbing with sick longing to feel his awful hands on me again. I wanted to scream, to cry, to curse, but instead I just watched him, wide-eyed, as he disrobed. His leanly muscled chest was almost as white as the fabric of his shirt. He tossed the garment aside casually and leaned over me once again, arms braced on either side of my trembling shoulders. He kept my legs pinned as he straddled them and pressed them together firmly between his knees.