TAKEN BY HIM

(Obsessed With Him, Book Four)

by Hannah Ford

Copyright 2015, Hannah Ford, all rights reserved.  This book is a work of fiction, and any resemblance to any persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.  All characters depicted in this book are eighteen years of age or older.

***

The next thing I knew, Colt was calling my name, pulling me back from the blackness that had briefly pulled me under.

“Olivia,” he demanded.  “Fuck, Olivia, what the hell happened?”

He pulled me into a sitting position from where I was slumped over on the floor and grabbed my chin, forcing me to look at him.  “Look at me,” he said.  “What happened?  Who did this to you?”  He turned my arm over in his hand and looked at my wrists, his eyes widening when he realized I’d done it to myself.  “Christ, Olivia.”

He reached behind him and pulled his shirt off, wrapping it around my wrists in an effort to stop the bleeding

My breathing was being to return to its normal rhythm as the initial shock of seeing all the blood began to fade.

“Stay here,” Colt commanded.  “Stay here and do not move.”

I nodded, too weak to argue.

He returned a second later with a first aid kit and a bottle of water.  He opened the first aid kit and then raised my hands up over my head, holding the fabric of his shirt against my wrists tightly, applying pressure to my cuts.

“Do I need stitches?” I asked.

“Depends on if I can stop the bleeding.”

I nodded.  Everything inside of me was screaming to push him away, to tell him to leave me alone, that I didn’t need his help. I was angry with him, angry with him for kissing me, for causing me to lose my mind, to be driven almost insane with lust for him.

I would have let him fuck me, right here in this room.

But he’d rejected me.

He didn’t want me.

I’d broken my promise to Declan, a promise I’d kept all these years, for a man who couldn’t have given two shits about me.

Fuck Colt, I thought.  As soon as I was feeling better, I was out of here.

Those dark eyes were locked on mine as he held my wrists so tight I couldn’t move, the tension between us crackling so intensely I could almost see it, like a taut electric wire joining us together.

I hate you, I chanted to myself, begging my brain to accept it as truth. I hate you, I hate you, I hate you.

After a few more minutes, Colt pulled my arms down and began unwrapping his shirt from around my wrists.

I winced when I saw what I’d done to myself.  Marks crisscrossed my arms like chicken scratches.  I would have scars.  Not like the ones I already had, either.  Bad ones.  Ones I might not be able to hide.

The wounds were still leaking blood, but it had slowed considerably.

Colt reached into the first aid kit and grabbed an antiseptic wipe, ripping it open with his teeth.

“This is going to sting,” he said, no trace of sympathy or regret in his voice, just a warning that what was about to happen was going to hurt.  But even though the tone in his voice was devoid of emotion, he was gentle as he began carefully cleaning my wounds.

“Do I need to go to the hospital?” I asked, not sure I wanted to hear the answer.  Hospitals meant questions.  They meant filling out paperwork with spaces for addresses and names of next of kin.  Hospitals meant doctors who wanted to send you to talk to social workers, stays in psych wards, and huge bills I would never be able to pay.

And that didn’t even include the actual medical part of the whole thing, which meant needles and stitches and shots and monitors.

“No,” Colt said.  “I can fix it with a butterfly stitch.”

“What’s a butterfly stitch?” I asked, slightly panicked.  I went to pull my arms away from him, but he held my wrists tight.

“Relax,” he said.  “It’s just a special kind of band-aid.”

“Oh.”  I watched as he finished with the antiseptic and began unwrapping a band-aid.  It looked like a normal band-aid except the two sides were held together by some kind of elastic.  He placed one horizontally over one of my cuts, and the skin tightened around my wound.

It was slightly uncomfortable, and I winced and averted my gaze.  Once I stopped looking, I instantly started to feel better.  My stomach stopped churning.  My head stopped feeling so light.  I didn’t know if it was because the bleeding had stopped, or because I’d been getting woozy looking at what I’d done to myself.

“I think I passed out,” I said, before remembering Colt didn’t deserve to know anything about what had happened to me.

He didn’t say anything.

I glanced up at him.

I wanted my eyes to be trained on something other than my wounds, but the last place I wanted my gaze to land was on him.

But I couldn’t stop.

It was like he pulling me toward him with some kind of invisible force.

His forehead was knotted in concentration, and he bit his bottom lip just a tiny bit as he continued placing the bandages on my skin.

His eyes were dark, his displeasure with me written all over his face.

When he was done with the butterfly band-aids, he reached for a roll of gauze and wrapped it around my wrists, fastening each side together with medical tape.

Once he’d placed the last piece of tape, he placed everything back in the first aid kit and then he stood up.

“Can you stand up?” he asked, holding his hand out to me.

“I think so.”

His hand wrapped around mine, and I instantly became woozy again.  Not from the blood loss or the cutting, but from Colt’s touch.  I hated the effect he was having on me, hated that he could make me feel this way.

He’d kissed me, touched me, pushed me beyond anything I’d ever felt, beyond anything I’d ever even imagined I could feel for anyone besides Declan.  And it made me both attracted to him and furious with him at the same time.

A rush of heat overtook me as I remembered what it had felt like, Colt’s tongue in my mouth, his hands on my body, the scent of his cologne, the faint taste of alcohol on his breath, how badly I’d wanted him inside of me.

I couldn’t help it.  I wanted him to kiss me again.

And for one incredible moment, as I stood there facing him, his eyes searching mine, I was sure he was going to, was sure he was going to pull me toward him and crash his mouth into mine.

But instead, he shook his head.

“You’re done.”

“What?”

“That’s it.  It’s over.”

“What’s over?”

“This.”  He turned my hands over in his, looking at the bandages he’d just placed on me.  His face softened, and I saw something in his eyes.  Fear?  Concern?  I couldn’t be sure.  “You’re not doing this anymore.”  The concern was gone from Colt’s face, the flash of it so brief I wasn’t even completely sure if it had been there at all.  Now all that was there was a steely determination.

“I’m not cutting myself anymore?” I repeated incredulously, and then laughed.

“No,” he said.  “You’re not.”  He picked up my bag, rummaged through it until he found my razors, then slid them into his back pocket.  Then hoisted himself up until he was sitting on the side of the desk, his legs dangling over the side. “That’s over, Olivia.  I’m not fucking around.”

“You do realize that it’s not that easy, right?”

“It is.”  He looked at me again, and a shiver ran up my spine.  “You will not cut yourself again.  Do you understand?”

Something about his tone, about how commanding he was being with me, made butterflies swarm my stomach.  I thought about how he’d dressed me in my tiny little outfit, how he’d held my hands down at my sides and let his eyes rake up my body.

“You’re not in charge of me,” I said defiantly, raising my chin in the air, daring him to contradict me.