Chapter 47: Desperate Need
Adrian Thorne had been my obsession for three years, though I’d never admitted that word to myself until recently. Other women called it love, but I knew better. Love was gentle, patient, and understanding. What I felt for Adrian was something rawer, more consuming—a need that burned through my chest whenever I saw him with someone else.
It had started at a charity gala, back when I was still trying to be the perfect society daughter my father expected. Adrian had been across the room, commanding attention without seeming to try, his silver eyes scanning the crowd with the kind of calculated assessment that made powerful men defer and beautiful women gravitate toward him like moths to flame.
I’d approached him the way I approached everything—with confidence born of a lifetime of getting what I wanted. The Keats name opened doors, our family’s media empire commanded respect, and I’d been told since childhood that I was beautiful enough to have any man I desired.
But Adrian had been different. Interested but not conquered, attentive but not devoted. For months, I’d told myself that was what made him appealing—the challenge of a man who couldn’t be easily claimed.
It wasn’t until he’d married that mousy little nobody that I’d understood the real truth: I wasn’t in love with Adrian Thorne. I was addicted to the way he made me feel—small and desperate and utterly alive with wanting something I couldn’t have.
That addiction explained why I was sitting in my car outside the Thorne estate at barely past dawn, waiting for any sign that Adrian had returned from his mysterious business trip. The private investigator I’d hired had confirmed his jet’s arrival the previous evening, but the house had remained dark, no signs of activity.
He’s back, I’d thought with a thrill that was part relief, part anticipation. Finally.
I’d waited until a reasonable hour before approaching the front door, my heart hammering with the kind of nervous energy that felt almost like fear. Adrian had been avoiding me since our encounter in his study, and I knew my dramatic scene at his dinner party hadn’t exactly endeared me to him.
But I also knew he wanted me. The way his hands had roamed my body, the hunger I’d seen in his eyes—that hadn’t been a performance. Whatever else Adrian Thorne was, he was still a man with needs his perfect little wife clearly couldn’t satisfy.
Thomas had answered the door with his usual professional politeness, but I’d caught the flicker of concern when I’d insisted on seeing Adrian immediately.
“He’s dealing with a family matter at the moment,” Thomas had said carefully. “Perhaps you could return later—”
“I’ll wait,” I’d interrupted, pushing past him with the kind of entitled confidence that usually got me what I wanted. “Tell him I’m here about his recent travels. He’ll want to speak with me.”
The threat was deliberately vague but weighted with implication. I didn’t actually know what Adrian had been doing during his supposed business trip, but the private investigator’s report had been intriguing enough to serve as leverage.
I had reluctantly been led to Adrian’s study, where I’d settled in to wait with the patience of a predator who knew her prey would eventually appear.
When Adrian finally entered, the fury radiating from him was almost palpable. His usually perfect composure was cracked around the edges, his silver eyes carrying a dangerous intensity that should have made me cautious.
Instead, it made me want him even more.
We’d sparred verbally, dancing around the topic of his mysterious trip while the tension in the room built to almost unbearable levels. But then he’d left abruptly, called away by some crisis upstairs, and I’d been left alone with my racing pulse and growing certainty that whatever had happened during his absence had left him exactly where I needed him—angry, frustrated, in need of an outlet.
When he returned, the rage was still there but now tinged with something darker. More dangerous. The kind of barely controlled violence that made smart women run and desperate ones press closer.
“You’re angry,” I’d observed, moving toward him despite every survival instinct screaming warnings. “I can see it in your shoulders, the way you’re holding yourself.”
My hands had found the knots of tension in his neck, and I’d felt him stiffen under my touch before gradually beginning to relax. This was familiar territory—the physical chemistry that had always existed between us, the way his body responded to mine despite his mind’s reservations.
“You need to release this tension,” I’d murmured, letting my lips brush his ear. “You need to let go of whatever’s making you so controlled.”
I’d felt the moment his resistance crumbled, the subtle shift from stone to fire. His hands that had been holding me at bay suddenly gripped my waist with bruising force, dragging me closer until my body molded to his. His mouth crashed onto mine with a desperate hunger that stole my breath, a hunger I’d been craving for months.
“Lock the door,” he’d commanded, his voice rough with need and fury combined.
I’d obeyed without hesitation, my fingers trembling as I slid the bolt into place. The click echoed in the silence, a sound that sealed my fate. When I turned back, Adrian was already reaching for me, his gray eyes burning with an intensity that made my knees weak.
What followed was everything I’d dreamed of—and more. Raw. Demanding. Completely consuming. There was no pretense of tenderness, no veneer of civility. His anger poured into every movement, translating into a dominance that stole my breath and shattered my defenses.
He didn’t coax; he claimed. His hands gripped, guided, positioned me with ruthless precision, leaving behind the sting of marks I knew I’d treasure for weeks. Each bruising kiss, each forceful thrust was a declaration I couldn’t mistake: he might go home to her, but this was mine.
The sounds spilling from my lips—gasps, moans, cries I couldn’t control—only seemed to drive him harder. They echoed against the leather-bound walls of his study, mingling with his growls of possession, filling the air with the undeniable truth of what we were doing.
And I loved it. I loved the loss of control, the way he stripped me of every careful mask I wore for the world. In his arms, society’s rules, my father’s expectations, my own polished composure—all of it crumbled into nothing. There was only sensation. Only Adrian. Only the reckless, dangerous pleasure of being wanted by him enough to risk everything.
This—this was what I’d been starving for in every other relationship. Not flowers or whispered promises, not wealth or polite tenderness. None of that mattered. What I craved was this: the feeling of being utterly consumed, completely overwhelmed by a man stronger than myself.
When it was over—when Adrian had taken his fill of me and left me sprawled across his desk like conquered territory—I should have felt cheap. Used. Reduced to nothing more than an outlet for his anger.
But I didn’t.
I felt triumphant.
My body ached, my thighs trembled, my lips were swollen from his kisses, and still a smile tugged at my mouth as I pushed myself upright. My hair was a wreck, my dress wrinkled, and I could still feel the heat of him lingering deep inside me—a mark far more intimate than any bruise.
Finally. Finally I had seen the real Adrian Thorne.
Not the polished businessman who shook hands in boardrooms. Not the perfect husband who smiled politely at his wife. No—this was the man underneath, the predator who took what he wanted without apology, without restraint, without pretending to care about anyone else’s feelings.
That man was worth every desperate wait, every humiliating plea for his attention, every sleepless night wondering why he chose her over me. Because his wife would never know him like this.
She would never feel the bruising grip of his hands, never hear the growl in his throat as he lost control, never experience the raw power that had just left me breathless and gloriously undone.
That side of Adrian belonged to me. And I would take it, again and again, no matter what it cost.
That knowledge was almost as intoxicating as what we’d just shared.
Let her have the marriage and the title, I thought with vicious satisfaction. I have the man himself.
And I intended to keep him, no matter what it cost.