“You think I’ll let anyone else see you like that? Touch you with their eyes? Laugh about it while adjusting their dicks like you’re a fucking snack?”
That shuts her up.
Her cheeks flame. Her breath hitches. But her eyes narrow, too.
“You can’t control me,” she mutters.
Wrong. I already do.
She just doesn’t know it yet.
“I don’t want to control you,” I say as I reach the villa stairs. “But I will protect you. Even from your own recklessness.”
“That’s rich, coming from the man who kidnapped me with a prenup.”
“I’m marrying you, Cecilia. Something a lot of women would kill for, by the way,” I correct. “And it’s not kidnapping if you walk willingly onto the plane.”
“You hit that guard and left my sandals.”
“I’ll get you new sandals.”
She sputters a laugh—half outraged, half amused—and I finally glance down at her.
Her eyes are bright.
Her lips part.
Her hair clings wet to her cheeks and collarbone, and her scent—sun, salt, woman—is making me fucking ache.
I walk inside and head for the master bedroom.
The maid I scolded earlier ducks and runs for cover. I can’t blame her, but also, I don’t really care.
Cecilia doesn’t protest when I squeeze her soft, wet body to mine.
She doesn’t say a word when I slam the door closed with my foot.
Not even when I lay her down, dripping wet, on the bedspread where I have every intention of stripping her nude and making her pay for what she just put me through.
“Next time you want to swim, you ask me.”
The words come out low, harsh, territorial.
I know I’m being a prick.
A bullheaded prick with too much adrenaline and too many feelings I don’t understand.
But fuck if I can stop.
Her eyes narrow. Her spine straightens. Her chin lifts like she was born to defy kings. She was.
“No.”
Just that.
A single word, soft and lethal.
“No?”
