“Next time, knee me in the groin. Don’t panic when you can’t breathe. Cause pain until I let go.”
Snared in the web of his attention, my body stilled. The green in his eyes came out to play, the outer rims like storm clouds. His gaze drifted from my neck to my face.
Electricity crackled to the surface of my skin, and my entire world tilted off its axis. He hadneverlooked at me like this. Not when I examined his hate brands. Not when he claimed me as his. Not even when I clung to him, desperate for comfort.
I tried to hold his stare, but I failed. My focus sank instead down, down, down to his mouth, and longing tore through my common sense.
I do not want this.
I should not want this.
I cannot want this.
The mantra chanted through my mind, ever quieter until the truth smothered it.
I want this.
I tipped closer.
He drew a breath.
A knock pounded on the front door. Our heads snapped toward it, both of us freezing as a man entered the house.
“Colonel?”
“You didn’t lock the door?” I whispered.
Healwayslocked the door.
“I did.”
My stomach dropped. “Who is that?”
“He’s trouble.” Lucas’s sudden curse was quiet, but harsh. He pushed me toward the door, whispering, “Do what I say and pretend to be scared, do you understand?”
Every nerve iced over.
What was happening?
He shoved me toward the bedroom across the hall, still furnished, and I didn’t have to pretend. Terror flooded my body with adrenaline. While my skin went cold, the muscles beneath poised to spring and flee.
Lucas remained focused, his ear cocked toward the man searching the home.
Boneless and shaking, I let him tear my shirt over my head, leaving me in a bra and cotton shorts. Before I understood what was happening, he was on top of me in the bed. He yankedsomething from the bedside table, and suddenly, both my wrists were cuffed to the iron bed frame.
I tugged, trying to shove down the panicky sense of entrapment. The metal only dug into my skin, stinging.
Tears blurred my vision.
I was chained to a bed beneath a Blood Colonel. This wasn’t a situation most women survived.
“Hello?” the voice called, closer.
Lucas dragged my shorts down, then wrapped my legs around his waist. I obeyed every silent command, petrified by the tension in his stormy gaze.
He paused just long enough to look me in the eye. “Trust me,” he said, and his eyes begged me to obey.
His lips crashed against mine, one arm encircling my waist to draw me flush against him.
