“Because I know.”
Those three gruff words make me shiver hotly. “Well…” I not-so-discreetly fan my face. “I’m going for my jog now. I’ll see you back at the—”
“You’re not going anywhere alone dressed like that.” His jaw ticks. “You’re in charge of my dick, princess, and I fucking love it. But that authority only goes so far. I’m in charge of everything else, do you understand me? That includes your safety. And you’re not safe jogging around in a bra. Not even from me.”
Oh boy.
I am vibrating like a plucked chord.
When we first met, he spoke to me like a child. Not anymore.
He’s talking to me like a woman now.
It’s so hot. So raw and unfiltered. I love it.
I love it so much I’m scared to live without it.
I sway closer to him, and he stops breathing, his eyes rolling into the back of his head when I deliver a sharp swat to his erection. “Control yourself.”
He bites off a groan. “Petra, every time I blink, I see you shaking that tight little ass in front of me, telling me I get to fuck it. I don’t know what control means anymore.”
“You better learn,” I manage, dizzy, the crotch of my shorts dampening by the second. I start to back away from him, ignoring the way he shakes his head in warning. “I’m going for a jog. Don’t you dare chase me.” I wheel around, giving him a fluttery wave over my shoulder. “You probably couldn’t catch me, anyway.”
I run for approximately a hundred yards, the soles of my sneakers pounding off the asphalt trail toward the lake, heart hammering in my ears, when I turn around to gauge his reaction. And I find him ripping open one of the condom boxes, securing one of the foil squares between his teeth. Stuffing the brown paper bag in the pocket of his sweatshirt.
Then he breaks after me in a dead run.
“Oh shit,” I squeak, picking up my pace.
I was on the track team in high school, even won a few medals in the hundred-yard dash, but apparently, I’m no match for a Green Beret, because in the space of ten seconds, he’s already gaining on me. I hang a left at the edge of the lake, sprinting along the path between the water’s edge and a wooded area. The sunrise glints off the water, but there is nothing peaceful about the golden rays or the cranes swooping down along the surface.
Not when I can hear his footfalls getting louder.
“Oh my god, oh my god,” I chant in a whisper, excitement spreading downward from my belly to my pelvis, tightening bolts of hunger along the way.
When I’m swept off my feet, it’s so sudden and soundless, my yelp is cut off by a hand, and suddenly, I’m being stomped into the woods by a man twice my size, my feet dangling above ground. My butt is secured against his belt buckle, the metal biting into my cheeks, his free hand roving up and down the front of my body, fondling my breasts, squeezing them, his knuckles raking down and up my mound.
“Barry!” I scream into his hand, my call of his name muffled by that heavy palm. “Take me back to the room.”
“It’s too late for that,” he grits, the condom still between his teeth.
“You have no control.”
“Youmake me lose it.” He cups my sex in a hard grip, jiggling it roughly. “I could be banging this in a soft bed right now. Butyouhad to run.”
We’re about fifteen yards from the path when he sets me on my feet and spins me around. Letting the condom fall from between his clamped teeth to the ground, his mouth taking hot, immediate possession of mine. My back bows as I’m bent backward over his arm, his tongue stroking into my mouth, intoxicating me. Making me forget that I’m supposed to be in control. The princess. “What have you done to me?” he mutters thickly, dragging me higher against his body until I’m on my tippy toes, his hands roving over my backside, kneading both sides in a sexually frustrated massage. “What the fuck have you done to me?”
That question rings in my head.
WhathaveI done to him?
This is not the kind of man who drags a girl into the woods and inflicts his will upon her. Between our game, my teasing, his needs that have had years to build without relief and my determination to run off in brief clothing, I’ve turned him into an animal. But I don’t want him to regret being too rough with me later.
This man having regrets about me seems to be my biggest fear now.
“Slow down,” I whisper, smoothing my touch down the side of his face. Gentle. “You’re not treating me like a princess, Barry.”
That robs the breath out of him, his head lifting to betray the distress in his gaze. “I’m trying, but I swear to God, if I don’t fuck you, I’m going to die.” His fingers trail up and down in the split of my backside, rubbing my tender rear entrance through the thin material of my shorts. “Was I really inside this sweet ass last night? Did I really come inside of it?”
