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“What place is that?” I demand. I’m trembling—my fingers, my voice—but I don’t look away. “On my knees at your feet? Is that what this is? You want me to grovel?”
“You tell me, Ms. Everett. Is that where you want to be?”
“Right now, I want to be anywhere but here.”
“Oh, I don’t think that’s true at all.” Lukas chuckles mirthlessly. His rough finger touches the underside of my chin. “I think you’reexactlywhere you want to be.”
I want to deny it, but my pulse is selling me out. It hammers against my throat, broadcasting every shameful thing I’m feeling to the man who’s putting those feelings there.
Because here’s the horrible truth: Iamexactly where I want to be.
Pinned against a wall by a man who just spent five million dollars to claim me, and I’mlovingit.
Cowering before a man who terrifies me, and I’mflushedwith heat and hunger.
Ownedby a man who makes my blood sing and my skin prickle and my core clench with something I’ve never felt before…
… and Iwantit all so bad I can hardly breathe.
I hate myself for that. All the little things happening in my body, I hate each and every one of them.
Idespisehow my breath comes in shallow gasps.
My nipples have hardened against the silk of this godforsaken dress, and I want to rip them off and throw them away forever.
This liquid warmth seeping through my limbs like honey, pooling between my thighs, heating my lower belly into something molten and alive? It’s awful, awful, awful.
Lukas watches me struggle. His gray eyes track every micro-expression that passes across my face. There’s nothing he doesn’t see. Nor does he have to ask what’s causing it all.
He knows.
He is.
He looks supremely satisfied with that. Not smug—that would require human emotion. No, this is something far colder and more ancient. Bloodless, really. Like a scientist observing a hypothesis confirmed.
His thumb strokes along my jawline. “Your body knows what you want,” he murmurs. “Even if your pride won’t admit it.”
“My body doesn’t know anything,” I whisper.
It’s a pathetic lie, delivered pathetically. I might as well have said,Yes, Daddy, whatever you want.
“No?” He turns his palm to rest against my neck so he can feel my pulse. “Then why is your heart racing?”
“Because I’mangry.”
Lukas shakes his head. “I have another word for it.”
I bet he does. The one he’s thinking of probably matches the flurry of words flying through my head right now.
Desire.
Fear.
Confusion.
Want.
Want, want, want.
