Page 37 of Bound

Finally, an easy request the man asked of her. As she answered him with a silent, steady nod, Jayd hoped the orders from here would be just as simple to heed.

But in so many ways, she didn’t.

Aside from the last week and a half, she had led a fairly charmed life. She was the first to admit that—and, concurrently, to hate it. Even her latest push at the boundaries, which had taken her all the way to Paris, hadn’t felt like a trial as much as an adventure.

Now that she wasn’t actually a princess, she still knew not if she even had the mettle of one. The courage to persevere through pain. The willingness to face her own fear and overcome it.

Granted, this was not like going into battle—but maybe, in many warped ways, it would help her with some of those blank pages.

Best of all, she would be doing it for Brickham. For his pleasure and approval. Right now, they both felt like everything.

“Good,” the man himself crooned, leaning over to buss her forehead. “That’s so good to know, because here we go.”

She was getting good at conveying questions with her gaze. Go? To where?

“As I said before, you’ll find out when you find out. But the first place you’ll travel is to your knees. Right here.”

Thank the Creator, another simple one. He made the moment even better by stripping off his shirt while she lowered to the tile. No way could she resist gazing up his massive body to admire the sculpted male triangle of his upper body. So many hard hills and etched valleys. There wasn’t a single soft spot on the man—a description that also applied to the part of him that supported the sharp tent in his cotton pants.

The part she also could not ignore. Oh no, not at all.

“You like looking at that, Pixie?” His soft snarl was tinged with rough pleasure now. He liked it when she gawked at him. Somehow she truly knew that. He teased her more, working the green fabric around his bulge. He tautened the fabric until it outlined its hard, heated girth.

“You like knowing what you’ve done to me there? How every inch of my cock clamors because of you?”

As Jayd watched, he kept working at the material against his erection. The rest of the world fell away. All she wanted, all she needed, was right there, pulsing with power and hardening with lust. All for her. All because of her. The thoughts made her dizzy. Fuzzy. Set her on fire with equally bright yearnings…

“You want a better look?” he husked at last—but she had no more nodded with eagerness before he said, “Well, you’ll get it soon.”

She rocked back on her haunches with a groan. The sexy bonsun before her responded with a similar sound. This could not be any easier for him, yet he was holding back—somehow, in some superhuman way—to give her all this. To show her his darkness. It was the bed she’d made, so now she would lie in it, though she prayed that took the form of her giant bed in the next room over, with Brickham pounding her into the mattress.

As if the man had also gained the ability to read her mind, he said then, “First things first, little pixie. If your hair dye was mud, we’d already have a filthy barnyard in here.” He gestured toward the bathtub with an elegance that was new for her. Gods of goodness, the force of nature could move like a summer breeze. If his goal was not to spoil her for any other man, he was miserably failing.

“Ready? Good.”

He stacked the words like splintered pallets, though that was less jarring than the action that accompanied them. His hand at the back of her head, anchoring into her scalp so he could guide her over to the tub. Yes, that forcibly. Yes, even with the three-day-old bullet wounds in his body.

“On your hands and knees is fine, sweetheart. I’m enjoying the view of my handiwork.”

Thank the Creator it was not too late to reconsider the spoiling her part.

The distance to the tub seemed twice as far with unusual parts of her slapping the tiles. She took no measure to hide her angry and embarrassed grunts, timed with every degrading moment of the ordeal. But between her peeved bursts, she became aware of another sound. Brickham’s bestial hums. The recognition that her servitude was bringing his pleasure.

Again, she was processing feelings she had never known. Purpose in her pain. A strange victory in her ignominy.

What was happening to her?

Was this man of the shadows dragging her to even darker places? Forbidden acts she should be running from? Or was he simply awakening what had been inside her all the time? And what did either answer mean?

There was only one way to find out.

To keep doing as he ordered.

“All right. In with you, girl. But no water yet. Lie on your back, facing sideways, with your legs toward me.”

Even if it was trusting him about bizarre instructions like that.

“Good. Very good. Now scoot a little closer. Hook your knees over this lip.”