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Lynx pauses, fingers gently cupping my hand, and I’m so scared he’s going to stop, but he just goes on staring at my injuries. “I hurt you. It’s my job to make it better.”

“I told you to hurt me.”

“It’s the only reason I did it.” His hazel eyes slide from my hand to my face. “I don’t like hurting people.”

“Sort of felt like you liked it.”

The pinch between his eyebrows deepens. “I liked … letting go. Indulging. It wasn’t the pain that I liked.”

What he’s always saying comes back to me. “Because you’re a protector.”

“I do what needs to be done. For my pack. It doesn’t mean I enjoy it.”

“There’s a difference between hurting someone out of fear and anger, and hurting someone who wants it. Who’s begging for it. It turned me on so much to see you lose control like that.”

He responds with one question I’m not expecting. “Why?”

“Because it makes me feel powerful. Getting someone like you to do what I want them to do gets me off.”

He studies me some more. “It’s still not a way to protect yourself.”

“I dunno. I’m feeling nice and protected right now.”

He finally drops my gaze and goes back to cleaning me. He’s concentrating hard, and I watch him, fascinated by the way he’s working on me, taking his time and being more gentle than I would have given him credit for. Some kind of emotion floods into my chest and prickles the backs of my eyes as the monster in front of me settles. Like he’s at peace with everything we did and has stopped fighting.

“Stand up and turn around.”

I do as I’m told, one hand steadied on the chair as he washes my back and then reaches my ass. His hesitation is so minor I would have missed it if I weren’t so in tune with everything he’s doing, and it takes all my willpower not to whine as he slips the sponge between my cheeks. His sticky cum is all over my ass and thighs, and he takes his time cleaning it from my skin.

I’m breathing deeply by the time he’s finished, and when I turn back around, he’s doing the same. With how he’s kneeling, his face is level with my stomach, and I can’t stop myself from reaching out and running my fingers through his hair. It’s a lot softer than I’m expecting, and he watches me curiously, like he’s waiting to see what I’ll do next.

I don’t even know the answer to that.

So after a moment of eye contact where neither of us says anything, he reaches into the back pocket of his pants and pulls out my silk panties. His eyes don’t leave mine as he holds them open by my feet.

Who is this man?

How the hell was I so afraid of him?

I step forward, one foot after the other until my panties are around my ankles, and Lynx slides them up my legs. He’s just as gentle as before, and it’s not until he reaches the tops of my thighs that his gaze finally drops.

And he freezes.

“What is that?”

I follow his gaze to my cock and the shiny white scars covering it. “Antonio.”

Lynx’s hands bunch in the fabric. “What did he do?”

Men like Antonio might be easy to manipulate with sex, but they also have some twisted fucking ideas of what power is and how to exercise it. “He had a … thing. Where he didn’t like me getting hard while he fucked me. So he had methods to make sure it didn’t happen.”

“Oh, really?” Lynx’s voice slithers between his teeth. “Like what?”

“Cock cages, mostly. When he was feeling sadistic, barbed wire.”

“Wire …” His thumb brushes over one of my scars. Then he snaps the panties back into place and pushes to his feet. “Go to bed.”

The gentleness is gone.