He was out when I crawled into bed. I watched him for a long time, traced the lines of his face into my memory. His brow clenched at one point, as if he were having troubled dreams. I reached out and ran my palm down his cheek. The tension disappeared, and he’d calmed. My heart ached as I watched him, but my plan was in motion, and I wouldn’t turn back.

Even though I saw a spark in him that echoed inside me. Even though his touch made me feel more alive than I ever had. Even though I wanted him. It could never work while I was a prisoner. No matter how many ways I tried to tell him that, he doggedly insisted that this was the only way we could be together. I fell asleep with the thought that the only way I could show him he was wrong was for us to be apart.

I awoke before he did, the slanting rays of sunlight shining in his hair as he rolled toward me and pulled me close. He sighed with contentment, and I didn’t have it in me to push him away. Besides, part of my scheme was to draw him closer today. I snuggled up to him, not because I loved the contact. It was necessary for everything to work correctly. It wasn’t because I knew this would be the last time.

His eyes fluttered open, and he winced at the light streaming through the windows. “Fuck.”

“Good morning to you too.”

He buried his face in my hair and ran his hands down my body. “Damn pajamas.”

Sliding his hand beneath my shirt, he flattened his palm against my lower back. “Better.”

“You smell like a whiskey bomb.”

“Good bourbon.” His muffled voice was scratchy and sexy as hell.

“I drove you to drink?”

He smoothed his hand higher up my back. “Yes.”

“Good.”

“Vixen.” He slid one knee between my thighs, entangling our bodies in the same way I feared our souls twisted around each other. “Are you still mad at me?”

“Of course.”

“No.” He groaned and pressed his lips to my throat. “Please don’t be.”

I let him kiss me, and I ran my hands through his hair. He was so dark, had so much raw intensity to him, that he easily eclipsed every other man I’d known. But in moments like these, he was stripped down to the simple desires inside him. He wanted me to be happy, especially with him.

“I’ll put it aside for the next two days. It’s Christmas and all. But we’re going to have to talk about it.” My core heated as he kissed lower, his teeth nipping at me. “I’m not okay with this.”

“Thank you.” He eased his hand around and cupped my breast.

“Sebastian.” My warning tone turned breathy as he pressed his thigh against my pussy.

“Let me make you feel better.” He slipped his fingers over the stiff bud of my nipple. “Just for this moment.”

I bit my lip as he pulled my t-shirt aside and kissed my collarbone. He sensed my indecision and took full advantage by sliding down my body and capturing a nipple in his mouth.

A fiery tingle of arousal shot through me as he sucked hard enough to bruise and palmed my other breast. I ran my nails along his scalp. He slid his palms beneath me, cradling my back as he sucked first one nipple, then the next. It didn’t take long for my mind to blank, for it to fill with thoughts of him, his cock, his aggression.

He dropped light kisses down my stomach and continued them along the waistband of my pajama pants. With a deft movement, he pulled my pants and panties down my thighs, then shucked them all the way off.

“I’ve needed this.” He kissed my pussy and flicked his tongue along the folds. “Your pretty pussy spread before me like a feast.” He opened my thighs. “Only cunt I ever want to taste.”

I let him, even if it was wrong. The matching darkness inside me wanted everything he had to give. He licked me slowly, and I gripped the sheets. His low groan vibrated through my hot flesh as he flattened his tongue against me, then dove down and pressed inside me.

When he returned to my clit, his tongue giving pressure and then rapid strokes, my legs began to shake.

He laughed against me. “My damsel needs a release.” His tongue swirled as he gripped my ass, pulling me to his face as he sucked and licked.

I reveled in his mouth, but I needed more. All of him. “Sebastian, please.”

“What do you need? I’ll give it to you.” He squeezed my ass. “Name it.”

“Fuck me.”

If his eyes had been bright before, they practically blazed when I asked for what I should have never wanted. He gave me a few more licks before prowling up my body. Pausing at my breasts, he teased each nipple with the same intensity he’d used on my pussy.

I writhed beneath him, desperate for more. “Please.”

“I can’t refuse you.” He rose to my mouth, sharing my taste as his tongue warred with mine. His cock rested against my pussy and slid down my folds to my entrance. “Here, damsel? Is this where you need it?”

“Yes.” I could barely form the word.

He took my hands and pinned me, our fingers laced together, as he pushed inside. I moaned at the minor sting and then the delicious pressure. God, he filled me just right as he slid all the way inside.

“Fucking hot cunt.” He dropped to my neck, biting and sucking, giving me fresh marks.

Keeping me pinned, he started a slow rhythm that built with intensity on each stroke. I spread my legs as far as I could, opening up to him, urging him to take what he wanted.

He didn’t disappoint, fucking me rough enough to rattle the bed against the wall. I knew I’d be bruised, but I wanted it. I needed to feel him, to sample every bit of him before I could walk away.

I arched against him, my sensitive nipples brushing against his hard chest. He growled and pulled out. Gripping my hips, he turned me onto all fours and surged inside me again.

My scream of pleasure and pain ripped through the room. It seemed to drive him wilder, because he pistoned inside me and slapped my ass hard enough for the sting to add an extra kick to the tightness inside me.

“I know you want it like this.” He gripped my hair and yanked me back to him as his other hand slapped my ass. “Rough, hard. You want all the dark. Tell me.”

I moaned when he slapped me again, the sting making my pussy ache for even more punishment. “I want it.”

“Fucking hell.” He pulled my hair harder and bit down on my shoulder, his hips bouncing against mine, our bodies slapping together with unfettered violence.

He released my shoulder and shoved me forward, pressing his wide palm against my upper back so that I was face down on the bed.

Another slap had me crying into the sheets.

“Look at that perfect asshole.” His feral growl sent a shot of fear through me. “Like a fucking flower.”

I jumped when he ran a finger down my ass. “Sebastian.”

Another slap, this one even harder. “Don’t deny me.”

I moaned, spiraling higher with each word from his dangerous lips.

“That’s it.” He kept his hard rhythm and pressed his wet fingertip around my asshole. The sensation was delicious and wrong, and I wanted more.

I pressed back onto his cock, impaling myself more deeply with each stroke.

“Oh, fuck.” He pressed his finger inside my ass.

I clutched the sheets as my entire body tensed. He pushed farther, and my orgasm exploded from nowhere. I cried out as my hips seized and pleasure rippled through me in deep waves.

“Give it to me. Come all over me.” He slammed harder, his finger in my ass sliding farther as I was still in the throes of my orgasm, each of his thrusts extending the aftershocks.

When the last tremor subsided, I gulped in air.

“You aren’t done, damsel.” He leaned over me, his muscled forearm next to my face, and reached beneath me with his other hand. When he slapped my clit, I bucked against him.

“Sebastian!”

Another slap against my hyper-sensitive skin had me trying to grab his wrist.

“You need to trust me.” He yanked my wrists behind me and held them with one hand, then snaked the other one beneath me again. Slap. “I know what this body needs.”

He used my wrists as a way to pull me back onto his cock with each surge forward. His fingers played against my clit, stroking and swirling, revving me up again. The next time he slapped me, I moaned with utter abandon. Nothing had ever felt so good. His fingers went right back to the spot where I needed them.

“I’m going to work you up so you come right when I shoot inside you. I want to feel your cunt squeeze me, to drain every drop.”

I would have agreed to anything he wanted as long as it involved me coming. Breathing into the sheets, all I could focus on was his cock inside me, his fingers creating an inferno that touched every part of my body and soul.

“Are you ready?” His voice shook, the control he’d exerted wavering.

“Please.” It was the only word I could form.

He intensified the pressure on my clit and thrust hard and deep each time. I was lost, buried beneath the wave cresting above me. It crashed down, drowning me with a release that blasted away everything I’d ever known until all I could think of was Sebastian.

His groan was the background music to my breathless orgasm, each pulse from deep inside me sending sparks shooting behind my eyelids. He surged deep, filling me with his release as my pussy squeezed him just as he’d instructed. I felt every jolt of his cock inside me, and our mutual release was the most erotic thing I’d ever experienced.

I collapsed onto the bed, my knees spreading until I was flat on the mattress with him lying on top of me, his cock still embedded.

His breaths came in hard bursts as he kissed my back, my neck, my shoulders. “Thank you.”

I didn’t know what to say. There was nothing except the lapping waves of release along with the harsh undertow of my captivity. He climbed from the bed. A few moments later, he cleaned me up with a warm washcloth.

Once he slid back between the sheets, he pulled me onto his chest. “That was the best hangover remedy ever invented.”

I snorted.

“Did you enjoy it?” He yanked the blanket up over me and laid his hands on the bare skin of my back.

“Yes, but it was another mistake. Like the first time. Shouldn’t have happened.”

“I don’t think that’s true.” He stroked some stray strands from my face.

I didn’t know what was true anymore. He twisted my reality around me. But not matter how much he made me question everything, I knew that I couldn’t stay. The messed-up thing was, I dreaded breaking what small piece of a heart he had. So many times, he’d told me he didn’t want to hurt me. But by kidnapping me, he had the very first day. I didn’t want to hurt him either, but I would, on the very last day.