Chapter Twelve

Cora sat quiet in the passenger side seat of his car. She hadn’t said a word since they left the restaurant. James hadn’t expect her to.

It had been a long day. An even longer night.

He wasn’t sure he had the energy for more talk. More arguing.

He let her sit shrouded and silent while the passing lights played over the lines of her still frame, over the misery clouding her eyes and tugging at the corners of her mouth.

He wasn’t proud of it.

But every war had casualties.

She was his.

She was the innocent life caught in the battlefield.

Her life was forfeit to appease his own miseries.

His demons.

His sanity.

Maybe she’d make it out whole.

She was strong, much stronger than Annie.

She was a fighter.

He had to believe she would survive.

She shivered and hugged herself tighter.

He reached for the heater and cranked it as high as it would go.

Stupid girl standing in the rain that long. She’d be lucky if she walked away without catching her death.

He didn’t care.

She’d brought it on herself.

She sniffled.

James gritted his teeth. His fingers tightened around the wheel.

He pulled off the road and stopped. He ignored her eyes when they turned to him in the dark. He popped the trunk and climbed out.

The rain had worsened. It came down in a blinding rush that resoaked everything he’d managed to dry off.

If he got sick, he was going to strangle her, he thought bitterly to himself as he shoved open the trunk and snatched up the folded blanket he kept inside. He closed the lid and darted back to his door.

He tossed her the blanket before climbing into the warm interior.

She stared at it like she’d never seen one before.

“Put it on,” he snapped, slicking back dripping strands of hair out of his eyes.

She raised her eyes from the offering to him. Her expression unreadable.

Reaching the end of his tether, he snatched it from her and shook it open, prepared to swaddle the shit out of her when she kissed him.

It came out of nowhere.

One minute he was leaning across the console, the next she had taken his face between her small, cold fingers and her mouth was on his. Soft, delicate butterfly wings fluttering beneath his, urging him to open.

He lost his grip on the blanket. He reached for her, but she’d already broken away. Her mouth had left his. Her lashes lifted. Her hazel eyes met his through the feasible flickers of light washing in through the rain.

It was then that he saw it, the distinct darkening in her eyes, the subtle hitch in her breath. He knew exactly what she wanted, could almost feel it coming off her in sharp snaps of heat. The intoxicating fragrance of her desires syphoned into the crisp air around them.

Her scent.

Her musk.

Her.

Fuck.

“Do you have anything?”

He didn’t pretend to misunderstand her question. “Glovebox.”

She slipped away, a siren receding back into the waves. The shadows on her side of the car took her, enveloped her so all he saw were flashes of her tiny hands flipping the switch. It wasn’t until he heard the smack of the door springing open that he remembered the gun.

His chest seized.

His muscles froze.

But it was too late.

She had the weapon in her hand.

It glinted too large, too menacing in her palm.

He waited for it to turn on him.

Waited to hear the crack.

To feel the ripping pain.

She returned it.

Pushed it aside, moved it away to reach for the box just behind it. A silver packet appeared in its place. The door was slapped shut.

“Why?”

The question abandoned his lips before he could stop it.

Her head tilted to him, the condom held between them. “I made a promise.”

He watched her kick her shoes off and shrug out of her coat. The metal tongue of her seatbelt snapped off and struck the door with a resounding clang.

Then she was reaching across him, invading his space, filling his senses with the scent of her. She flipped the lever that sent his seat skittering back on its ridges.

“Want me to stop?” she teased, head coming up, her face painfully too close.

He moved even before his mind could fully process the wisdom of his uncontrolled gut reaction. His mind and all its many voices faded behind a white wall of silence the moment his hands closed on her arms.

The sights and sounds of the world vanished. There was only her and the sound of her gasp when he hauled her into his lap, and the cry that followed was lost beneath his growl.

He had no recollection of capturing her mouth until it was opening beneath his. The sweet taste of her enclosed him in their velvety claws, ensnaring the remaining shreds of his senses until there was nothing left of his rationality, except the crippling pulse of his own heartbeat pounding in his ears.

Hands, small, with slender fingers curled into his shoulders, bit through his coat to sink into flesh. The sweet pain did nothing to dissolve the red haze of madness. If anything, its vicious encouragement only fueled his own hands into motion tearing up her skirt and dragging her legs across his thighs.

She broke the kiss. The pale light bleached everything it touched, except the flush in Cora’s cheeks, the bright pink in her swollen lips. Her eyes shone a vivid green a pit of unmistakable passion. Its endless void tempted him to leap head first into the unknown and never turn back.

But he had to.

He had to regain control.

This was not the plan.

Fucking her in the front seat of his car wasn’t part of the plan.

Yet it was all he wanted to do. It was all he could think about. Every fiber and muscle in his body physically throbbed with the driving need to claim her, to pound every ounce of his own sick frustrations into her heat, to punish her and twist her into the same warped and fucked up mess that he was. Even sitting there, all he could think about was leaving his mark on every inch of her.

She held out the condom.

He reached for her hand, bypassed the offering and snatched at her wrist. He yanked her back to him and kissed her.

He devoured her.

He deprived her of even a shred of his gentleness as he forced her into the wheel.

He tore down the shoulders of her dress, ripping the fabric and baring her breasts to the sharp nips of his teeth, to the greedy handling of his palms.

Cora never protested. She allowed him to restrain her.

Crush her.

Violate and expose her.

Her dark eyes bore into his, welcoming every vicious attack with a willingness that only amplified his rage.

Stop looking at me like that! he wanted to snarl at her. Stop wanting this! But all that came out was a low growl as he tore at his own pants. The buttery soft material gave easily. She raised her hips, allowing him to slip them down his thighs.

He took the condom from her.

“Hold your skirt.”

She obeyed without question. She bunched the material up so he had a clear view of her perfect lips. She stayed that way, even when James reclined his seat to take in the sight of her, to etch every curve and bend of her, the raw fervor coiling off her to memory. He told himself that fucking the daughter of his sworn enemy in the seat of his car was a small victory, a slap across De Marco’s face, but there was no lying to himself. Fucking Cora had nothing to do with De Marco, or the plan, and everything to do with what he wanted.

What he demanded to have.

What was rightfully his.

He strapped on the rubber and reached for her. She raised her hips and he aligned himself with her opening.

James paused with his hands at the bare skin of her hips. He studied the angles of her face, the delicate lines of her jaw, the heavy curl of her lashes. He lost himself in her eyes. Those fucking eyes. And forgot about everything, except having her.

He pushed inside her, slowly, gradually, with a deliberate ease that sent her head back with a groan of pure, unadulterated sin. Her walls clenched in welcome, embracing him like a long, lost lover. He held her to him even as he surrounded himself with her velvet heat.

She met his push with a downward thrust of her own, fully seating herself on him, around him. Her nails bit into his chest, through the soft material of his shirt, drawing blood, claiming him.

“James.” His name from her lips in the midst of passion was the most beautiful symphony he’d ever heard.

It filled the cabin.

Filled his core.

His soul.

He took her breasts. Cradled them. Worked the hard peaks in time with each upward thrust.

Cora moved with him, meeting every plunge with a downward push of her own. Her heart pounded against his palms, matching the growing sounds of her approaching release, sounds that would haunt him possibly for the rest of his life. Each whimper, every moan of his name fanned the flames of his madness. Each time she shuddered and her slick walls rippled, he had to battle the urge succumb to his own release. She was liquid fire in his arms and he was all too happy to let her scorch them both to nothing.

“Don’t stop!” Cora’s snarl bordered on something between a scream and a moan, and it was all the warning anyone got before she came with a vicious sob of James’s name.

Heat rushed over and down his cock, drenching them both as the woman in his arms collapsed against him. Her back shuddered against his palms. Her pants bathed the curve of his neck. But she didn’t stay there long.

Her head lifted. Eyes the opaque black of midnight bore into his with the wild abundance of a woman under the spell of passion.

“Your turn, Captain,” she breathed in a sultry purr that tightened every nerve ending in his balls. “Come for me.”

Her urging was followed by her white knuckled grip on the headrest and the demanding plunges of her hips as she rode him with fierce determination.

James shoved her back into the wheel, forcing her to stop as he circled her middle and sank his teeth into her left breast. Her cry as he marked her sang through him. It fed the starved beast hating the limitations of a tiny front seat.

Next time, he told it. Next time she’d be on a bed, open and tied down.

He bit her again. Her nipple this time.

Cora sobbed. Her core cinched with a painful violence that made him curse.

He reached between them and tore away the rest of her dress, leaving her naked in his arms, naked to his mouth. His teeth. His bruising touches.

He found her newly swollen clit with the pad of his thumb. He circled it, urging her to drive them both over the cliff.

She came a second time. The gentle suckling of her pussy took him with her. He spilled into the rubber sheath. But his thumb continued its lazy flicks until the last shudder had escaped her. Until she was limp and sated, slumped in his arms. Nestled against his chest, fully naked to his fully clothed.

“I could sleep like this,” she slurred into the side of his neck.

Thing was, so could he.

“We need to get back.”

She sighed and raised her head. Dark tendrils slipped off bare shoulders and formed curtains around their faces.

“I still hate you,” she murmured. “Nothing’s going to change that.”

He took her chin in a firm grip. “Promise.”

She nodded without hesitation. “Promise.”

He didn’t release her until there was irrevocable proof in her eyes to support her claim.

Twenty minutes later, the rain had stopped, and Cora boarded the ship wrapped in the blanket and nothing else. James watched her climb the steps in her heels, her strides the lazy shuffle of someone ready for bed.

At the top, she paused and turned to wait for him. With the ship lights radiating behind her, her hair was a dark halo around her shoulders.

“My cabin,” he said when he reached her. “I’m not finished with you.”

He felt her pulse race as if it were his own. It lit the flames in her eyes and cast colors into her cheeks.

“Can I take a shower first?”

He searched for hidden layers of sarcasm, but there was none.

He nodded. “Use the one in my room.”

“Aye aye, Captain,” she replied smartly, and for once, he didn’t mind her cheek.

He watched her turn and make her way in the direction of the main stairway. Her heels clapped in a rhythmic clip, filling the night. She was halfway there when Nicholas appeared. Neither paused when crossing the other, each headed towards their own destinations.

Nicholas joined James on deck.

“How did it go?”

James folded his arms and propped a hip against the railing. “As planned. She agreed.” But Nicholas already knew that. He’d been the one James had called from the parking lot. “We need to move quickly.”

Nicholas nodded. “I already called Reverend Marcus. He’ll be here at dawn.”

James would have preferred that very night; time was a luxury they didn’t possess. But dawn wasn’t too far off.

“No one sleeps tonight,” he told his second. “I want around the clock guard until this is over.”

“I’ll see to it.”

James shook his head and pushed upright. “I will. Cora wants a shower. She’s in my cabin now. Keep an eye on her.”

“Think she’ll try and run?”

He didn’t. Maybe it was because she had the chance to shoot him and she hadn’t, but he knew she’d stay. If for no other reason than because she was afraid he’d hurt her parents.

Fear was always the best motivator.

“No, but I don’t want her left alone.”

“You got it, boss.”

He watched Nicholas head off in the direction Cora had taken.

Getting married had always been one of those things that never required much thought, because he’d never once considered it as an actual possibility. No woman alive wanted to saddle up with an outlaw, especially one that spent nine months out of the year smuggling illegal crap across the ocean. While the idea was usually a turn on in the beginning, the novelty eventually wore out. Plus, he was already married to the sea and his ship.

But politically, marrying Cora was the only way he could guarantee the safety of his men and his ship. With her by his side, he would have De Marco’s protection against Bishop. The crime boss would never allow anything to happen to his daughter and the MI5 agent wouldn’t dare attack without risking De Marco’s wrath. Any attack on Cora would have been grounds for war. Bishop knew that. And De Marco was the wrong person to have as an enemy.

As an ally, however ... James may have wanted the man dead, but not before De Marco had served his purpose. Once Bishop was out of the picture, Cora was going to help James take the throne. She would be his stepping stone to taking over De Marco’s empire and ending the other man’s life.

But first things first.

He had a call to make.

Giovanni De Marco picked up on the first ring. His voice was firm, unyielding, gruff, but James heard that quiet ting of desperation, the ripple of hope hidden beneath all that. It wasn’t much but the man’s barely hidden pain only made the night that much sweeter.

“Mr. De Marco, I’m Captain James Crow. We’ve never had the pleasure.”

There was a long swell of silence on the other end, a full heartbeat where the man was probably trying to place his name.

“What can I do for you, Captain?” he said at last.

Lip caught between his teeth, James descended off the ship, taking each step at a lazy trod to the wooden pier. He prolonged his answer the entire way down.

“I have something of yours, sir,” he declared at last. “I hear you’re looking for her.”

The silence this time was deliciously fraught with the other man’s realization. James could have licked the very air and tasted it.

“Where is she?” He didn’t even bother to conceal his panic.

James stole a glance over his shoulder at the looming bulk of his ship. “I’m guessing she’s in the shower.”

“Put her on. Right now. I want to talk to my daughter.”

James chuckled. “You know that’s not how this works, Mr. De Marco. I have her. That means I’m in control.”

“What do you want?”

“At this moment? Nothing. I might not even want something tomorrow, or the next day. I’m quite content in my life at the moment. However, there may come a time in the future when I do need something. I’m hoping when that time does come, I can count on you to return the favor.”

“Fine.” He didn’t even hesitate. Stupid man. “Whatever. Put my daughter on.”

“No, like I said, she’s in the shower. We got a bit wet earlier.” He could almost hear De Marco’s jaw creaking and had to bite the inside of his own cheek to keep his laughter contained. “But I can bring her to you tomorrow say ... three?”

“No, now.”

James clicked his tongue. “No, I like tomorrow better. I’ll text you the location. Please don’t be late. I dislike being kept waiting.”

He hung up and pocketed his phone.

Too easy. Too deliciously easy. The man was practically in the palm of his hand.

James snickered into the night.

“Until tomorrow, Mr. De Marco.”

Cora was waiting on his bed when he entered his quarters. She sat with her legs crossed under one of his t-shirts. A piece of toast was pinched between her fingers.

She looked up when he shut the door behind him.

“We missed supper.”

He peered at the buttered piece of bread and raised an eyebrow. “Is that what August gave you?”

She shook her head. “He offered to make me a plate, but he’d already cleaned the kitchen...” Her eyes narrowed in concentration. “Mess hall,” she corrected with a smug little grin that elicited one of his to poke out. “I didn’t want to trouble him. This is fine.”

He walked over to her. “For a child, maybe.”

He caught her wrist halfway to her mouth and raised her hand. He took a bite of her toast. The pulse beneath his curled fingers leapt. The flecks of gold in her eyes shimmered.

He released her and straightened. “I’ll have him bring something else.”

He left her there and moved to the chest. He exchanged his clothes for cargo pants and a sweater.

“Not coming to bed?” she asked, finishing off the rest of her toast.

He shook his head. “Not yet.”

“Can I come with you?”

Not sure he’d heard her correctly, James paused in the fastening of his boots. “What?”

She swung her bare feet down to the floor. “Can I come with you?” she repeated. “See what you do. I won’t touch anything.”

He eyed her legs. Even with the hem of his shirt brushing the tops of her knees, there was still a lot of leg showing.

“Not dressed like that you’re not.”

Scrambling up, she grabbed the heels from earlier and quickly slipped them on. Then she stood there like that made all the difference in the world.

“Definitely not.”

Her shoulders drooped. “What? Why? I have shoes.”

What she had was miles of already sexy as fuck legs in fuck me heels.

“Because seeing you like that is not going to help anyone do their job. Seeing you like that is going to get someone hurt. Possibly killed if I get my hands on them.”

She sat back down, lips curled down. “I guess I’ll just stay here then.”

That was the best idea she’d ever had. Until they got her clothes, she wasn’t going anywhere.

“I won’t be long.”

He found Nicholas in the crew lounge with Presley, August, Michael, and Jordon. The five were seated around the coffee table, cards in hand and a thick cloud of smoke drifting around their heads.

“Hey Captain,” Michael greeted him first. “Want to join?”

James shook his head. “Who’s on deck?”

“Larson and Joseph,” Nicholas answered without looking away from his hand.

“Where’s Stevens and Marlow?”

“They’re getting the dawn shift.” He pinched his cigarette between his teeth, pulled out two jacks and tossed them into the pile; grown men playing go fish. “They’re probably in their cabins.”

“Hey, congratulations, Captain,” Michael piped in. “Heard the big news. I haven’t met the lady, but I hear she’s real pretty.”

“She’s smoking fucking hot, is what she is,” Presley muttered.

Nicholas kicked him under the table.

Presley blinked up to where James still stood. “I just mean...”

James shook his head. “It’s true. Can’t fault a man for having eyes.” He turned his attention to August. “Is the kitchen completely closed?”

August straightened in his chair. The wood groaned under his weight.

“I have some leftovers in the fridge. Want me to heat—?”

James shook his head. “I got it. Have you heard from Mable?”

The other man dug out his phone and checked the screen. “She said she picked up those items you requested, but she won’t be able to get them here until morning.”

“Morning’s fine, but it has to be before noon.”

August’s thumbs moved across the screen, relaying James’s message.

James turned to Nicholas. “Any word on that tracking device I asked you to get?”

Nicholas closed his cards, rapped them on the table once, then fanned them out again. “I won’t have it until the day after, but I picked up something close. It’ll do the job until the other one arrives.”

“And our location tomorrow for the meet?”

The cards were set down.

“I’ll have Stevens and Larson scout in the morning. But I still think we should have them come here. We’d have home court advantage.”

James shook his head. “You don’t shit where you eat.”

Nicholas didn’t comment.

“Hey, Boss?” Presley turned slightly in his chair. “Just curious, what are we doing with the cargo below?”

“It’s already bought and paid for,” James reminded him. “It’s going to be delivered.”

“So, we’ll be heading back out?”

James nodded. “Once I handle matters on land here, we’ll set out.”

Presley bobbed his head a few times and went back to his cards.

James met Nicholas’s eyes, exchanging a brief glance before turning on his heels and leaving. He picked his way to the mess hall. The corridors rang with the sound of his boots. Several of the rooms he passed hummed with the sound of low voices from TVs and stereos. He faintly considered getting one for his cabin; Cora could use the distraction. But she wouldn’t be on the ship for much longer and he hated that crap in his room.

Hated clutter.

The mess hall sat dark and empty when he pushed in the swinging doors. August hadn’t even left a light to guide James to the pantry. It was out of sheer memory that he made it without bumping into anything.

Supper was pork chops, mashed potatoes, and green beans. Leftovers were wrapped neatly in containers and labeled in the fridge. He emptied a bit of everything into a plate and popped it into the microwave. A can of soda was stuffed into his pocket.

With the heated plate in one hand, fork and knife in the other, he made his way back to his cabin.

Cora wasn’t on the bed when he pushed his way in. He found her at the round window, on her tiptoes despite the heels still strapped to her feet.

She looked back over her shoulder when he walked in. “Hey.”

He motioned her to come with a jerk of his head.

The food was set on his desk, along with the cutlery and the soda.

“You didn’t have to bring me anything.” But she sat when he pulled out the chair for her.

“Well, I considered letting you starve, but I don’t know how loud your stomach growls at night.”

His attempt at humor earned him a dry glower over curved lips. “Your thoughtfulness astounds me.”

“Just remember, I can be thoughtful.”

He took a step back as she picked up her fork and knife with an amused shake of her head. He watched her cut into the meat and popped a piece into her mouth.

Her low, throaty moan went straight to his groin.

“I don’t know how August does it, but ... gah, the man’s a genius.”

“I’ll let him know,” he murmured. “I have to do a round. Finish up and get to bed.”

“Aye Aye, Captain.”

Her cheek got her hair coiled around his finger and tugged. “Watch it.”

She just grinned around a mouthful.

He left her.

But she remained with him throughout his entire walkthrough.

Thoughts of her. 

Thoughts of her father and the meeting in the morning.

Thoughts of Bishop and the shit that was about to hit the fan.

Who ever said a pirate’s life wasn’t exciting? It certainly beat sitting behind a desk.

James returned to his room twenty minutes later with a pilfered cookie from the kitchen to find Cora curled up in his bed, peacefully asleep. Her plate sat empty on the desk, knife and fork placed neatly on top.

She had done exactly what he’d instructed her to.

Had eaten her dinner.

Had gone to bed.

He wasn’t entirely certain if it was because he’d told her to, or because she’d had nothing else to do. But it didn’t matter. Consciously or not, she had listened.

That was progress.

He set the cookie on his desk and moved to the bed. James peered down at her. He studied the dusky splay of her lashes against the ivory curves of her cheeks, the soft set of her lips, the slow rise and fall of her chest.

She was stunning, painfully beautiful, like a piece of art created solely for him. If he could have, he would have put her behind glass, preserved her as she was forever.

But it wouldn’t have been enough.

He would have wanted to play with her.

He would have wanted to take her out and reenact all his dirty fantasies.

He wouldn’t have been satisfied otherwise.

He drew away the blankets, stripping her of their warmth.

He pitched them to the foot of the bed. Out of the way for when he rolled her onto her back.

Gingerly, he slipped his hand beneath the hem of her shirt and lifted. His fingertips traced the path of skin from thighs, over her hips, dipped into the lines of her waist, counted every delicate rib, and paused at the slopes of her breasts.

It was here, she stirred.

Her lashes parted.

Her eyes locked with his in the murky obscurity of night.

She said nothing.

He said nothing.

He liberated her of her top.

She let him.

It was tossed somewhere behind him.

Leather hissed as it was dragged free of fabric. The belt buckle jingled in the hot silence.

“Arms,” was all he said.

She gave them, wrists touching, somehow already knowing what he wanted.

He circled them and slipped the tongue of the belt through the silver clasp. He slid it closed until her hands were bound. Then dragged both arms over her head. He fastened them to the iron bars of the bedframe.

His heart thumped in his chest. It clapped in time with his anticipation. He could taste the excitement at the back of his throat, a savory mixture of cotton candy and Cora. He could hardly stand it.

He stood back and studied his handiwork. Even in the dim light of the room, she glowed, a pale candle flame in the shadows. He could make out with taunting accuracy every part of her he wanted to kiss.

Touch.

Mark.

It was all on display just for him.

Springs groaned with the added weight of his body climbing over her. The mattress shifted. The bed rattled. But the woman never moved. She remained trustingly still, except for her eyes. They followed his every move.

“Scared?”

To his surprise, she nodded. “Good scared.”

Christ.

She would be the end of him. He could already feel it.

He lowered his head and skimmed a feather light kiss to the bite mark he’d given her earlier. No skin had been broken and it was already fading, but the sight of it fueled him with a surge of ownership. Like when he and Annie were children and they each wanted the last piece of cake. The first person to lick it, owned it.

He owned Cora Harris.

He’d licked her.

He’d marked her.

She was his.

Goose bumps rose across her belly where his lips trailed to her navel. The muscles flexed beneath his touch. She made a sound, a grunt of protest that had him raising his head.

“Ticklish,” she whispered, her tone breathless.

Lifting one hand, he brushed it in a slow sweep from underarm, beneath her breast to tummy.

The woman jerked. The sound this time was between a groan and a giggle.

James hid his grin in her belly button. Then his teeth in the soft skin just next to the tiny indent.

Not hard.

Just hard enough to turn the giggle into a sigh.

He resumed his mission. He could feel his own anxiousness prickling at his patience. He would do better next time, but it had been days since he’d tasted her. Being that close was a tease to his barely controlled addiction.

He parted her thighs. She raised them, bending them at the knees and splaying them as far apart as they would go, granting him unlimited access to her most sacred place.

“Good girl.” He murmured. He bent to her lips, already open and eager for his attention. “Hello again, sweetheart.”

His guttural drawl was followed by an open mouth kiss that included a teasing nudge of his tongue dancing between the folds to flick her clit.

The woman above him gasped. Her hips lifted, interrupting his task.

He pinned her with both hands bracketing the insides of her thighs, framing the slippery, pink petals of her sex. The muscles beneath his palm vibrated, but they remained still otherwise.

He returned to his own pleasure. He returned to painting the curves and folds of her with his tongue. He returned to tasting and teasing, to quenching the hunger he’d had building in his gut for days.

He dipped his tongue into the hot pool collecting over her opening. He circled the tight ring and nudged with just enough pressure to make her shudder.

His fingers replaced his mouth without lifting off the hold they had on her thighs. He pushed one thumb in and held it there, fascinated by the ripple of muscles trying to pull him in deeper.

“James...”

He ignored her breathy whimper and returned his mouth to the sliver of skin joining her thigh to the junction of her body, an inch from her lips. He suctioned, sucking lightly in time to the steady rock of his thumb inside her. He didn’t stop until his mark on her was the proper redness and size.

“Did you just give me a hickey on my...?” Her voice held silent laughter, but he also heard the incredulous shock under it.

“Pussy.” He rose up on one arm. The other remained, the thumb still working inside her. “Had to mark her somehow. And she isn’t yours.” He raised his head and met her hazy gaze. “She’s mine.”

He slipped off her, off the bed, and stood over both. He took a moment to enjoy the flush pinkening her breasts and flowing up to stain her neck and cheeks. She hadn’t closed her legs and the mark next to her glistening center winked invitingly, begging him to return.

To take.

Her, like that, restrained, helpless, but completely open and wanting was an image he would never tire of.

His hands discarded his clothes, unhurried, prolonging the moment he would be inside her again. He moved to the desk and pulled out a condom. He slipped it on before returning.

Cora wiggled the moment he drew closer. Her arms tensed above her head. Her legs pulled up higher towards her chest.

She wasn’t even breathing.

Her anticipation was as hot and palpable as the sun in the hottest July afternoon. He could feel the swelter of her desire radiating off her, could taste her musky aroma saturating the air. She was wound and ready with such intensity, he knew she didn’t have long.

“Do you want this?”

He closed his fist around the hard length of his erection and gave it a lazy stroke. He watched, fascinated, enthralled as she licked her lips.

“Yes.”

The space between her legs dipped as he knelt into place.

“That’s not it.”

The slender column of her throat bobbed rapidly. She licked her lips again. The bar above her head squeaked beneath her tightening fingers.

“Please.”

A grin lifted the corner of his mouth. “You’re getting much better at that.”

He took her hips in his hands and lifted her to him. In her eagerness, she pushed up with her heels and he nearly lost his grip.

He gave her thigh a smart smack. “Settle.”

She jolted with a pained yelp. Her heels lost their anchor in the mattress and she dropped down with a bounce. She lay still.

Once certain she wasn’t going to wiggle again, he brought her to him. With his free hand, he aligned the head of his cock with her opening and pushed through.

Cora whimpered. The frame above her head groaned with her struggles not to move, but she was still from the waist down.

He fed her inch by inch with a slowness he knew was driving her crazy. He could see the impatience gleaming in her eyes, in the vicious grip she had on her lip. Frustration furrowed her brows, twisting them together.

Her quiet misery was intoxicating.

“Only good girls get what they want,” he purred, drunk on his newfound powers.

“I have been good,” she protested.

James lifted his head, one eyebrow arched. “Is that for you to decide?”

Cora bit her lip, badly concealing her grin.

He hummed quietly, working the sound with the final push of his hips, sheathing himself fully in her velvety heat.

“Oh God!” Cora’s spine arched off the mattress. Her head fell back against the pillow. “Too much...”

“No such thing.”

He gave an emphasizing nudge that elicited another throaty sob from her. The walls of her pussy tightened with the most exquisite pain.

He tugged back, giving her a taste of relief. He allowed her body to slump, her toes to uncurl. He waited for her chin to lower, for her eyes to open and find him. The green and gold were barely noticeable beneath the heavy fog of passion.

He closed the space, that sliver of an inch crossing the threshold between pleasure and pain, and held while the woman beneath him arched like a beautifully drawn bow string. Torrents of raw electricity wove beneath her heated flesh and zapped him in all the places they touched. It rippled beneath his palms.

“James ... James, stop ... stop ... wait ... fuck!”

She came before even he knew it was happening. Her body seemed to break against her will. It shattered, taking her with it in an explosion of fire.

The sight was glorious.

It was riveting.

Addicting.

“No ... no more ... no more ... I can’t...”

But it wasn’t enough.

He hadn’t had enough.

How could it be? He was a child at Christmas with a new toy and he’d just unlocked a special feature, a secret.

He was drunk on it.

High on her.

“No!”

Releasing her hips, he rose over her, a dark ship in the storm and took her mouth. He stifled her every whine, her every whimper, her every sob of his name.

He swallowed her air.

Her sense.

Her fucking sanity.

He wanted it.

All of it.

Everything she fucking had.

He wanted her soul.

He drove into her, wild, brutal.

A madman seeking salvation.

He lost himself.

His control.

His patience.

His will to be human.

She let him.

She welcomed every vicious kiss, every ruthless thrust. She twined herself around him, as tight as the lock of her core taking his abuse.

“You’re not going to sit tomorrow,” he snarled into her ear. “I’m going to make fucking sure of it.”

Her answer was the sharp piercing of her teeth into his shoulder, hard enough to hurt.

Hard enough to bleed.

James roared. His fingers tangled into her hair and he dragged her face back. He took her mouth in a bruising kiss. He would have suffocated her if she hadn’t broken it to wail her second release.

He tumbled over with her. He had to. He had to stop while she was still breathing, still capable of walking.

“Christ, I want to fuck you to death.”

His bloodthirsty declaration was met with an oblivious little giggle. She had absolutely no idea the limits she tested for him. She had no idea how badly he had to control himself. It was a sickness. A fucked up sickness. And she was both his cure and the cause.

“I can’t feel my fingers.”

Lifting his head from its nestled place in her shoulder, James looked up at the slightly purple tinge in the digits peeking up from their leather confinement. He undid the belt and tossed it over the edge of the bed. Then took her hands in his.

Blood was already beginning to return, but he rubbed them lightly, rubbed at the welts around her wrists.

“Okay?”

Cora nodded, her eyes on his face.

He released her and rolled off the bed. He padded into the washroom, and returned five minutes later with a glass of water and a damp rag. The glass was handed to her. The rag was tucked between her legs.

“Cold!” Cora yelped.

Water slopped over the rim of her cup to spill over her breasts. It pooled between her breasts and dribbled along the underside to dampen the sheets.

James knelt next to the bed and suctioned his mouth to the puddle. He ran the flat of his tongue along the path of the trickle, tasting the salty tang of her skin and cool water, and feeling the heavy clap of her heart.

“Why is it cold?” she panted, breathless.

The hand still holding the cloth remained firmly in place, but he bit gently into a nipple. “So you can walk tomorrow.”

“You should probably stop that then.” Her mouth held a wobbly grin that contradicted the heat in her eyes.

Releasing the crest of one breast, he switched it for the other one. “I’m not doing anything.”

Her breathy laugh spoke volumes to her disbelief. But she didn’t ask him to stop again.

“I have something for you.”

That perked her interest. Her head came up.

“What?”

“Hold this.”

Leaving her holding the rag in place, he rose and went to his desk. He returned with the cookie.

Her eyes lit up. “A cookie?”

He let her wiggle higher on the pillows before switching the treat for the water glass. She immediately tore off a piece. It disappeared into her mouth. Her eyes rolled back into her skull with her lusty moan.

“I never thought I’d miss chocolate this much.”

James set the glass on the desk and dropped down next to her, exhaustion and the wee hours of pre-dawn drawing his eyelids closed.

Cora had other ideas.

“James?”

“Hmm?” He kept his eyes shut, already in that place between blissful sleep and consciousness.

“When can I see my parents again?”

“Soon.”

“How soon?”

He hooked her middle blindly and dragged her to him. “Soon. Now, go to sleep.”