I shriek like a mouse picked up by the tail.
He jumped from halfway up the stairs like one of those French street runners and it’s too late to stop. I throw up my hands and try to bounce off him, shove him away. My heart tries to beat its way out of my chest via any exit it can find. My throat. My rib cage. My spine. It’s an animal fighting for freedom like I am.
I’m still going to escape. Grant hasn’t quite got a firm hold of me, and I wriggle out from where he tried to pull me tight to his chest. Free.
But in using both fists to push Grant away, the silky fabric of my dress falls and tangles in my legs. I grab for it as I fend Grant off, but it’s no use. My desperately scrabbling legs have snagged the silk on my thighs, the friction tightening, constricting, hobbling. For a moment I’m weightless, between running forwards and tripping. Then I’m falling, throwing out my hands to catch myself until the air is knocked from my lungs by an arm at my waist.
My back slams into a hot, muscled chest.
I failed. I’m done. I’m as trapped here as my heart is within the confines of my ribcage.
Grant is breathing hard, as I am. Pressing into the small of my back is a hot, solid length. That shouldn’t be my first thought as my liberty slips away. But this is the first time I’ve ever felt a man’s cock. Ever. It’s intriguing and exciting even as my breath heaves and panic surges in my blood.
I thrash. I flail like a wild animal, and for a split second I think it’s working. I’m twisting out of his grasp.
He ruthlessly pins me to him, but chest to chest this time. I can feel every part of him, including the hardness of his cock on my belly.
Our race has made him hard. He enjoyed it.
And… so did I.
The feeling of running for my life was primal. And knowing he was coming after me? Heat rushes to my cheeks.
Grabbing my hands, he keeps them hostage.
“You’re mine.” He lowers me to the floor, cupping the back of my head, careful that he eases me to the cool marble, and gripping my wrists. Then his hips are pressing in, and his ankles pin my shins and I’m helpless and exposed, my hands splayed in the small of my back and shoulders pressed onto the smooth floor. My front though, is on fire with the hold of his body.
I’m trapped.
He should secure me. I might run. Surely the game isn’t over? But right now, I can’t. There’s nothing I can do.
He’s going to take me here on this floor. His cock feels harder than the marble, it’s a scorching brand on my belly. He said whatever depraved acts he wants, and my body is his to do with as he likes. I wish my nipples weren’t puckering and my breasts heavy at the thought. He’ll strip me of my innocence.
“I’m a—a virgin.” I spit the word out. Like it’s what? Protection? So he’ll go easy on me? Is that even what I want?
“Uh-uh. For twenty-four hours,” he rumbles into my ear. “You’re mine.”
What does that mean?
It means my v-plates are about to be burned to a crisp, for sure.
“Twenty-three hours and fifty-nine minutes, kingpin.” I’m proud I can be defiant after my silly confession. “After that, I’m leaving.” My breathlessness is just from running. Definitely.
“You’ll be free to leave, yes. But you won’t. You’ll be so addicted to the pleasure I give you that you won’t be able to tear yourself away. After you’ve come on my tongue and my fingers, felt me stroking you into madness, you won’t think of going anywhere.” His voice is deep and rough, resonating through me and the shift of his cheek against mine rubs his bristles on my softer face.
Oh god. As though that chase hadn’t got me hot enough, now this. I’m embarrassing myself. I can feel how swollen and wet my pussy is. Overflowing.
“I’m going to indulge every depraved and filthy fantasy with you, sweetheart. I’m going to make you dirty and you’ll love it.”
The blush of shame for being so inappropriately aroused—slutty is the only word—only makes it worse. Without my volition, my hips roll in a futile attempt to get some pressure on the spot between my legs that aches to be touched. My body desperately wants relief. To come. To have that void filled up with his cock and his… Oh god where the fuck is my feminism when I need it? His seed. To be bred by this alpha male.
Dirty. Filthy.
Yes.
He’s big and strong and powerful and he caught me. He saved my life. Now he’s going to do depraved things to me? My nipples tighten. My clit pulses without any stimulation. I shudder at the mere press of his body onto mine.
“I won’t stop. I’m going to make you ache and gasp and cry out. Tell me, did that chase turn you on as it did me? Did you like knowing I was coming for you? Are you needy, sweetheart?” he croons. “Are you wet?”
“No,” I lie.
“Then you won’t mind my checking that you’re telling the truth, will you?” He rears up, takes my delicate silk dress in both hands at the top of my thighs, and rips it.
I gasp as I see the tear from my navel to mid-thigh. A shocking intrusion on the white silk. Then before I can react, he’s over me again, his chest on mine, my hands caught in one of his above my head. I try to wriggle to get away but all it does is rub my pebbled nipples against his solid chest and the heat of his naked skin. He’s burning hot.
“Now, let’s see, shall we?” It’s a teasing statement but I feel my cheeks flush. Oh god. He’s going to find out what a little liar I am.
Because I bet…
There’s the barest featherlight brush of his finger against my pussy, and I jerk with the pleasure of it.
The bastard laughs. “You’ve soaked your knickers through, sweetheart. You say you don’t want this, but your body says otherwise, open and weeping for me. Just waiting for your man to claim.”
Late, far too late, I realise I should have pressed my knees together. I should have fought him. But I’m too wet and achy and hot to have thought of it. My brain is about as useful as putty. I’m a quivering pile of aroused flesh, desperate for his caress. Because I’m certain Grant can make me feel good. Make this amazing.
“Do you want me to touch you?” he asks in a deep rasp against my lips.
I’m just… Looking down, and then back up again. It’s not a nod, I tell myself. He’s taking his part of this bargain. I’m his for the day. I have no choice.
“Hmm.” He makes a sceptical sound from his throat. “That will do for now. But I’ll have more before the day is out. I’ll have you screaming and begging. I’ll have you thrashing as you come and digging your nails into my back as you’re overwhelmed with pleasure.”
A whine of sheer desire comes from me, without my say so. I really shouldn’t want that. The floor is cold and hard and he’s heavy and hot and pressing me down. The combination is electric. It’s like he’s flicked switches in my brain I didn’t even realise I had. I have twice as many nerve endings everywhere than I used to; that’s the only explanation for how I feel.
I tell myself I don’t have a choice when his hand brushes over my knickers again. I honestly make an attempt to remember what I aimed to achieve only a few hours ago—freedom and to be on the opposite side of the world. But when he pushes the fabric aside, I arch into Grant’s touch as finally—finally—he touches me.
“You feel so perfect.” He groans as his fingers slide through my folds slowly, as though both of us aren’t panting. I’m shaking. He’s barely done more than skim my clit, but that feels like more than any of my efforts alone in bed.
It’s the forbiddenness and the taboo of the whole thing, I think. The way he’s doing this, I don’t have any responsibility. He’s taking without my permission, right? That was the deal. I shouldn’t like it, but I do. After all the planning of the past months and having to watch myself for my entire life, I’m loving that he is seizing control to my benefit. He’s stroking me, gently at first, as though he’s waiting for me to pull away and stop him, but I don’t.
I don’t because, fuck that feels amazing.
Then he strokes more and harder, keeping me pinned and helpless. I’m not fighting now. I’m mindlessly chasing his touch as best I can given how solid he is on me. Our skin only touches in a few places, scorching. His hand holding my wrists. The back of his forearm, with hair that treads the line between soft and wiry. And his fingers in my pussy.
“That’s so good. You’re so good,” he tells me in a rough voice. “The little noises you’re making are sexy as fuck.”
I wasn’t even aware I was making any noises. But it’s true. Someone is mewing and whimpering, and someone is me.
The way he’s touching me, my body is hardly my own. I’m a creature of his making, of pleasure and vibration and feelings both in my heart and between my legs. He’s bolder than I would be with myself, but I’m wetter too, so it works. A synergy like sugar and butter, it sounds wrong, but it’s magic. He’s relentless. He strokes my clit in consistent patterns. Hard. Right over the nub that I would be tentative about, he pushes the pad of his fingers.
“My pretty girl.”
And then he kisses me. Soft lips and sandpaper stubble. I gasp. It’s more surprising than his blatant sexuality, this kiss. He takes my parted lips as an invitation, invading my mouth. Then it’s not subtle, it’s deep and filthy and sending the good sort of shivers down my spine. He is thrusting his tongue all the way against my cheek in a bold mimicry of sex. His other hand is still holding my wrists as he steadily drives me higher and higher. I’m mindless and out of control. I’m shaking with his touches and all I can do is moan.
“That’s it,” he says against my lips. “Give it up, sweetheart.”
It’s nearly, so nearly enough… Then he thrusts a finger—or maybe two or maybe four, who knows—into my passage and I arch and come apart at the seams. I scream. I shake and thrash like I’m trying to get away but at the same time I’m pushing my mouth to his like that point of contact is the only thing keeping me on the planet.
I’m not even certain I exist out of the throbbing pleasure where his fingers are easing in and out of me, and stroking over my clit. It’s only slowly, so slowly that I’m aware of my legs. Then my pleasantly curled toes and tingling calves. The heaviness in my torso. And then—more astonishing than my still having parts of my body in addition to my pussy, which is pretty shocking I can tell you—I notice my head. Specifically, my cheeks. My nose. My mouth and forehead. Each part of my face is being kissed by my captor. This is nothing like the claiming, possessive kiss while he stroked me to an orgasm so strong it might have caused concussion. Nope. These kisses are sweet and delicate as butterflies. They’re as unexpected as the way he effortlessly avoided everything I put in his path, and jumped over the side of the stairs to stop me from leaving.
He deserved that win. However desperate I was to get out, he wanted more for me to stay. What’s baffling is why. I thought if he won he’d just take his pleasure and my virginity on the floor in the most animalistic manner.
Instead, he has given me an orgasm better than anything I’ve achieved on my own.
Part of me wants to pretend that’s neither here nor there, but the way he pushed to the limits of sanity to win our competition? And then drank in my bliss like it was his own?
Yes. Yes.
I want to kiss him back. I want to return those delicate kisses.
But I’m so sated and exhausted. My eyes close. Sleepy. And… I belatedly realise that I feel… Safe. Because Grant might be a terrifying monster of a mafia boss, but he hasn’t hurt me. Quite the opposite.
My head knows I still need to get out. However much my body likes this man, he’s a merciless kingpin. So when he scoops me up, I should object.
“Where are we going?” I mumble instead.
“To my bedroom.” He presses his lips to my temple. His arms band around my thighs and shoulders and his hands hold me tight.
“But I should… My rooms.” I am incoherent.
“You’re sleeping in my bed,” he tells me and his gruff voice is a warm caress over my whole body. “You’re mine. That means I will have you with me every minute of our one day together, even when we’re asleep.”
He sounds obsessed. Unhinged. And damn, but… I like it. A lot.
