Dominate (Deliver 8)

He stepped forward, slow and menacing.

Revenge was his life, in his blood, and he intended to punish her in payment for a wrong that had been done. He was beyond listening.

She turned and ran.

CHAPTER 12

Rocky sand bit into Rylee’s bare feet as she sprinted through the dark. In normal circumstances, she would’ve been terrified of stepping on a scorpion. But there was a deadlier threat on her heels, breathing down her neck, closing in—

His fist caught her throat, his other twisting in her hair. The punishing grip wrenched her off her feet, dragging her knees and scraping her hands along the ground as he hauled her back into the house by her hair.

No amount of fighting or screaming slowed him down. By the time he wrestled her into the bedroom, she was out of strength, out of breath, and he hadn’t broken a sweat.

He tossed her onto the bed like a rag doll and followed her down, straddling her legs and pinning her arms above her head.

“You fucking psycho!” She wheezed, trying to catch her breath. “This is wrong. This isn’t you. Please, Tommy. Stop this madness!”

The sound of metal clanked above her. She twisted her neck and glimpsed handcuffs in his grasp.

“No!” She renewed her fight, but it was a wasted effort. “Get away from me!”

Within seconds, he shackled her arms to the wrought iron headboard. His thigh pushed between hers. His hand covered her mouth. Then he gave her his weight. All of it.

Fucking God, he was muscle-heavy. Hard. Dense. Utterly immovable. His heat, his strength, every inch of him pressed her into the mattress, making her whimper against his palm. And his eyes. Damn those eyes. They were so shockingly, brilliantly gold. Gorgeous. Mesmerizing. Vicious.

He radiated rebellious, bad-boy intimidation coupled with a virility so potent it made every warmblooded woman’s head turn and mouth water.

This was the closest she’d ever physically been to him, and while she loathed him for hurting her, it wasn’t enough to dampen her reaction to his masculinity.

A sharp, carnal tug pulled inside her, dirty and wanton. There was a wicked wildness about him that called to her filthiest desires. After accusing him of hate-fucking women, she couldn’t stop herself from imagining him doing that to her. Didn’t mean she wanted it. No way in hell. But the naked possibility of such a thought messed with her head.

His hand moved from her mouth to wedge beneath her nape, tightening at the base of her skull and yanking her toward his sinful lips. Not to kiss her. He just held her mouth against his, breathing, seducing, making her squirm between want and repulsion.

He’d written in detail about his captivity in Van’s attic. Eight weeks of brutal sexual instruction. Van had whipped him and taken his virginity. Liv had taught him how to kiss and suck a cock, but she never fucked him. He didn’t have intercourse with a woman for the first time until years later.

The intimate position made it impossible not to think about everything he’d endured. Everything he’d learned. He was trained in sexual pleasure and knew how to use it to lure and torture. He was tormenting her with it now, arousing her, confusing her. Just to be a dick.

“I know what you’re doing.” She jerked her face away.

He gripped her jaw and yanked it back.

She drank in the youthful texture of his skin, his symmetrical, rough-hewn features, the flavor of his breath, the faintness of beer, spicy meat, and all man. The delectable, warm scent of him enveloped her like a fantasy.

While she reeled from his overbearing proximity, she wasn’t the only one affected. Electricity writhed between them, twisting the dynamic of their tumultuous relationship and weaving layers of toxic complexity.

They had no business staring at each other like this. There was too much animosity and resentment in the air. But neither of them looked away, their breaths melding into shimmers of hot, poisonous attraction. It punched through her, almost causing the last of her senses to desert her. Christ, she was shaking.

He responded to it by sliding his touch along her jaw, studying her with his fingertips, feathering them along her cheekbones, her nose, her lips. Then his touch grew heavier, harder, pressing against her skin until his entire hand was squeezing her face.

Anger. His reaction to her was pissing him off. Or maybe this was what he’d meant in his emails. When he was intimate with women, he always hurt them.

“Tommy.” She shook her head, gasping and trying to break his cruel grip. “You’re hurting me.”

He was all biceps, abs, and rock-hard thighs, bearing down on her like a brick wall. He must have felt her shifting beneath him because he removed his hand from her face. Then he stared at her mouth, watching her gulp for air under his heavy body.