He slammed his mouth to hers and kissed her hard, every punishing stab of his tongue a direct assault. He gripped her tits, cupping her delicate flesh in a rough squeeze. “Is this what you want?” he growled, tugging her dress lower and dropping his mouth to her nipples.
He sucked relentlessly and she cried out. He didn’t care if he was being rough. His insides were raw, and a dam inside of him was about to break.
“You want that fucking land so bad you’d give me this?” He yanked her panties down to her knees and shoved his fingers between her folds.
Her breath hitched and something akin to fear skipped across her face, and he froze. Panting hard, he stared at her for a long moment, wanting to scream at her and ask why.
He yanked his touch away and paced. When he turned, he saw the rosy marks where his stubble had burned her throat and the fingerprints of his rough handling on her breasts. Her wide eyes watched him, dark with streaks from the rain, and her innocence too fucking vulnerable to bear.
Her knees knocked together, panties twisted at her shins. “Gage—”
“Get out,” he growled.
“I—”
“Get out!”
She scrambled off the bed and grabbed her coat, fleeing from the room like terrified prey in the den of a predator. He wasn’t even sure if she got her panties up.
“Fuck!” he screamed, flipping the small table by the television.
He should go after her. The roads were slick and she was upset. He should apologize and demand they talk. Instead, he did nothing.
He sat on the edge of the bed, seething and gripping his hair by the roots as he balanced his elbows on his knees and tried to think. Every hard breath smelled like her, and when he scrubbed his hands over his face, he scented her on his fingers.
He thought he was ready, but maybe he was wrong. Maybe Tara was right, he was better off alone.
She could have her fucking land. He wanted nothing to do with this place anymore.
Chapter 10
Perrin peeled into the parking lot of the bar, like an alcoholic back from a bender. Her shame and regret tunneled through her with the force of a tornado, and a guttural sob spilled past her lips as she gripped the wheel. What had she done?
She’d thought, in all of her stupidity and desperation, that she could bribe him into rescinding his offer on the land, but she hadn’t prepared for his anger. That look of betrayal and disappointment in his eyes, his absolute disgust as he screamed at her to leave… It gutted her like nothing else.
Gulping through her sobs, she tried to pull herself together enough to walk to her apartment. At least the rain offered a curtain of privacy from anyone entering or exiting the bar.
She couldn’t snap out of it. She hyperventilated, choking on each breath as she tried to syphon it down.
A knock rattled the window, scaring the crap out of her. Maggie waited on the other side of the glass under a black umbrella.
Perrin rolled down the window but couldn’t manage a single word. She merely looked up at her sister through blurred vision and shook as another sob tore through her.
“Oh, Perrin.” Maggie opened the door, locked up the car and gathered her under the umbrella, then escorted her up the back steps to the loft.
Once inside, she dried her off and helped her change into clean clothes. Perrin didn’t say a word, yet Maggie seemed to understand exactly what she needed. She washed her face clean of tears and smeared makeup and covered her with a blanket, pulling her close to her side.
“It’s okay,” she whispered, with a maternal ease neither of them had been shown in their childhood. “I’ve got you.”
She didn’t know who was watching the bar or if Maggie had somewhere else to be. She never issued a word as her sister held her, letting her cry. It was as if all the pain and humiliation of calling off her engagement paled in comparison to disappointing Gage.
She sniffled, the jagged catch of her breath upsetting in itself. “I ruined everything.”
“Nothing’s ruined until someone’s dead,” her sister whispered. There was no sarcasm to such a comment. Maggie knew true loss and could speak of it with a bluntness others hadn’t earned. “Everything’s fixable.”
“You didn’t see the look of disgust in his eyes. He hates me.”
“He doesn’t hate you. Besides, hate requires emotion. Consider yourself lucky he wasn’t indifferent.”
“I don’t know what I was thinking.”
She hadn’t told her sister what she’d done, but Maggie could probably gather enough from her drenched appearance when she found her. Perrin wasn’t the sort to dress up—not for a guy and not since her breakup with Bran.
God, Gage had to be laughing at how desperate she must have looked, showing up like a soggy hooker trying to pay for what the bank wouldn’t grant her.