Mastered by Malone (Haven, Texas 6)

He pulled her up onto her tiptoes, his hand under her ass. He was firmly in control and instead of freaking out, she found herself craving it. She wrapped her arms around his neck and tried to give back as good as she got. She had no doubt he was way more experienced than she was, and she wanted to do her share.

Then he smacked his hand down on her ass. She gasped. He kept kissing her. But his hand landed again.

She should knee him in the nuts. Pull away and tell him off. And maybe she would have, if each smack to her butt hadn’t made her clit throb even harder. The slight warmth, only slight because she was wearing jeans after all, filled her entire body.

Okay, maybe this spanking thing wasn’t so bad. What had she been arguing about? If he wanted to spank her while kissing her then maybe she wouldn’t complain. Too much.

Then he drew back, staring down at her with a devilish glint in his gaze.

“And that is why you should never dare me. Now take those jeans off and bend over my desk. Grasp the other side with your hands and keep them there. Since this is your first spanking, I’m only going to use my hand on you. You can thank me later.”

Wait . . . what? He’d just gone from kissing her like he wanted to devour her to barking out orders about taking off her jeans and bending over his desk and . . . she stared up at him in horror. “You want me to bend over your desk so you can spank me?”

“Yes.”

The ice king was back. She didn’t like it. She wanted the man who’d kissed her like she was the very breath he needed to survive.

“You just spanked me!”

He looked momentarily confused. Then understanding moved over his face. He let out a bark of laughter. “That? Babe, that was not a spanking. And if you think it was then you are in for one hell of a shock. Did your parents never spank you as a child?”

“Certainly not.”

“Hmm, so that’s where things went wrong.”

“There is nothing wrong with the way my parents raised me.” She put her hands on her hips as she glared up at him. “And I am not bending over your desk so you can slap my ass. And I am certainly never going to thank you for it.”

“Hmm, maybe I won’t get the thank you. But you are getting the spanking.”

No. No. No. Yes. No.

She was turning into a lunatic. Because only a lunatic would actually consider being spanked by this man. Sure, she’d kind of liked those couple of slaps to her ass. But he wasn’t talking about play. This wasn’t a scene in a club. This was punishment, pure and simple. And she wasn’t going to agree to that.

She’d had less than a handful of lovers in her life, and not one of them had anything on Malone. Not one of them would have grabbed her and told in that low, commanding voice to calm down. They certainly wouldn’t have kissed her the way he had. And no one had ever, ever, smacked her ass. So why the hell was that such a turn on?

Only one explanation for it. She was going insane.

“And if I say no?”

“Are you saying no?”

“I’m asking what happens if I do?”

“You go upstairs and pack up your stuff and get ready for your cousin to come and get you.”

“Nice. Either I let you spank me, or you kick me out. That’s blackmail.”

“No, that’s an ultimatum.”

“Well, pardon me for getting my threats mixed up. This is not exactly a situation I’m used to. I’m not used to men who can walk into a room and shoot innocent people in the head. Men who murder an innocent woman, even if she is a rotten clothing thief, in the head. And I’m not used to men who give ultimatums like that.”

“You did not just compare me to a murderer,” he said coldly.

Oh. She might have. Shit. What was she going to do?

“Have you ever thought that you might need it?”

She looked over at him. She hated that he looked so at ease. As though he hadn’t just laid this huge stipulation at her feet. As though she wasn’t stuck between a rock and a hard place because of him.