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  “I’m not the docile one anymore, damn it. No! No!”

  “Rayna, honey…listen to me. Look at me.”

  She kept fighting. Bucking her whole body. Squirming and writhing. Sucking down air in giant, desperate gulps. Those inhalations made her smell the monster, which was confusing as hell. He didn’t smell like sweat, mud, and halitosis. He smelled like cedar, smoke, and mountain wind.

  She swallowed and opened her eyes.

  Then let her mind wake up. And her heart fall apart. “Zeke.”

  His face warmed with a gentle smile. “Hey.” He slackened his hold on her wrists.

  “Your cabin.” Relief flooded from her with the words. She grabbed the front of his T-shirt, pulled him close, and nestled her head into his chest. “We’re at your cabin.”

  “And you’re safe, bird.”

  Right after he rumbled it, he shifted to roll off her. Panic speared her like a rogue icicle. The worsening storm, which had turned the afternoon into an eerie night outside, didn’t help. She dug her fingers deeper into his shirt.

  “Don’t go. I can’t—”

  “All right.” He smiled softly, his teeth contrasting with the stubble that was quickly becoming a full beard. “I’ll be right here, okay?”

  He patted a couple of pillows. They were as close to the edge of the mattress as possible. She whipped her head back and forth. “No. Too far. I’m still scared.” Her voice was small and pathetic, but she didn’t care. “And cold.” She ran her fingers along the little gap between his T-shirt neck and his skin. “And you’re so warm.”

  He expelled a long breath. “Rayna, you know what I’ll do if—”

  She wrested his argument by showing him what she yearned to do. With one hand yanking on his shirt, she drove the other into his hair. She wrenched his face down to hers, fully ready with an open offering of her lips and tongue. Their mouths fused. Their breaths mated. As the storm raged outside, they stirred a wanton, hot hurricane inside. Rayna let the tempest take her, rejoicing as it ripped through her blood, fired through her sex, and decimated her resolve.

  “Zeke,” she finally pleaded. “Help me forget it. I need to make it all go away. Please!”

  She watched his jaw tighten and his eyes flare. A squall of dark humor passed across his face. “Fuck,” he whispered. “You’re not talking about a chick movie and a foot rub, are you, honey?”

  “No.” She moved her hand to his face, digging her fingers into his beard. “I want you to make me forget…just like you made Luna forget.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Zeke stared at her hard for a long minute. Now he had to be the one dreaming. For the last forty-eight hours, she’d been the merciless erotic torment in his mind, but now she was his wildest desire come to life, right here in his arms. With her lips parted, her eyes imploring, and her body this close and warm… Fuck. Dream come true was the tip of the goddamn iceberg.

  But weren’t dreams the soul’s way of reminding you what you couldn’t have? Who was the depressing dickhead who’d said that? Oh, yeah. That was him.

  With a resolution he couldn’t be further from feeling, he uncurled her fingers from his shirt and then cupped the ones at his face long enough to press a kiss on her knuckles. “Honey, as much as every bone in my body would thank me to do that…I can’t.”

  As he forced himself to sit up, her bewildered stare followed every move he made. “Why?”

  How could she speak one word but scratch at fifty corners of his composure? Even if her trembling tone didn’t tip him off, he saw the self-doubt on her face, the way she glanced down at her body, encased so adorably in his shirt and nothing else, and compared herself to Luna’s “charms.” And clearly noticed every difference that he did. Then instantly came to the ridiculously wrong conclusion.

  “Damn it, Rayna.” He cracked his neck. Wasn’t working. His thoughts still bounced in his head like ping-pong balls in a carnival guppy booth. “It’s not you, honey, okay?”

  “So it’s you?” she retorted. “Is that it? And I’m supposed to believe that how, Mr. Prom King of the Seattle kink crowd?” She shot a derisive laugh at his stunned gape. “There isn’t a lot Sage and I don’t share with each other, Z. I’ve known since before you went on the last mission. But even if I hadn’t, the rocket-science degree wasn’t necessary to witness it at Bastille last night.” Her glare dissolved, and again she tore at his edges with her questioning eyes and wobbling lips. “But there’s no subbie waiting line right now, is there? You can’t have your pick of the bench. But you can have me, and—”

  He surged to his feet. “My pick of the bench?” Straining the outrage from it was impossible. “Is that what you think? That I just stroll into the club and decide what workout I want for the night? Like choosing to go run on the treadmill or play some basketball?”

  She twisted the drooping sleeve of his shirt. Goddamnit, why did she have to look so sweet and small and sexy in it? “I don’t think anything, Zeke. I just want— I just—”

  “You just want? Okay, you just want what? Are you able to verbalize that much?”

  “Stop talking to me like I’m seven. These aren’t words I’m spewing on a whim. I didn’t decide to pop them out because I liked the sound, okay?”

  “Right. Because you were thinking so lucidly after having a nightmare that had you nearly tearing up this bedroom.”

  He was being a semi-asshole. Maybe more than semi. Still, she responded with tight calm, “From time to time, Sage shares a few things with me about what she and Garrett have as Dominant and submissive. I already know there’s a lot more to it than what people assume. Now I’ve had a chance to witness it firsthand, too.”

  He moved to the end of the bed and locked his hands behind his back. “That’s nice. But you didn’t answer my question.” After stepping one leg out and bracing himself in a full drill-instructor pose, he leveled his stare back into hers with unflinching intent. “What. Do. You. Want. Rayna?”

  She earned a new chunk of his respect for not surrendering an inch of her own gaze. Despite the Gung Ho Mo Fo act he flung at her, she gave back as good as she got, drawing up her shoulders with admirable precision. But when she spoke…her words were complete woman. One hundred percent a pleading, sexier-than-hell husk.

  “I want you to look at me the way you looked at Luna last night.”

  Gut, meet a boot named Rayna Chestain.

  His breath left him on a heavy rush. So did his anger. But the void left behind didn’t remain empty. He recognized the feeling like rounding a corner and seeing an old schoolmate—the one who liked to get in a couple of punches before letting him move on.

  “That’s not a request I can grant, Ray-bird.”

  She rose up on her knees. “Why the hell not?”

  “Christ.” It roared out of him. He threw up his hands. Another emotion two-by-foured his core without the bully’s help this time. Despair didn’t need a sidekick. “Did your ‘firsthand’ experience include what I did to Luna last night, Rayna? Did you see the marks on her body? All of them? Did you think about how she got them, about what I did before—” The look that crossed her face, as if preparing herself to be slapped, clutched the words short in his throat.

  “Say it,” she rasped. “Before you fucked her. There. I did it for both of us.”

  “I didn’t fuck her.” She blinked, seeming to believe him, though his ominous growl didn’t give her much choice. “I wasn’t her Dominant, Rayna. I was her Top. There’s a massive goddamn difference.”

  She let out a breath in frustrated puffs. Her lips twisted. “But when you stood in my living room and told me you were going to Bastille and what you were going to do, I thought—”

  “I know what you thought. It was exactly what I wanted you to think.”

  He pivoted and crossed the room. Though it was the middle of the afternoon, the world was a swath of pewter mist and black clouds. A perfect backdrop for this conversation.

  Conversation? No. It wasn’t goin
g to be that. She was silent and still now, and he needed to just leave it at that. He had to close her down from ever thinking they could explore a D/s dynamic together. He knew damn well what would happen if he ever crossed that line with her, ever accepted her at his feet and demanded a Yes, Sir spring from her lips. As beautiful as the beginning would be, none of the end results were remotely good.

  Yeah, he should have left it at the silence.

  But her mute hurt tore at his edges. Pulled and jabbed and peeled at his scabs.

  Shit.

  “Letting you think I was going to screw Luna was an easier way to break things with you, okay? I needed you to see what I am, Rayna. How I’m wired.” He swung his gaze toward her again. “And how that equates to a disaster for your wiring.”

  As he expected, she was waiting for him with eyes that looked like crushed emeralds—tossed on top of a bonfire. “So you just decided to sever my wiring,” she charged. “Is that it?”

  Hell. That mind of hers. Nothing was a bigger turn-on, and nothing made him want to throttle her ass more. Hard. With a slotted paddle.

  “I’m not going to jump on this carousel with you. It’s going to leave us both dizzy and pissed. You don’t understand half of what you’re asking me for, and—”

  “God!” She climbed off the bed so fast, she thought nothing of the peeks she gave him at her bare sex as she did. He stood locked in a mix of stunned and stimulated as she advanced and smacked the center of his chest. “They give you three golden rules in BDSM, right? Safe, sane, consensual? Congratulations, Jesse James. You’ve already stolen the third from me, and you’re well on your way to making off with the second.”

  He openly fumed at her—and seethed with disgust at himself for doing so. Goddamnit, the brat had hit him twice, and he just fumbled like the fucking new guy with bad intel, disbelieving what was happening but unable to pick up a damn radio and order a proper extraction. Gawking. Helpless.

  No. Way.

  He hadn’t been helpless for a very long while. He sure as shit didn’t plan on starting a trend of it now.

  Rayna had made the mistake of leaving her hand suspended midair in front of his chest. Now she drew it back a little, as if contemplating whether to pummel him again. The follow-through was a no-brainer. He whipped his own hand up, swallowing her fist inside his own.

  “You want to discuss your sanity, bird?” He shook his head with steady surety. “Trouble is, you haven’t gone insane. You’ve gone bratty.”

  Her eyes widened. She flinched and attempted to pull back. He grinned and clutched her tighter. Yeah, that aroused him. A lot. But this had nothing to do with his pulsing cock and everything to do with teaching this little girl a lesson. Sometimes—many times—that involved mission recon above the waist.

  Not that she made the effort one click easier. Instead of fighting him more, she tossed her fiery hair and gritted her teeth in sexy challenge. “Bratty, huh?” One side of her sleek mouth quirked up. “Aren’t you big bad Doms supposed to put brats in their place? Teach them a lesson?”

  Damn it. She was really, really asking for it.

  Openly sparring with you doesn’t mean she wants you to subdue her, Hayes.

  Even if she did, it’d be too damn dangerous. Tait wasn’t here. Nobody was here. That was the fucking point. Zsycho couldn’t come out to play if there wasn’t a babysitter, especially with Rayna. Especially with how incredible she’d feel under him, snarling at him…then finally, breathlessly begging him…

  With a tight growl, he slid his hold from her fist to her wrist. Using the extra stability for strength, he yanked her closer to him, nearly punching her nose with his as he forced her to stare at him. “Is that what you want, Rayna? A lesson? From me?”

  She drew in a rickety breath. But her eyes glittered with pure sass. “Hmm. What do you think, Master Z? Do I need one?”

  He shook his head again. The move wasn’t so patient this time. “Ohhh, honey…”

  “Well?”

  “It doesn’t fucking work that way, Rayna. Five minutes ago, you were about to kick in my family jewels because of fighting off the cockroach twins in your sleep. Now you want me to turn off the lights and take you to subbie dreamland. But if we hit a land mine on the way, your psyche is the casualty. Do you get that? Has Sage explained that part to you?”

  In spite of the challenge, he made no move to let her go. She didn’t shift, either. Her chin jutted higher, almost daring him to go on.

  “You’re pulling bratastic on me right now. Doing a damn fine job, too.” He tapped her head with his free hand. “But there are a lot of emotional insurgents in here waiting for you to pop your parachute, Rayna. If you’re ever on your knees for me, that brat walks out the door. All the way out. You won’t get to hide. You won’t get to pick the reaction you think I want or some cute answer from a story Sage has fed to you about what she and Garrett did one night in the dungeon. I don’t teach lessons like that.” He watched her pupils dilate in response, so gorgeous and intoxicating, making it impossible to conclude in anything less than a low but determined thunder. “So be damn careful of the one you’re asking for now.”

  The message finally seemed to get through. Thank God. Apprehension and expectation played over her face. He was about to let out a breath and slacken his grip—when the defiance surged back into every inch of her stance.

  “So…what? Is that supposed to scare me?”

  Hell.

  He let her go and moved back. One wide step. Another.

  Now you need to turn around and leave completely. Now. Get your ass downstairs before you start really contemplating how good it would be to chop that saucy attitude to pieces in screaming, writhing, climaxing, sinfully submissive chunks.

  “Yeah, bird. It sure as fuck is.”

  She didn’t move except to slide both hands to her hips. Christ. She was breathtaking. Her stance defined her luscious curves in every damn way. Was she actually tapping one set of turquoise-polished toes?

  “Well, it doesn’t.”

  Goddamnit. Yeah, she was tapping. And glowing. And tempting him with every rise of her beautiful breasts, every tug of teeth at her cinnamon-dark lips, every drop of need in her open, honest eyes.

  She wanted this. And damn it, he did, too.

  He pivoted and took another step toward the threshold. Rayna coiled her fists tighter at her hips. That pushed the shirt harder at her breasts, stretching the parrots that matched her stubborn toes. Fuck. His shirt got to feel up more of her than him, and he was the one getting glared at like Caligula? This was wrong. On a number of shit-laden levels.

  “Well, it should.” He sneered it viciously enough for the Caligula rep.

  “Got that part, Sergeant. Are we moving on now?”

  For a moment, he was plunged back into disbelief. For another he just blinked, unable to splice together the sweet friend who’d gone fishing with him in August was this mouthy rebel who tempted him with every lift of her chin and toss of her thick red mane.

  In the third, his fury slammed him back into action. As he regained the distance back to her, he tore off the T-shirt in which he’d been sleeping. “You want to throw down on this, Rayna?” he charged. “Then let’s do it.” Ignoring her open gawk at the sudden exposure of his chest, he seized her hand and forced it against the tattoo between his pecs. The small black circle, divided into three equal slices that bore a dot each, rose and fell with his incensed breaths. “Touch it,” he ordered, “since you seem to know so much about it. The triskelion means something to me, Rayna—something so deep that it’s stamped into the skin over my heart. All three sections of it. Safe, sane, consensual. They’re embedded into me. They’re part of me.”

  She nodded. “I—I know, Zeke.”

  He tugged her chin up with a finger. The brat was gone. Fresh tears glistened in the jade pools of her eyes—and that was actually a good sign. Maybe she was really comprehending the depth of this subject, especially for him. “You do?” he challenged.
“So that’s why you’re standing here in a cabin in the Cascades with me, miles from any human let alone your phone or clothes, freely offering yourself to me?” He tilted his head. “Did I get all that right?”

  Shockingly, her face broke into a soft smile. “Zeke—”

  “Because you see, honey, that ‘consensual’ part implies a little something called trust.”

  She pulled his hand away from her chin and curled one of her own around it. Her other hand still rested atop his tattoo.

  Atop his heart.

  When she spoke again, her tears flowed as steadily as her words. “Let me be clear. I know what I’m asking. I know where I am. Right here, alone in a cabin with you, Zeke Hayes. Without my phone. Without my clothes. There’s really only me. And with all of me, I trust you. Not stupidly, not blindly. I am giving you the trust you’ve earned from me, over and over and over again.”

  He expelled a weighted huff. “And here we are again. Back to the hero thing.” He pushed back, disentangling his hand.

  “You need to listen—”

  “No, you need to listen. Stop making this into something from a movie or a sappy novel. What went down with King was doing my job.”

  “And what went down with Mua was, too. Right?”

  He knew she’d go there. And was ready. “Tied into the same stinking mess,” he admonished. “You and I both know that.”

  Rayna blinked at him through fresh tears. “So how do you explain what went down with Kier?”

  Forget the boot in his gut. Her words were the talons of a crane now, ripping into him, picking him up and flinging him fifteen years into the past.

  Kier. Holy fuck, he hadn’t heard from or seen that asswipe since they’d both squeaked by with their high school diplomas, though the guy had been a filthy spot on his radar for years before that. Between shuttling drugs, fencing fake watches, and beating up half the school, the guy always found time to hang out in the park and spin up creative ways to make life hell for anyone who dared to cross his unofficial turf. Like girls who just wanted to enjoy a walk on a sunny day…