Avenge Me. Maisey Yates

would be too tempting. It would be too much. He was on the edge as it was, and one more brush of her soft skin on his and he would lose it completely.

      He picked up his phone. “Car. Up front. Now.”

      The lobby doors opened just as his black town car pulled up to the front of the building.

      He opened the door and waited. “Get in,” he said when she approached and paused.

      She obeyed, lowering her head, the lights from the building shimmering over that hair, still contained in the tight bun. Heat burst through him, starting in his gut and spreading outward, pooling in his groin.

      He got in and closed the door. “The Black Book Hotel,” he said to his driver before leaning back in the seat and pressing a button that put up a black divider between them and the man in front.

      They hadn’t exchanged names. And that suited him just fine. He didn’t need a name to know that tonight she was his. Though, she might feel differently.

      “Did you want to exchange names?” he asked, not sure, if she did, if he would be honest or not.

      “I sort of like it like this.”

      “Do you?”

      “Not being me for the night? It works.”

      He’d been right about the demons. Maybe she had a husband or boyfriend. Or it was related to what she felt she owed Jason. He didn’t care. Didn’t care if she loved someone else, as long as tonight, she didn’t think of anyone else.

      None of that would come between them tonight. Nothing existed tonight but the fantasy. But a few blessed moments of feeling like there was something in his life that wasn’t beyond him.

      “I’m going to kiss you again,” he said. “Come here.”

      She was across the car from him, her seat belt buckled. She pressed the button slowly and then put her hands on the seat, crawling to him slowly, on her hands and knees.

      Everything in him tightened to the point where he thought he might break. It was the practical way to move across the car; he knew that. But there was something about it that grabbed him by the throat and shook him hard.

      His eyes dropped to her breasts, emphasized by the motion, pale and round, spilling over the top of her black dress. Her red lips were parted slightly and it was so easy to imagine them wrapped around his cock. And her hair loose, wrapped around his hand...

      Not yet.

      He captured her face and leaned in, kissing her firmly, his tongue sliding along the seam of her mouth, delving in deeply when she parted for him. A muffled sound escaped her and he captured it, kissing her harder.

      Lust, need, fired through him. All heat and desire, the kind he’d never known had existed before. He’d tasted it. On the edge of dreams, with fantasy women, when he woke up, sweaty and wrapped in his sheets, slick with shame and release.

      But never in reality. Because he’d always held a part of himself back. And he’d imagined he always would.

      Not tonight.

      He kept kissing her, their bodies separate, need roaring through him. He wanted to tug her up against him, to feel those delicious curves pressed against his body, but he was determined to wait.

      Determined to prolong the torture because there was something about it—this lust that bordered on pain—that appealed to him in a way that was beyond description. Beyond comprehension.

      It wasn’t even his own deprivation that mattered. It was hers. She wanted more. And he wasn’t allowing her to have it. He had her on the brink with just a kiss, and he knew it. And he had the power to deny her pleasure, and right now he was using that power.

      The car stopped and he pulled away from her. “Ready?”

      She nodded slowly.

      “You get out first,” he said.

      She did, as she slid past him and opened the car door. She got out and stood on the sidewalk, waiting for him as people walked past, her breath a cloud in the cold air.

      He got out, shutting the door behind him. “Walk ahead of me,” he said. “I want to watch you.”

      She did, and he followed, his eyes on the elegant curve of her neck, the delicate line of her spine. And her ass. So round and perfect.

      She went through the revolving door of the hotel and into the lobby, and he continued in behind her. He liked this. Liked the feeling that she was putting on a show, in public, meant only for him.

      Her legs demanded at least an hour devoted to a fantasy starring them exclusively. Sky-high black pumps emphasized the length and the sleek muscles. The seams of her stockings—damn, he hoped they were stay-ups—centered so perfectly in the backs of her calves, a tease, a hint that she was some sort of sweet old-fashioned girl. Which made him want to do bad things to her even more.

      He could picture her now, without the dress, stockings and shoes on, bent over a piece of furniture, just waiting for him to take her....

      That was going to happen. At some point tonight, he would be sure that it did.

      Another damned elevator.

      She got inside and leaned back against the walls. The doors started to close and he had to jog to make it in time. He stuck his arm in between them, then slipped inside, letting the doors slide shut behind him.

      “That was naughty,” he said.

      Her cheeks colored and she met his gaze. “Sorry.”

      “Are you?”

      “Yes.”

      “Why did you do that?”

      She lifted one shoulder. “I’m not sure.”

      “Are you going out of your way to misbehave?” he asked.

      “Maybe.”

      “It’s almost like you want some consequences,” he said, his voice tight, making it almost impossible to breathe. He wasn’t sure what he was saying anymore. He wasn’t sure what he was thinking.

      Except that it was hard to think with all of his blood just south of his belt.

      But fantasies, erotic images, didn’t require much thought. He could think of so many ways to punish her....

      No. He had to have a limit.

      “If I did?” she asked, sounding breathless. Excited. Aroused.

      Damn. This woman was a lit match against a pool of gasoline inside of him. Sitting there, dormant and under control for so many years.

      Yeah, he’d known it was there, but he’d done his best to ignore it.

      But with her, he was on the verge of exploding. And it was too late to go back.

      “I can give them to you, baby, but I’m not sure exactly what you expect.”

      “I’m not sure, either. Only that...you make me want things... I don’t know what I want,” she said, her eyes never leaving his. “You’ll have to show me.”

      The elevator stopped and the doors opened. He took her hand in his again, her fingers icy now. Nerves. It made him feel like the asshole he very likely was.

      He was a stranger. Much larger than her. And here he was, taking her back to a hotel to play power games that not even he knew the boundaries to.

      He might just have a spot in hell next to his father yet. The kind of man who said he only wanted to protect women, while he used and manipulated them.

      No. This isn’t the same.

      Isn’t it?

      He shut down that thought and held her more firmly, walking toward the room and checking his phone before keying in the code on the ornate door.

      “Ladies