Authors: Amber Bardan
He tasted like life, made me want to dive right in. He seized me up in his arms and surrounded me. My breasts ground against his chest. I wanted more, more friction, more of his tongue in my mouth, more of his hands on me, more of
him
. I gripped him by the shoulders, tugged the cotton covering him.
Haithem jerked back and stared down at me. We panted. That kiss proved why he really wanted to pay me—he wanted to own me.
“You want this. Behave and we can both have what we want.”
Behave
.
I shivered. I had images of doing just that. Behaving for Haithem. Being his paid pet. But the thought spiked a pain deep in my chest.
I had to get away from him.
I pulled back and fled the cabin.
His footsteps thundered behind me. “Stop, Angelina.”
“Just stay away from me.” I turned and faced him, my anger finally catching up with me. “You want to know the truth?” I took a deep breath and let it all rush out. “Yeah, I’m attracted to you, but you’re a massive prick. I’ve got no desire to
behave
or do anything else for you.”
His jaw hardened.
For an instant a shard of true fear spiked me. Would he possibly stop me from leaving?
No
.
That would be crazy. Criminal. Evil. He couldn’t—wouldn’t.
But... The way his eyes narrowed. The way he assessed me. How could that be? Hot one moment, cold the next?
Cold
.
Suspicious
.
Agreements and secret business. There was worse, and more sinister things to him than I’d first seen.
What was he hiding?
Why did Haithem, beautiful, rich, sexy, smooth Haithem, look at me as though I might be something to be studied and broken, shaken until my secrets spilled free?
His posture shifted as if he’d shrugged on a coat of formality. “Fine, if that’s how you feel, I’ll walk you to the dock and have Karim drive you home.”
I backed up, placing my hand on the railing. “You just don’t get it, do you? I don’t want
anything
from you. I have a phone, and believe it or not, I have access to money. I’ll walk myself out and take a cab.”
He just stared at me, his body so tight my own stiffened at the idea of what he might do. Insist I follow orders, most likely.
“Suit yourself. Goodbye, Angelina.”
He turned and stormed back into the cabin. The door crashed behind him. The vibration shuddered under my feet.
As quickly as they’d formed the ridiculous suspicions I’d had melted on the salty breeze.
He’d given up. Haithem had given up.
I’d have bet he was incapable of such a thing.
A shameful longing in the area of my rib cage mourned the fact that he wasn’t immune to defeat. I’d let myself fantasize that I was invaluable to him, that he’d fight to have me. That his macho bullshit was a facade. I just didn’t realize how much I’d believed in that fantasy until he walked away.
Now I felt the disappointment to my toes. The wind blew gusts, and air whipped around me, flapping my dress around my thighs and sinking a chill into my skin. I crossed my arms, then shuffled to the stairs and grasped the railing. I shot one last look over my shoulder. Light filled the cabin. He’d closed the curtains, but the silhouette of his shadow stalked back and forth.
I’d agitated him. Gotten under his skin. I let that brazen satisfaction take hold. Haithem was
different
—larger than life—and
I
affected him. He tempted me with things I didn’t dare dream of doing. He’d drawn a picture of a seductive fantasy where I did everything I’d never allow myself.
Wrong or right, I wanted to live that fantasy.
I closed my eyes briefly.
A blast of wind hit me from behind like a giant hand. I tripped and grasped for the railing, but the yacht dipped suddenly, and I fell forward, propelled across the rails. My body hurtled over the edge. The wind stole the breathless scream from my lips as I plunged through a wave of lights.
Then fell into darkness.
SEVEN
P
AIN
.
Pain then heat. I twitched my fingers. My body ached, throbbed from my ankles all the way up to my cheeks. Not to mention the bitch of a headache murdering my temples with invisible ice picks.
Hangover—a hangover from the fiery pit of hell.
I tried to sit, but something smothered me. I rolled onto my back and fumbled with the covering. I broke free and—dear god, the light.
Blazing light almost took out my eyeballs. I covered my face, then shielded my eyes. A blue glare pierced my vision. I blinked. The blue divided into a pale sky above and glittering water below.
What the actual fuck?
The world slowed, and I dropped back onto my elbows. I didn’t remember getting home. All I remembered was realizing Haithem was the devil—and apparently I had an appetite for destruction—right before heading to the stairs.
I clutched my head. The freaking stairs... Wind... Dipping bloody boat.
I glanced around, my stomach dropping. The ocean spread on my left, and the white expanse of a superyacht towered over me on the right. I moved around a bit, my feet tangled under a tarp.
A lifeboat.
I’d fallen through a tarp and into a goddamn lifeboat on the lower deck.
My heart seized, and I looked all the way up to the railing on the narrower top deck. I patted myself down with trembling hands. Somehow I’d landed in one piece, in spite of my splitting headache and aching limbs.
Faaark
.
My parents were going to kill me, or, at the very least, ensure I wished for death by the time they finished with me. It was daylight, and I wasn’t home, and I hadn’t called them. All hell would have broken loose, and I would soon be trussed up and ready to be roasted. I disentangled my legs and threw one over the side of the lifeboat, then shimmied onto the floor.
My heels touched the floor, but the world swayed. A shout boomed across the deck. I turned in time to see a figure rush toward me, yelling indecipherable words. The man came into focus, then another emerged.
The silver barrel of a handgun flashed. It was trained on me.
My vision narrowed until the gun was all I could see—and instinct kicked in.
I ran, adrenaline spiking through my veins. I fled in the opposite direction, down a hallway. Footsteps closed in behind me. Light broke at the corner, and I strained to reach it. Darkness flashed across the light, and my face slammed into something solid.
Hands clamped over my arms, and I did the only thing I could think to do.
I screamed.
I filled my lungs and let sound boom out of my chest like a siren.
“Angelina?”
The sound of my name wrapped around me like an embrace. I looked up at Haithem, taking in his magnificent features drawn tight and fierce. My blood pounded manically, thudding in my eardrums. I clung to him, buried my hands into his shirt and held on.
“There are men with guns.” I glanced over my shoulder.
The men slowed. The one with the gun held it loosely at his side.
Haithem wound an arm around my waist and pressed my face against his chest. I breathed in the subtle strength of his scent.
He spoke quiet, foreign words, and the men fell back.
“Come with me,” he said, and grasped my arm, leading me around the corner and upstairs.
We glided across the deck, then into his cabin. The walls swam around me. I still felt hot, as if I’d been baked alive under that tarp. Haithem lowered me into a chair. I sank down, then gripped the arms. Things had gone blurry again. I needed water. There were cracks on my tongue. He dragged another chair across the carpet and positioned it in front of me.
Haithem flicked the button of his right shirt sleeve, rolled the material and pushed it above his elbow, then did the same to the other side. His bulky forearms flexed. The raw masculinity of those meaty arms hit me even through the madness flooding my system.
All I could think was
Man. Man. Man. Man.
My upper lip twitched where moisture cooled the skin. Finally, it made sense. The weirdness. The fogginess.
I must be dreaming.
That seductive nightmare where I wanted those arms to crush me. Where I could do all the things I longed for and be absolved of guilt for choosing to do them. Hadn’t I longed for this? To escape with him? But I couldn’t make that decision. Not without facing an ocean of guilt. So now dreams took over and let me have my fantasy.
Nicely done, imagination. In that case, I’d bloody well enjoy it.
I reached for that warm olive skin, but his roughened voice stopped me.
“Why are you still on my yacht?”
He wasn’t acting like he should be in my dreams. He wasn’t revealing the rest of that magnificent skin. Wasn’t touching me. He was acting serious—being
real
.
My fingers flew to my temples, where pain radiated and scattered the flood of thoughts. “I fell into the lifeboat.”
He leaned forward, rested those forearms on his knees and studied me. Studied me as if he just might open his mouth and swallow me whole.
“We departed Melbourne over twelve hours ago. You expect me to believe you only just scrambled out?”
Twelve hours...
I couldn’t have been on the boat that long. I ran my hands over my crumpled dress, and smelled the slightly sweet scent of sweat clinging to me like film. “I think I knocked my head...”
His jaw flexed, and his words took on lethal sharpness. “I’m going to give you this one chance, and I hope you are smart enough to take it...” He scanned my eyes. “Who do you work for?”
I straightened up. The absurdity of it all, of being on a yacht with armed men, of his questioning, sank in. I laughed. Laughed until the sound snorted out of my nose, and tears leaked out my eyes.
Haithem wasn’t laughing. He scowled, and that look—my god, it made me laugh harder. It was entirely too fierce for one man’s face—it probably made people piss themselves, but I could only piss myself laughing.
He stared at me until my laughter wafted into giggles.
“Who do you work for?”
I’d lost it. Maybe it was the hit to the head, the fact that I couldn’t see straight, or maybe I was drunk on his nearness. Or maybe it was the part of me that still didn’t believe this was real.
“Are you supposed to be some kind of James Bond?” I lowered my voice and put on the world’s worst English-stroke-Scottish-stroke-who-the-fuck-knows-what accent. “Who do you work for?” I laughed again at my own hilarity. Certainly not a magazine—they hadn’t hired me yet. “I’m more of a Jack Reacher girl, myself. Although, I have to admit, they both have nothing on you in a suit.”
He rubbed the underside of his jaw with his knuckles. “I will find out, Angelina. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. It’s up to you whether we do this the hard way.”
The hard way...
My skin overheated, and moisture itched along my hairline. I tasted salt and leaned back into the chair. I stroked the hair back from my face. My temple throbbed where my fingers brushed, but then again I could feel
everything
more. My skin felt overly sensitized. I looked at Haithem, my eyelids half-closed, and let one hand trail down the side of my neck.
“You promise?”
His stare followed my hand. “Promise what?”
“That we can do it the
hard
way.”
His gaze snapped to mine. I tried to hold it, but my eyelids fluttered. Ringing chimed in my ears, and I could only watch him from hooded lids. He stood, reached for my hands and pulled me to my feet.
“Take off the dress.”
I felt stripped by his words. Naked already. I’d never have the nerve in real life, but this couldn’t be real. My limbs were so light I could’ve floated away. I fished behind me for my zipper and stumbled. Screw that—this was my fantasy.
He
could undress
me
. I swept my hair over my shoulder and presented him with my back. His rush of breath whispered across my neck. A gentle tug pulled between my shoulders, then fabric parted down my back with a gentle swoosh of the zipper.
Salt coated my lips. I was hot, so hot, yet the fingers that touched my skin burned. They traveled over my shoulders and down my arms, pushing my dress away. My senses homed in on the stroke of his fingers. The dress pooled at my waist, caught at the flare of my hips. His hands moved from my arms to grip my waist. A hum vibrated through my lips. I gazed down at myself, naked to the waist but for my bra. Large tan fingers pressed into my flesh, making my skin seem paler, softer than I’d ever seen it look.
His fingers flexed, and he tugged me back, cradled me against his hardness. I needed the support to remain standing. He splayed his hands at my sides and moved them to my belly, sliding his open fingers down, down, down to the place that throbbed and ached to be touched. But he didn’t touch me where I wanted him to. He stroked down my thighs, and pushed my dress to the floor.
I leaned into him and closed my eyes. His body changed, and a thick thigh wedged between mine, opening me to him, holding me up. He stroked the insides of my thighs, burning a path of pleasure toward my core. Finally, he closed his hands over me, and I made a sound, half moan, half plea. He rubbed over my panties with firm, determined strokes. I arched into his touch. Blood plunged though my veins, erratic and uncontrolled. His thumbs hooked under the elastic of my panties and slid up and down the sides. I could only watch his hands move, watch the white lace flow through his fingers. He moved to the waistband, performing the same little ritual.
Not the touching I expected, not the kind I craved, but he was close, so close. He teased me with the nearness. I waited for my panties to follow the dress to the ground. Instead, his hands traveled over my skin again. The muscles in my belly contracted under his touch.
I raised my arms and gripped his shirt collar. He wedged his thumbs under the middle of my bra, the small stretch of material nestled under my cleavage. My breasts pulled forward with the tug, straining higher, hungrier. He brushed against the inside of my breasts. My nipples tightened. His thumbs ran beneath the underwire, tracing the curve as high as they could toward my armpits, then his hands pushed inside, stroked their way over my sensitive skin.
I shivered, and gasped for air. Lace dragged over my nipples with just enough friction to be exquisite. Just enough friction to frustrate the hell out of me. He pulled his hands free, and my breasts fell heavily back into my bra. I bit back a groan and tugged his collar. Fast breaths against my hair warmed the top of my head. He slid his palms over my breasts, finally squeezed them the way they begged to be squeezed. My head tossed against his shoulder. He plucked my nipples through the bra, flicked them gently then stroked over them.
“Haithem...” I moaned.
His hands left my breasts, and he turned me sharply. I caught the briefest glance at his face before he held me to him. His expression, dark and ravenous, burned into the back of my eyelids. An unforgiving hardness pushed against my abdomen. I rocked my hips against it and wished I were taller, so it could rub between my thighs. He gripped my bottom, holding me still and tight. I wound my arms around his neck, trying to draw him down for a kiss. He resisted but buried his lips in my hair.
He explored my ass through my panties, running over the curve, skimming under the elastic, even for a moment running his fingers down my crease. I shook against him and stretched up, seeking his warm skin with my lips. The movement brought that hardness closer to the place that craved it. My mouth found the base of his neck, the soft skin just below the start of his bristles. I filled my mouth with that skin, tasted its tang, tasted the subtle bouquet of cologne.
His touch traveled over my back, up to the clasp of my bra, yet again, he only ran his hands under it, didn’t tear it off. I clamped my teeth on his flesh, not hard enough to break skin but enough to show him my impatience. He jerked and made an animalistic sound against my hair. He grasped my ass again and dragged me higher. I wrapped my legs around his waist and hitched myself up with my arms around his neck.
He moved, and a part of me knew it was toward the bed, toward the place I knew he would make me a woman in the way I wanted to be one. My sweat-slicked skin burned. I
needed
him. Needed him with every cell. The bristles on his neck prickled my cheek, and I turned into it, ran my tongue over the sharpness like the wild feline thing I’d become.
My back lowered into divine softness, then he traveled down my body. I arched into the scrape of his face. He nipped my ribs with his teeth then descended, stopping to run his tongue just under my belly, where the waistband of my panties rested.
The wetness between my legs flowed, and the entire area pulsed. He knelt between my knees, ran both hands down one of my thighs then gently bent my leg at the knee and kissed me on the kneecap. I felt his lips against me as if he’d kissed the place between my legs. My core tightened. His fingers smoothed over my calf then tugged off my shoe. He held it in one hand and slid his other hand down to remove my remaining shoe.
He sat back, holding my shoes. His gaze flowed over me, over my knees, which had fallen open, to the place between my legs that I knew had soaked through its covering, then up to where my chest heaved and my breasts strained.
His nostrils flared, his jaw ticked, and he met my eyes. Every trembling part of me seized. His gaze was voracious, rapacious and shaking with fury.
“I’ll give you one thing. You’re a fine little actress.”
He scooted off the bed, my shoes in his hands. Confusion blazed through my overloaded senses. Haithem stalked to the door. Some of the fog cleared, and alarm rose in my belly. I rolled off the bed, an odd emptiness and nausea turning my stomach. I followed him out the door. He strode across the deck to the back railing, and I ran after him. He stopped at the rail, grasped one of my shoes, and tugged out the insole, then tossed it over the rail and looked inside my shoe as if it contained some sort of mystery.