Total pages in book: 84
Estimated words: 78415 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 392(@200wpm)___ 314(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78415 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 392(@200wpm)___ 314(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
When his hands scooped under my legs and he pulled me closer to him, positioning me right at the edge of the bench, I wasn’t sure where to put my foot that had been resting on the stone. He straightened for a moment, dropped a kiss against my ankle, and set it over his shoulder.
His breath was warm against my skin in juxtaposition to the cool, misty breeze, and then suddenly there was fire. It scored along the insides of my thighs as he dug his sharp fingers in and raked them down. I hissed at the discomfort and lifted my head to glare at him—
Big mistake. He watched me with longing as he pressed his lips to the red lines blooming on my skin. The track marks he’d created and said were necessary to intensify my orgasm. It was as if he wanted to soothe the pain away. I couldn’t watch. My head thumped back against the unforgiving stone, and I swallowed huge gulps of air.
He moved closer to my hands, and my heart beat furiously. Blood roared through me, fueled with anticipation and unwanted need. Could he feel every tremble in me? Did he think he was the cause?
I held my body uncomfortably tight when his mouth arrived at my hands blocking him from his destination. He didn’t push them away. Instead he continued to kiss, outlining each finger. It simulated what he wanted to do. His head between my thighs, his mouth at my center, his palms smoothing seductively over my legs.
By making Royce his father’s proxy the night of the initiation, at least I’d spared him from having to watch what was about to happen. My left hand was on top of my right, and Macalister ignored the ring there the same way he ignored the one he wore on his own hand.
He peeled my left hand back and laced his fingers with mine. It was disorienting and intimate, but I couldn’t focus on it. There was still my right hand covering myself from him, but he was only a breath away.
Everything froze like an ice storm, a moment trapped under glass.
An alarm sounded in my mind, reminding me to keep fighting, and it came from me between panted breaths. “It’s been . . . more than . . . two minutes.”
His eyes were so hooded, so drunk off desire, he didn’t understand what I was talking about at first. But a smug smile burned across his lips, like a banker excited to tell a rude customer their account was overdrawn.
“It has.” His voice was rich and dark. “You owe me interest, though. One minute for each day you denied me.”
SIXTEEN
I FLINCHED AND TRIED TO SCOOT AWAY, but Macalister’s grasp on my hips stopped me.
“No,” I said.
“Or I give you an orgasm,” he added. “Whichever comes first.”
I’d hoped to outlast him. Two minutes I could endure, but it had been two months since the initiation, and there was no way I’d survive an hour of his torment. “I didn’t agree to—”
A trill erupted from the phone he had tucked in his pocket, shattering the ice that had trapped me. He unlaced our fingers and sat back on his heels as the phone was answered and brought to his ear.
“What?” he barked.
He’d been furious to be disturbed, but as he listened to the other side of the conversation, his expression changed.
His eyes widened, then narrowed.
His posture stiffened. The muscle running along his jaw flexed.
Whatever he was hearing, it was serious and urgent. Hope sparked inside me. Was I about to get a reprieve?
“How interesting.” Macalister’s tone was sharp as a dagger. “I appreciate you letting me know.” His gaze swept down over my naked body, my bound hands clasped between my legs, and he seemed to be weighing his options as if deciding which he wanted to deal with first—the new information or the trembling girl in front of him.
“No,” he said. “We need to consider how to respond. Find Richard and bring him to my office.”
The phone call ended as abruptly as it had started.
He stared down at me with a hard look, full of disappointment, and it was clear he hated the words coming out of his mouth. “We’ll have to continue this another time.”
“There’s nothing to continue.” My heartrate flew as I scrambled toward escape. “I gave you your two minutes.” Counting the phone call, I’d given him even more.
His face turned so ugly, I shivered. He grabbed the knot where he’d bound my hands and jerked to get my attention. “You made me wait, and therefore you owe me interest.”
I shook my head. “I never agreed to that. Untie me. We’re finished.”
“We’re finished when I say we are.”
Strong, rough hands lifted, and I was pulled down into Macalister’s lap so I was straddling him as he sat back on his heels. He ducked his head into the circle created by my bound arms, and my eyes went painfully wide.