Marked as His (3 page)

She walked out of sight, and he turned his head to watch. The round, tight globes of her ass made his dick swell to impossible proportions.

He took stock of his surroundings. Normal chick’s bedroom. Nothing screamed “psycho” to him. The bedding was a serene blue and the walls pale gray. Her furnishings were sparse, but her closet door was cracked open and he could see it was a mess.

She wore a lot of black.

For a woman who didn’t want anything to do with her dad, she sure acted like him.

Small sounds from the other room filtered through the open door. The soft thump of a cupboard and the sucking noise of the refrigerator opening. A sharp rap and then the clink of ice in a glass.

Ah, so she wasn’t going to kill him with warm tea.

He grinned but when she came back into the room, he quickly hid it. She held the glass and eyed him.

“How am I supposed to drink like this?” He rattled the cuffs and the bed shook.

“Get on your hands and knees.”

“Sounds kinky, love. Why don’t we stop playing around and get this party started?”

Her brows drew together, and her dark eyes narrowed beneath them. Even when she was riled she was breathtaking. Heart-stopping, actually. He hadn’t seen a lot of women of her caliber and he wanted to know more.

“Why don’t I dump this over your head?” she asked.

With a huff of a laugh, he forced his knees under him. It was damn hard without the use of his arms, but luckily his elbows touched the mattress. He scooted up to his knees and she held the glass to his lips.

As he drew a swallow into his mouth, he held her gaze. She looked away first.

“Thank you, love. Now I think you should tell me your intentions.”

“What?”

“This is the part where the kidnapper threatens the person to make him do her bidding.”

“I’ll tell you what’s going to happen. I’m going to hold you here long enough that your Hell’s Sons get worried. Then even longer until they’re pissing themselves thinking a rival club has you. I know all about your enemies.”

“Don’t forget the Feds coulda snagged me. They think they know about the alcohol.”

She arched a brow. How would she look when she smiled? He needed to find out. “So I can call the cops right now and never see you again?” She moved toward the dark wood nightstand and a phone.

“Nah. I’m not that important.”

“What exactly do you do at the club? Besides try to get women to visit their fathers?”

“I tattoo.”

Her gaze seemed to heat his skin as she looked at his arms, fully sleeved in ink. The backs of his hands and even his knuckles bore the signs of his trade.

“Do you ink yourself?”

“Most of it, yeah.”

“How do you tattoo with your non-dominant hand?”

He stared at her through lowered eyelids. “I’m good with
both
my hands.”

She made a noise of annoyance.

“See the eagle there though?” He tried to move his arm into position but she had to duck to look.

“Yes.”

He caught her gaze. “Know what that is?”

“Prison tat?”

“Nice try, love. I’ve never been caught.”

“Well the artist sucks. One wing’s bigger than the other.”

He eyed her. “Are you knocking my baby brother?”

She straightened and put distance between them. “Is he a Hell’s Son too?”

“No. He’s seventeen. I let him ink me as practice. He’s getting some mad skills. You should see the one on my—” He twisted his hips suggestively.

She threw up her hands before he finished. “Just don’t try anything stupid. I have things to do.”

“Like what?”

She walked out the door.

“Santana!”

She didn’t return. He waited. And waited. According to her alarm clock, an hour had passed. What was she doing? The house was dead silent. He didn’t think she’d left, but maybe she’d sneaked out and silently closed the front door.

What the hell was he going to do now? Another hour later, his neck was beginning to cramp. He rolled onto his side but it tugged at his shoulder socket.

She was seriously going to leave him cuffed to her bed.

“Santana! What if I have to take a leak?”

“Hold it!” she answered immediately, her voice close. Was she sitting right out of view? His mind conjured her sexy figure. And that hair—long, dark bouncing waves. So heavy he wanted to lift it off her neck and kiss the delectable skin beneath.

His cock hardened.

“I really gotta piss.”

She grunted. “So eloquent.”

“You work in a welding shop. You must be used to it.” He had to raise his voice a little and talking with walls between them didn’t set well. He wanted to see her.

“I am, but I don’t like it.”

“Then why work there? Get a bank job. Or work in the school. There has to be something more wholesome.”

“I don’t need wholesome. I’m not that kind of girl. But I like a man with manners at least.”

Manners. He could do manners. His momma had been a good Southern lady and raised him up well, after all.

“Would you please consider releasing me so I can use the bathroom, Santana?” he asked with as much sweetness as he could muster.

She appeared in the doorway, and he stopped breathing. She’d changed out of her slim dress pants and top and wore tight jeans and a black tank top.

“You’ve got ink.” His voice sounded as a ragged sigh.

She looked down at her arm. From shoulder to elbow black lines flowed and curled into a feminine garden. The flourishes were a touch he didn’t get much opportunity to do, working on mostly rough men.

When she met his gaze, the air was punched from him. His balls ached and a fever was rising in him. Lust bound him more than the handcuffs. He couldn’t lay a hand on her, only use his voice to seduce.

But she wasn’t a bit receptive. She’d pointed a loaded weapon at him and wasn’t about to let him loose to run his hands all over her body.

“Come closer. I want to look.”

As she drifted toward the bed, he caught her scent—warm notes of perfume and something citrusy. When she extended her arm, he caught a bigger whiff.

“Did you just eat an orange?”

“Yeah. I suppose you’re going to tell me you’re hungry for one.”

He wanted to taste it on her skin while plunging into her tight body. He fought to focus, but the last time he’d been in bed with a gorgeous woman near him, he’d banged her hard till dawn. His body knew what his mind understood it couldn’t have.

He shook his head and let his gaze wander over the loops of vines and curls of flower petals. “Is that Tat Assassin’s work?”

Stepping back, she covered the ink with her hand as if protecting it from him knowing too much. “Yes.”

“Jeff’s work is notorious. He did a sick job of keeping it feminine. It suits you.”

Her breasts rose against her tank top as she drew an unsteady breath. “I don’t need your approval. Do you have to piss or not?”

“So eloquent,” he mimicked. “Yeah, I actually do.”

“A man of your size can’t hold himself?”

“Sure I can. But you intend to keep me here for a long time, right? Do you want your mattress soiled?”

That made her spring into action. She produced a key from a front pocket of her jeans that were so tight he wondered how she fit the sliver of metal in there. As she stood by the bed, he smelled dryer sheets, orange, and woman.

The knot in his groin was growing tighter.

When she hesitated to insert the key into the lock, he jangled the cuffs. “If you don’t want to unlock me, at least slide down my zipper and hold it so I can piss into a bottle or something.”

That shot her into action. She filled the gun with bullets again first. Then she kneeled on the bed, making him crazed with lust. “I’m going to unlock one arm from the bedpost. Do not try anything, or I’ll shoot you.”

He could take her down faster than she could blink, but he wanted to see more of what she had to deliver. Sure, his arms were beginning to ache but she was worth it. Besides, he was earning his blood patch.

“Scout’s honor,” he said.

“I doubt you were a Boy Scout. Now put your hand behind your back.”

She moved to the other side of the bed. The mattress depressed, and he shifted toward her. God, her knee was against his torso. Heat screamed through his body like a bike engine pushed to evade police.

“When I release this hand, put it behind your back too.”

He did as told, getting a helluva kick out of taking her orders. Was she as bossy between the sheets? He drowned in fantasies of her forcing his head between her thighs, tugging his hair as she took what she wanted.

“Now roll over.”

When he did, he was quite aware of his cock bulging against his fly.

She snorted. “How are you gonna piss with that?”

“You noticed, huh?” He waggled his brows, and she trained the gun on him.

“Get up. Slowly. The bathroom is through that door. Don’t think you can escape or try to take me out because I have a hair trigger and I will put your ass down.”

I’d like to put your ass up.

He got to the side of the bed and stood. “Hands up or down? Behind my back?”

She jerked forward and hooked one dangling cuff to the other, linking his hands before him. He barely had enough room to unzip his fly and hold his cock.

First he’d need a splash of cold water on it. Either that or he’d have to think of something terrible—burying puppies alive or kissing Great Aunt Callie.

When he faced Santana, he realized how damn impossible this was going to be.

•●•

God, he was huge. He had to be six feet four and built like a football player. Not an ounce of fat could be seen under his tight jeans and T-shirt though. He had to dig ditches for a living. Only a man who worked hard had muscles like his.

She waved the gun, tempted to put a bullet in him just to wipe the shit-eating smile off his rugged features. “Get in there and do your business.”

“What if I need to do number two?” He raised his cuffed hands.

“Shut up and do this before I change my mind about shooting you.”

He turned to the bathroom. Was he laughing? His broad shoulders moved. Catching the door with a boot, he tried to shut it.

“Don’t close the door the whole way.”

“Oh. Maybe you have a golden shower fetish? I’m up for anything.”

Ugh.
He was damn infuriating. Just as she remembered all the Hell’s Sons—cocky, alpha sons of bitches. They took what they wanted and owned the town. Even the police looked to the club to help eradicate drugs.

While she waited what seemed an eternity, her mind worked with lightning speed. What was she doing? Her activities could be construed as criminal, but she thought of it as self-preservation. She wasn’t going to be delivered to her father as if she were a pizza.

The sound of Paxton taking a piss filled her ears. She closed her eyes and tried to control her rioting emotions. While she wasn’t into golden showers at all, having a man in her bathroom was masculine to the extreme.

He came out with a grin. “I’m having trouble getting my zipper up.”

“Well, it can stay down.”

He shrugged. “All right by me. Roomier,” he whispered as he passed her and stretched out on the bed on his back.

“Face down.”

“I’m getting a neck cramp. I want to be on my back for a while.”

She stared at him, trying to determine what was best. He held up his hands for her to detach them. She freed his hands. If he wanted, he could take her down before she could gasp. But she didn’t even need to ask him to wrap his hands around the posts—he did it on his own.

When she had him bound once more, she wished to hell she’d put him on his stomach. Her gaze skated over dark hair, eyes, and a scruff of beard that made her skin prickle with the desire to feel it against her. His biceps bulged and his forearms were roped with veins. His big body between was power-packed. A woman could ride into the sunset on a body like that.

And the bulge in his jeans…his distended fly revealed a patch of dark gray cotton underwear. He was a beautiful specimen.

“Take my boots off, love? My feet are hot.”

As soon as he opened his mouth, cold water splashed over her psyche. She dumped the bullets and set the weapon on the dresser. When she started from the room, he called her back. The sound of her name rumbled from his lips shouldn’t affect her as much as it did. Heat licked her insides, pissing her off further.

“Where ya going?” he drawled.

She really needed to consider moving out of the South. Country boys with Southern drawls were bad enough, but there were too many men of the rugged and dangerous variety she preferred.

“I’m going out.”

“When will you return?”

“A few days from now.”

He arched a brow at her threat. “What am I supposed to do?”

“Think about your club members believing you’re dead while you dehydrate and starve.” She walked out.

At this moment the house was too small. Knowing Paxton was in her room, steps away, made her feel like running. What
was
she doing?

She pressed a hand through her hair. She couldn’t keep him here indefinitely, but when would she find the finish line drawn in the red Alabama dirt? When would she know to release him?

So far he was pretty compliant. He thought her a joke, and that rubbed her wrong. But the first time she’d emptied the chamber of her handgun and he’d seen those bullets…

She squelched a laugh behind her hand.

It was only a matter of time before her father realized his minion had disappeared and she was the reason. But her father couldn’t come within a country mile of her with that protective order.

Was she trying to get a rise out of the Sons or just teach another dirtbag biker a lesson? She needed to think.

In the kitchen she set another jar of tea to brew
,
then washed up the few dishes in the sink. When she wrung out the dishcloth and hung it on the faucet, the rattle of the bed frame made her turn.

Staring at the door, she held her breath. Another violent noise of metal smacking wall.

She rushed into the space to see him fighting his restraints. His wrists were red and fury etched on his face.