Knight's Game (17 page)

His low, soft growl reminded her of how defenceless she was against his casual commands, how she felt with him inside her, how he could make her forget everything but pleasure. And her body stirred as it always did when he looked at her like that, his intentions clear. ‘How far inside?’ she purred in a soft throaty contralto, her green gaze feline and sultry, deliberately provocative.

‘Stop it.’ His voice was cool, his gaze suddenly distant, like an abrupt downshift in a transmission, her sex kitten come-on a jarring flash of déjà vu, the number of women who’d offered themselves to him infinite. ‘I’m not paying you by the hour.’ There was an acid pause before he spoke again. ‘Frankly, you don’t have the skills.’

Her arm shot out, her eyes hot with spleen.

He caught her palm before it hit his face, held it lightly in further insult as she struggled to break free. ‘Careful,’ he said, unbalanced by the flashback, wondering for the first time whether he was being played. ‘You might get hurt.’

‘Are you threatening me?’ She cocked her head as though they were actually having a conversation, as if the dripping
sarcasm in her voice was honey; ignoring the fact that he was towering over her, his eyes like flint. ‘Are you going to bring out the whips?’

He stared at her so long, his gaze unflinching that she wondered if she’d finally stepped over some invisible mark, if she’d shot her mouth off one too many times and something unpleasant was going to happen. Then his unblinking stare disappeared as quickly as it had arrived and he was back in her time and space.

‘Relax.’ Dominic slowly smiled. ‘You wouldn’t know what to do if I brought out a whip.’ And whether he was being played or not was irrelevant to his immediate plans. ‘All I need from you, baby, is for you to spread your legs. You know how to do that.’

Her temper instantly shot back up to a full boil. ‘
Let go!
’ she said through her teeth.

Her eyes were free of fear. He’d always liked that about her. ‘If I were to let go’ – he took a moment to sort through the clutter in his brain: the resentment at the great upheavals she’d made in his life, the goddamn horniness that never went away and, perhaps most of all, the unsettling trauma of having her in this room – ‘you can’t leave.’

‘Don’t say
can’t
, Dominic,’ she said, staring at him stonily. ‘You really aren’t paying me by the hour. In fact, we don’t have by-the-hour playmates where I come from.’

‘I wouldn’t be so sure about that.’ But he dropped her hand and opened his arms wide, the brilliant negotiator complying. ‘I take back the
can’t.
Your move, baby.’

‘That’s such bullshit.’

He smiled, weirdly pleased with her defiance. ‘I know. Come fuck me.’

‘I’m not in the mood,’ she said, icily.

‘Pity,’ said the man who had gone out and conquered the world. ‘Maybe next time.’ And reaching out, he placed his hands on her hips, hauled her close despite her curses and squirming, dipped his head and stopped her swearing with a hard, punishing kiss. Ramming his tongue down her throat to make his point about who was in charge, he took advantage of her choking surprise to slide his hands under her arms and, holding her at arm’s length, moved towards the bed – ignoring her wild punches, her kicking feet, as if contentious sex was the norm in his life. Oh, that’s right, it was. Reaching the queen-sized bed covered in a brilliant blue and green psychedelic silk-screen quilt, he tossed her in its general direction, dragged his T-shirt over the back of his head and let it drop.

‘Goddamnit,’ Kate gasped, her breath knocked out of her. ‘Have you … no fucking … respect?’

‘Respect?’ Dominic looked at her with amusement. ‘What are you, for Christ’s sake? Some southern belle?’ His voice was mellow. ‘No one gives a shit about that. Unless you’d like to respect
my
wishes and spread your legs,’ he added with soft mockery. ‘Although I’m guessing that’s not what you had in mind.’ Leaning down, he jerked the blanket off her with one hand, unzipped his jeans with his other. Then
in the process of freeing the button on his waistband, he suddenly lunged for the bed.

Catching Kate’s ankle before she could scramble away, he dragged her back and flipped her over. ‘You’re making this harder than it has to be, Katherine,’ he mildly said, ignoring the fire in her eyes. ‘You know you like to fuck. That’s pretty well documented. What’s your problem?’

‘You’re my problem. You’re fucking crazy.’

The words rang out in the quiet room.

His eyes widened a little; otherwise he was absolutely still. ‘What?’

‘You heard me. You need a fucking therapist.’

There was a short silence.

‘Don’t forget you’re in my house. I’d watch your mouth if I were you.’

She ignored the implicit threat in his voice, the small insistent twitch along his jaw. ‘I’ve been in several of your houses.’

‘But not
this
house,’ he said darkly.

‘Meaning?’

He looked at her steadily. ‘Meaning I’m not sure you should be here.’ He uncurled his fingers from her ankle, placed her foot back on the bed with unnecessary care, struggled with his chaotic feelings, wanting and not wanting her in his house, this room. In his life.

‘Mind telling me why?’ She was no psychologist, but this room was a time capsule.

His look was unreadable for a moment, then he shrugged.
He wasn’t going to say this room had always been his last barricade against the world, his sanctuary and refuge. Or that he didn’t deal well with emotion. Or with personal relationships. ‘Let’s just say it feels strange having you in this room.’

She tuned into the restraint in his quiet declaration, the unexpected underlying tumult, the sudden desolation. ‘Maybe this isn’t a good time for you.’

He looked at her lying pale and nude and voluptuous on his bed, glanced down at his rock-hard dick, then back at her. ‘I wouldn’t say that.’

Her mouth firmed at the casual indifference in his tone. ‘Maybe it’s not a good time for me.’

‘I’m not sure that matters.’

‘Jesus, that master of the universe never goes away, does he?’

‘What the hell do you expect?’ he said, his voice no longer mellow or casual or weary in his mildly contemptuous way, but suddenly razor-sharp. ‘You think I’m going to change? You think that hot sex with you is going to alter my life? Burn away thirty-two fucking years of encoded distrust and the poisonous shadow of my parents? I got news for you, baby. It ain’t gonna happen. So just get the fuck out. This is my room.’

‘Your last defence, you mean.’

His eyes were searing blue. ‘Yeah, it is and you’re not supposed to be here.’

She swung up out of bed, stood well away from him, faint colour rising on her cheeks. ‘I need my clothes.’

He stared at her, at her redhead’s pale, translucent skin, at her pulse-quickening beauty, at her extravagant tits and her soft, curvaceous body that fit his like a glove. ‘Later,’ he said.

She straightened her spine at his words, drew herself up to her full height that still fell short of his by a foot, forced herself to meet his implacable gaze. ‘I’m not going to let you walk all over me, Dominic. I’m not afraid of you. Jesus, will you stop? Don’t look at me like that. Like you’re doing a cost analysis and your dick has the final vote.’

‘My dick always has the final vote with you, baby. And the first and tenth and hundredth. And right now he wants to bang the hell out of you.’

‘It’s nice to know you care,’ she said, her lips compressed, unfiltered animosity in her eyes. ‘This is a real Hallmark moment.’

‘Don’t get all worked up,’ he said, as if he weren’t standing there with a major hard-on behind his open zipper. ‘Maybe that’s how I care. Maybe that’s the only way I care. Maybe I don’t know any other way.’

‘Jesus, you are so fucked.’

‘Uh-uh – you are.’ He moved in a blur, picked her up, tossed her back on the bed, kicked off his sandals and, standing at the side of the bed, freed the metal button at the waistband of his jeans. Sliding his fingers into his open fly, he shoved his boxers down enough to draw out his heavy cock.

She glared at him. ‘You’re such a child.’

‘I was never a child, Katherine,’ he said with a small sigh.
‘Not within memory. Tell me you want this. That’s not too difficult, is it?’ His mind-fuck aside, there was no way he wasn’t going to screw her. Of that he was certain.

She tried not to look, but his massive erection was defying gravity, starkly upright, the swollen head reaching past his navel.

‘He’s not insulted by bitchy women, baby.’ The faintest of smiles flickered across Dominic’s face. ‘But we need you to get with the programme. You know how it works: I give the orders; you follow them.’

‘Go to hell,’ Kate snapped.

Something tightened in his jaw, his smile disappeared. ‘I’m not playing this game anymore,’ he said, cool and seamless, the billionaire CEO reinstated. ‘I’ve been kissing your ass since Singapore. I don’t kiss ass.’ He gazed at her across endless years of hard living and taking what he wanted. ‘I’m done with this bullshit.’

‘Excuse me? Is that what this is?’

‘I don’t feel like excusing you right now.’ His voice was grating, deadly, her second question dismissed. ‘Just do what you’re told.’ He ran his closed fingers up the length of his pulsing dick, took a deep breath as the pleasure streaked up his spine. ‘Now tell me you want this deep inside you.’

She should tell him to fuck off. Better yet, she should get up and leave this infuriating man with his invisible world he was battling; she should turn her back on this impossible relationship that wasn’t a relationship at all, unless nonstop fucking qualified. Perhaps she might even have followed
through if his eyes hadn’t been fixed knowingly on hers, if he hadn’t run his finger all the way up his monstrous dick so slowly she could see the fresh blood pouring into the network of distended veins feeding his arousal.

A sudden spike of shimmering desire raced through her body, recklessly vaulted over judicious thought, left her quivering. Instant recall of the consequences of Dominic’s brusque orders flooded her senses: the wild hysteria, the seething need, the soul-stirring ecstasy; how he could make the pleasure last.

‘You’re pissing me off, Katherine. Talk to me or fuck it – I’ll turn on some porn and take care of myself.’ He circled his erection with his fingers, slid his hand down to the base of the thick shaft, tipped his towering dick in her direction and arched his brows.

‘Will you be starring in the porn?’ Bile spilling from her tongue.

He gave a small shrug. ‘Not necessarily. Would it interest you if I were?’

She blushed furiously and for what seemed an ice age, she was under the gaze of a silent observer who had the power to overlook the ordinary constraints of life. Who had the power to make her ache for him.

‘The porn can wait,’ he said quietly, as if he could read her mind. ‘But I need you to answer me. Politely. You must, Katherine.’

She flinched at the steel edge in his voice, called herself every kind of fool for trembling at his free-of-apology
demand. Had she learned nothing in the past month about personal freedom and choices? ‘OK then, yes,’ she said, as though she had no will of her own, as though she were on some carnal autopilot.

‘OK?’ he said silkily, because he’d been walking a bloody tightrope since Raffles trying to please a woman for the first time in his life and he needed some serious payback. ‘That doesn’t sound very enthusiastic. You can do better than that.’

‘I want …’ Her voice was shaky under his burning stare. ‘I want you … that.’ She pointed at his engorged dick, which he was holding lightly in the curve of his fingers. ‘When I shouldn’t. When I should walk away and leave you and your dick behind.’

‘But you’re not going to, are you?’ His voice was smooth and dangerous.

She looked up, her eyes large, a current of distrust shimmering through her senses. ‘I should,’ she whispered.

‘I wouldn’t let you anyway.’ A languid rise of his hand, a flick of his index finger. ‘Show me, Katherine. I want to see if you’re wet.’ He frowned when she didn’t move. ‘This isn’t about what you want, Katherine. It’s about what I want. You know the rules.’

She suddenly felt cold under that still blue gaze; her hands started trembling.

‘Jesus.’ His voice was soft. ‘Are you scared?’ He looked at her, his face rigid, his jaw tense. ‘This is too fucked up.’ He nodded, his gaze infinitely weary. ‘There’s the door. Get out. I’m sure someone has carried in your luggage by now.’

A heartbeat later, she shoved herself up on her elbows, met his gaze straight on. ‘I’m not scared of you.’ There was that faint air of defiance, as if she were daring him to throw her out. ‘Just stop being a prick. Enter the human race.’

He smiled faintly. ‘Easy to say.’

‘Well, dial it down a notch. Can you do that? I’m not going to piss all over your boyhood mementoes. I’m only here for a few days.’

‘You never know,’ he said, because deference was unnatural to him, especially with sex. ‘It might be more than a few days.’

‘Oh, I know all right,’ she said, unblinking, deference equally meaningless to her. ‘Now, can we get this show on the road?’ She pointed at his dick.

‘Not a problem.’ His smile was brilliant. ‘Any more directions? I wouldn’t want to make any blunders,’ he murmured, his voice softly insolent.

‘One last direction,’ she said unwisely. ‘Make me feel—’

Hot with temper, he was on top of her before she’d finished speaking, slamming into her because she could piss him off damn near better than anyone.

Stunned, she sucked in a breath. ‘What the
hell
are you doing?’

His erection barely past the entrance to her body, her taut, unyielding flesh strangling the head of his dick, he gazed down at her, his lips curled in an icy smile. ‘I’m trying to fuck you, baby. I’m not getting much help. Should I order in some lube?’

‘Get. Off. Me,’ she said, tight and angry.
‘Right now
.’

‘No way.’ His reasons for refusing were enigmatic and territorial. The territorial part he understood; that was the part where he fucked her.

‘How about some minimum recognition of who you’re screwing then?’ She spoke with cold intensity because he hadn’t moved and it didn’t look like he would, the head of his erection pulsing against her tense flesh.