His skin felt too tight and too damned sensitive.

Muscles burned, abrasions stung.

All in all, he was a fucking mess. And he had no one to blame but himself.

Himself—and Damien Stark.

Goddamn the arrogant prick. He’d fired Jackson? What kind of bullshit was that?

Even now, the memory made him want to put his fist through the wall, and he really should have worked that shit out by now. Lord knows the fifteen large he’d won in the ring last night should have been therapy enough. He’d beaten the crap out of every challenger Sutter had tossed at him, and still the rage bubbled under the surface.

And not just because of what Damien had done, but because of how he’d done it. Putting it on Sylvia. Making her lay down the gauntlet to Jackson, when Damien knew damn good and well that she wanted Jackson on the project, not to mention that they were dating.

Dating.

The word sounded too thin to hold the depth and power of the emotions he felt for Sylvia. He’d left because he couldn’t stand the thought of losing it in front of her. And he’d returned because, goddammit, he needed her touch to find his way back to himself after the rage had passed. After he was aching and exhausted.

Christ, she was perfect, and all the more so because of the way she’d given herself so fully to him. Did she even realize what she’d done to him? The way his heart had flipped over when she’d looked at him with those wide, whiskey-colored eyes and told him that she’d submit to whatever he needed? That he could use her however he wanted?

Now her back was pressed to his chest and he held his arm loose around her waist. The steadiness of her breathing was like a gift, as if she was silently telling him that so long as she was in his arms, all was right with the world. She trusted him, fully and completely. He felt it now, and he’d seen it when she’d so boldly offered herself to him. In her eyes, on her face.

That trust had both humbled and excited him. Hell, even now his cock—about the only part of him that wasn’t battered and bruised—was as hard as a rock and nestled sweetly against the curve of her ass.

He knew how much she craved control. He remembered with painful clarity the night when she’d finally told him why. When she’d shared not only the truth about what that fucking asshole Reed had done to her when she was a teen, but also about how she’d reacted.

How she’d wanted to run but hadn’t been able.

How she’d wanted to get lost in her head, but had been denied that, too.

How her body had heated, responded. How Reed had touched her. Teased her. How he’d stroked and played with her.

He’d taken her to climax—and when she’d gone over, that loss of control had humiliated and mortified her. More than that, it had scarred her. Changed her.

In the end, it had infused her with a bone-deep need to keep control. Jackson understood that—and so he understood as well just how much of herself she’d offered him tonight.

And, yes, they had already gone part of the way down this road. Early on, he’d glimpsed the shadows lurking in her past, and had recognized that it wasn’t control she needed, but submission. A safe place where she could surrender to pleasure and not feel ashamed. Where she could give control rather than have it ripped from her.

He had offered that to her, and she had agreed. So far, though, they’d taken only baby steps.

But this …

She’d trusted him openly and completely even though her core makeup was to not trust at all.

She’d surrendered control even though she didn’t understand how far he might want or need to go.

But what had really twisted Jackson up was the realization that just saying the words had aroused her. He’d seen that clearly enough in the way her pupils had dilated and in the flush that rose in her cheeks.

And her excitement had made him hard.

Hell, just thinking about it now made him harder, though how that was physically possible he really didn’t know. He was so stiff right now he felt like he’d been sculpted from a goddamn slab of marble.

If he’d had any doubts that Sylvia would go with him as far as he—or she—needed to go, she had soundly erased them. Christ, she’d put herself out there as a proxy for the ring.

That would never happen, of course; she wasn’t a punching bag, and he would never, ever use her like that. But her offer, made with such sincerity and love, had stolen his breath.

He’d told her once that he’d taken all the shit from his childhood and turned it around. His anger to fighting and his need for control to sex. All true, yes. But the deeper truth was that the anger stemmed from control as well. From the lack of control, to be specific. From the feeling of being tossed aside by his father who’d had a whole hell of a lot of better shit to do with a hell of a lot better son.