You flirted with Pascal and Blaise. It was no wonder they thought they were going to score the way you were carrying on.

There was another long silence. He felt her frown just as if he was standing in front of her. He knew she had a habit of licking her full bottom lip with the tip of her tongue. He’d seen her do it in the bar when she was sitting there at his table. The only real sign of nerves other than when her fingers twisted together beneath the table. He knew she was doing that right at that moment.

Heat rushed through his veins and blood pooled low and wicked. His erection was painful. Huge. Worse than when he was a fucking teenager. It was impossible to walk around with an enormous hard-on. Cold showers weren’t going to take it away. He needed Cayenne. Really needed her.

I don’t flirt. I wouldn’t even know how to flirt. I haven’t been around all that many people.

What the hell was that in the bar? The edge to his voice was now in his mind. He couldn’t take a step so he didn’t try. He opened the front of his jeans to give himself a little relief. The material couldn’t stretch that much. His hand circled his cock, fist closing tight. Why the fuck couldn’t he stop being such a bastard? Why were images of her with other men wreaking havoc with his brain?

I think I’m angrier at you over that, putting yourself on display to those two morons, than you betraying me by leading me on with that kiss and then paralyzing me.

He wasn’t angry with her for biting him. He actually understood that. She’d been terrified. A part of her was not only protecting herself, but she thought she was protecting him. She could have killed all three men, but she hadn’t. She wouldn’t have left them lying there for any wild animal to find. She had stayed to watch over them. Every time he thought about her sandwiched between the Comeaux brothers there at the bar with the sound of her laughter floating back to him, now that made him angry.

I had to find a way to survive in a world I was totally unfamiliar with. I needed money for food. I needed clothes. I followed various women and observed them and then I acted the way they acted. They appeared friendly. Most were married. When they talked to their friends they laughed. I laughed at the things they said even though, to me, it wasn’t funny. I tested them to see what kind of men they were. But I wasn’t flirting.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. She was crying. Again. He’d made her cry. He’d wanted to hurt her because sitting in that damn bar watching her with those two losers, two of the worst men in the swamp, had hurt him. He acknowledged that now. He had to. He had to come to terms that she gotten under his skin.

You fucking know you belong to me, Cayenne, so tell me why we’re doing this dance. I don’t want you going to a bar and standing close to other men, showing them your body. Letting them touch you.

I didn’t let them touch me, she objected.

I didn’t see his hand on your ass – the beautiful ass that, by the way, belongs to me? I didn’t see that? Is that what you’re telling me?

I don’t want to talk to you anymore.

I’ll just bet you don’t. My cock is as hard as a rock. But then you know that, don’t you? You make it that way. You sit there naked and tease me with your voice, knowing you shouldn’t have allowed that man to touch you like that, not ever. The only man who touches you is me. The only man who kisses that mouth is me. And I’m the only man who is going to be inside of you. So stop fucking around. You need money, I left a cache in the kitchen for you along with plenty of food. Make a list of what you need and I’ll bring it home. Figure this out soon, lady, or you’re going to find I don’t have patience for this dance and I’m going to be coming after you.

I don’t understand half of what you’re saying to me.

You understand me. You’re in my head. You know what I want. You know what we’re going to be doing together. I spell it out every time you’re in my mind. I want you in my bed. I want you as my partner, including in the lab, because after that peanut comment I know damn well you’ll be an asset there. You fucking gave yourself to me four nights ago, and I’ll be damned if you take yourself away.

You didn’t come. Her voice broke.

He knew he was being a bastard, but he still couldn’t get that image of her sandwiched between Pascal and Blaise out of his mind. He couldn’t push aside the black jealousy, because if he did, he’d have to face the reason. The real reason he was angry with her. He set his jaw stubbornly. He’d held her. Comforted her. She’d given herself to him and there was no going back, he wasn’t allowing that.

I want your mouth on my cock and I want to be buried balls-deep inside of you. I want to tie you up and take my time, making you scream with pleasure. I like playing, baby, and I want to spend the rest of my life knowing you’ll let me do that. That you’ll enjoy it. Not just enjoy it, but crave it. I want you thinking about me day and night, waiting for my touch. For my cock. For anything I want to do to you.

There was another long silence. He thought he’d lost her. He made it back to the master bedroom, every step painful. He was making his erection worse with every image rising in his mind. He wanted her to know what kind of man he was, what he would demand of her in the bedroom. The kind of complete surrender he would expect. The kind of partner she would be for him.

Cayenne drew her knees up, making herself very small in the chair she nestled in. Trap was angry with her, when he should have been apologizing, or at least comforting her. Instead, he acted as though she was a seductress and had betrayed him in some way. That wasn’t logical and it didn’t make sense. She’d had four months to study him. He was never out of control. He was often rude to people – even his teammates – but he wasn’t out of control.

She pushed aside the things he’d said to her and tried to move deeper into his mind. He hid things from himself. Not things. Emotions. He was jealous, but he used jealousy to cover something else, something much deeper. She was under his skin, there was no doubt about it. His mind was consumed with thoughts of her. Images, most erotic, but many of just holding her. It had meant a lot to him, comforting her the way he had. That she’d come to him.

Trap wasn’t used to feeling vulnerable. She was. He always was in control. She’d been powerless in her cell, at the mercy of others. He wasn’t equipped to feel the force of their combined pull. All along, because he knew about families and relationships, because he’d lived in the world and she hadn’t, she thought he had the upper hand. She realized he didn’t. He cared for her. Really cared for her. She mattered to him. He seemed to be experiencing that for the first time, and it didn’t sit well with him.