Page 97 of Lock Up the Darkness

“It doesn’t sit well with you?”

“No,” he grunted.

“Why?”

“Just because.”

“Well, that’s definitely not the most articulate you’ve ever been.”

“Aurora,” he growled in warning.

He should know me better by now.

As if I’d give in to that. Backing down wasn’t exactly my thing.

“What’s next if I agree to this thinly-veiled order of yours—which I won’t, by the way—my skirt?” I brushed my fingers over the hem of the little black skirt, watching as his eyes darted right there, dipping to my thighs.

His jaw worked. “Don’t push this.”

The hell I wouldn’t.

I trailed my hand up to my black wrap top and brushed my fingers up and down the V-neck bust, to the tops of my pushed up breasts. “This top, because it might dip a little too low for your liking?”

His eyes followed my fingers back and forth.

A growl rumbled in his throat.

“Or not low enough for your staff’s liking, right?” I dropped my hands from my shirt and made a show of musing, “Hmm, maybe I’ll just take a walkabout through the whole mansion tonight in my bra and panties. Would you take those away too then, Your Majesty?”

He lunged forward in the blink of an eye, the sudden shock of it making me squeal.

His hand slid under my ass roughly, and then he was hauling me onto his lap.

He wrenched my thighs apart, making me straddle him

I had to grab onto his shoulders to steady myself.

A dozen ways and moves to extricate myself from his hold and subdue him at the same time whirled in my mind, ones that wouldn’t cause too much damage given that I was still in recovery.

“Don’t.”

I lifted my gaze to his.

Fiery intensity stared back at me, threatening to burn right through me.

“How do—”

“Those electric blue eyes say a lot, if you know how to read through the mask you struggle to keep strapped on tightly. So much observation, so much research, watching and waiting in the shadows, just standing by until it was enough to decode… it’s all allowed me to acquire that privilege. To be able to read you.” I jolted as his hand grasped my left thigh in a harsh grip. Just that fucking touch had me pulsing with need and the bastard smirked. “For the most part.”

“Then you know what I’m going to do if you don’t release me.”

“You mean the moves you would’ve made already if you really wanted to before I’d even managed to anchor you to my lap?” he said, that smirk turning full-on devilish as he slid his free hand up my other thigh. I couldn’t suppress a tremble and goosebumps trailed in the wake of his fingertips. Fucker.

“Besides, you wanted to know why it doesn’t sit well with me for my men to see you on display.”

His fingers slid under my skirt and I bit my lip against the tingling heat that broke out over my skin and shot straight to my core.

God, his touch was electric.

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