Page 62 of Cruel Dominion

And I wasn’t stopping there.

No fucking way.

I barely gave her half a minute to come down before pulling her up for a rough kiss on the mouth.

Guiding her off my lap and shakily to her feet, I leaned over my knees to watch her. “Take your dress off.”

I shrugged out of my jacket and tossed it away, steepling my fingers against my lips as her bright eyes flicked over me, drinking me in as if I were a dream personified.

If she didn’t take that dress off right fucking?—

She reached behind her neck to unzip the top before reaching for the hem to pull it up over her head, revealing inch by inch more and more of my territory.

A landscape I fully fucking intended to capture, cultivate, and build my forever home on.

I undid the buttons on my shirt and pulled it off. Her gaze felt like a physical touch as she traced the lines of my muscles and the shadows of my tattoos.

“You’re beautiful,” she said, sounding dazed.

I smirked. My body was muscular, but it was also scarred. Some of the scars Anna had already seen, remnants of my childhood. Others were fresher, thicker. I had lived a violent life, and my skin was the proof of it.

Her brows lowered as she took in some of the ink on my right arm and I wondered if she was putting together their meaning.

The ship heading into a storm, like the lyrics of the song she declared our song when we were seventeen.

The shattered diamond for the one time she joked about wishing she could smash every diamond her father insisted on buying her and forcing her to wear.

The jellyfish that stung me when we took a midnight swim and she insisted she had to pee on it or I would die.

There was very little ink on my body that wasn’t in some way tied to her. Each tattoo reminded me of my goal, kept my eyes on the prize: become a man even more powerful than Hudson Vaughn. A man he couldn’t touch. A man who could protect his daughter better than any other man on this fucking planet.

It felt obscene to be shirtless next to Anna, with her perfect posture and willowy figure. But she bore marks of violence, too. The bruises on her back were almost healed, but still yellow. Her wrists were red from the ropes that had tied them.

She wouldn’t scar, not physically. With time, her skin would heal. But she would carry that violence with her for the rest of her life.

The urge to imprison her in my villa surged up again. Here, no one could hurt her.

No one except me.

With her dress discarded, Anna kicked off her panties and unhooked the matching sensible bra, her breasts dropping into soft, heavy peaks that I wanted to get my mouth on more than I wanted air.

Her hands were on me before I could get my pants off.

“I wanted to touch you before,” she said, sliding onto my lap, drawing her fingernails over my heart. “But you wouldn’t let me.”

“You can touch me now,” I promised. This was her reward and I wouldn’t put a limit on it. Not like the others. “Everywhere. As much as you want.”

She did, her hands slowly mapping my body, teaching me lessons in patience I didn’t ask to learn, but would swallow if it meant I could keep her once I was a learned man.

My little siren lingered on every scar she’d never seen. It was almost like she’d memorized me as I once was, and wanted to remap everything she missed.

When she ran her fingers down the V of my hip bones, I gritted my teeth to stop myself from grabbing her. It was her turn to use me just how she wanted.

Anna started undoing my belt, her movements painfully slow. If it weren’t for her own quickened breath, I’d think she was torturing me. Finally, she loosened the buckle and undid the button underneath. She pulled down my pants and underwear, my cock springing free, hard as granite for her.

“What does this symbol mean?” she asked, tracing the sharp intertwined lines at the base of my cock, making me clench my teeth.

I smirked at her. If she didn’t see it, it meant she wasn’t ready to. “I’ll tell you sometime.”

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