Page 25 of Claimed By Rage

Orshe kills me in my sleep and figures out how to undo the locks.

I’ll have to sleep with one eye open tonight.

“Are youkiddingme? Is it Fort Knox in here?” She bangs on the door, then lets out a sharp cry. Yeah, that shit’s gonna hurt no matter how tiny your fists are.

I could tell her to stop. She’s going to hurt herself if she rams against the door.

But I don’t.

I listen to her heavy breathing, the way she paces the room like a cat in a cage, grumbling the entire time. She picks things up. Puts them back down. Opens the closet door and rummages through the racks. Tears open drawers and slams them back shut.

I wasn’t kidding earlier—I have nothing to hide.

The dull drag of metal on metal catches my attention. She huffs, clicks her heels toward the door, and slams something heavy against it. Wood splinters and cracks, and she laughs in triumph.

My fucking dumbbells.

Snarling, I tear open the bathroom door and bare down on her. She lifts the dumbbell again, a ten pound weight that shouldn’t do much damage, and rams it back into the center ofthe door. A tiny hole materializes, letting a sliver of light in from outside.

“What are youdoing?” I growl, snatching the weight from her hands and tossing it behind me. Itthudslike a boulder, but I don’t give a shit about the floor.

Her wild grin takes my breath away.

It breaks as soon as she realizes I’m crowding her in, giving her zero chance of escape. Her hazelnut eyes widen as I back her against the splintered wood and slam my fist beside her head. The wood groans beneath my throbbing knuckles.

“You can’t escape me. You can’t escapethis.” Exhaling hotly across her face, I grab her throat and kiss her hard on the lips. Her body goes rigid, the instinct to fight coursing through her veins. I growl against her mouth, slamming my fist into the door, and feed her my anger.

I’m so goddamnfuriouswith her all the time.

“Why can’t you stay?” I lower the hand gripping her neck to her chest, feeling her heart beat wildly inside her ribcage. A heart that’smine.I stop myself from saying what I really want to know?—

Why can’t shewantto stay with me?

“It’s one night.Onenight. With me.” A shudder rolls through me and I kiss her again, moving my lips over hers even though she’s frozen solid.

This is worse than when she’s mad at me. It’s nothing at all. A blank expanse of body heat without any emotion attached. But I know she’s in there, and it kills me to have her so close but utterlyvacant.

I dig deeper, sliding my tongue between her lips, groaning at how she lets me in. I bury myself inside her warmth, searching for any piece of her she’ll allow me to find. When I come up empty, a shudder courses through me.

If I go any deeper and tear out what I want—her pleasure, her pain, her fear—she’ll hate me for eternity for taking it by force.

But I’m starting to believe that’s the only way I’ll ever truly have her.

Finally, she lifts her hand and touches me, placing it on my chest. But she doesn’t push me away—she slides her palm up to my shoulder, across the back of my neck, and into my hair. Grabbing a fistful andpulling, she rips my head back and glowers up at me, lips pulled back, teeth bared. “Because it’s not one night! Nothing with you is one night! I learned that the last time I was in your secret fucking club!”

Heat sears across my scalp, but I take it. I’ll take anything I can get from this woman.

Even if it’s not the things I’d dared to hope for.

Lovefeels impossibly out of reach.

“Give me tonight.” It won’t be enough, but it will give me time to think. To plan. I’ve been anticipating that Celia would give in to me eventually, but it’s becoming increasingly clear that her aversion to me is bordering on permanent. It’s something I’m doing wrong with pursuing her—like there’s a secret thread holding all the answers that I have yet to unveil. Pull the right thread, and she’ll unravel in my hands like the most beautiful flower, blossoming forme.

I just have to find the right one…before my brothers do.

While she processes my request—as if she has a choice in where she sleeps tonight—I take my fill of her body. Her chest rises and falls with every breath in her lungs, the flush across her cheeks trailing down her neck. It lingers near the topmost edge of the deep V cutting between her breasts, but the milky skin of them peeks out on either side, untouched by the sun. Her complexion is warm despite the coming winter, meaning that she either tans topless at the spa, or she never bothered tanning to begin with and she’s naturally honey-toned.

I’ve never seen any bikini lines across her hips or thighs.

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