Page 7 of Lose Me In The Shadows

He shook his head, but lifted her chin with his finger so she couldn’t look away. “A few things. One: your panic attack wasn’t over something stupid. Nothing about you is stupid, not even your anxiety. Two: I’m not attracted to manic pixie dream girls. Three: don’t call yourself an ogre or a nightmare or a bitch. None of it is true, and I won’t…” he wasn’t sure what possessed him to say it, but he did, anyway. “…I won’t tolerate you talking badly about yourself that way.”

She swallowed, staring at him, and he could feel the energy between them change from something emotionally heavy to something sexually heavy, before settling in his cock.

“And what are you going to do to stop me?” she murmured.

“Careful, sweetheart,” he warned her. “I’m not sure you’re ready for the answer to that question.”

Luke expected her to prevaricate. In his experience, a lot of women played coy when he teased them with even the merest hint of his desires. They liked the idea of flirting with danger, but when they actually came face to face with it, they pretended they didn’t understand what they’d been toying with in the first place. He didn’t blame them for it, of course, but it still surprised him when Kara moved in closer to him, her tits so close he swore he could feel the air between his abs and her nipples shift.

“How are either of us going to know, if you don’t tell me?”

Huh.

Luke glanced around. The trail was empty. Testing her, he moved in closer to her so that her tits brushed his body. Her nipples were hard.

“I’d rather show you,” he said, pinching her thigh.

Kara inhaled sharply. Her eyes flashed. With outrage, or lust? He waited for her to snap at him, hop off the boulder, slap him, anything—any of it would be deserved.

Instead, she licked her lips.

“Was that supposed to hurt?” she asked.

“Oh, sweetheart,” Luke laughed.

She shrugged, but the look in her eyes—definitely lust now—gave her away. “I’m just saying, if this is supposed to be some sort of punishment for me almost standing you up or denigrating myself, it feels pretty half-assed.”

He’d show her half-assed. Luke grinned to himself. His cock still felt heavy, but his chest felt a million pounds lighter.

So he was a traitorous liar. So what? He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been this excited about anything or anyone.

Kneeling up on the boulder, she started to pull her shirt over her head.

“What are you doing?” he asked, stopping her. “We’re in public.”

“Whatever the fuck I want.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Did I deserve that?”

“No. Ugh,” Kara groaned. “I’m so out of my depth with you, I don’t understand half the shit coming out of my mouth. Ineveropen up like this. I neverwantlike this. I want to piss you off, I want to turn you on, I want, I want…”

“What do you want, sweetheart?” he asked her, but he already knew. After all, what did it mean, when you were with a man who you knew wouldn’t be gentle, and you egged him on anyway? Sometimes Luke found himself in that exact same spot with Conor and Micah. You wanted to fight with everything you had, knowing your opponent would still come out on top. You wanted to put them in their place—and have them put you in yours, right back, but better.

You wanted more.

Kara’s eyes were wide and dark, scared and demanding. She looked away and then back at him, licking her lips again, and caressing his wrist. Inhaling deeply, she straightened her shoulders and finally said, “I want it to hurt.”

Luke moved. Using her hold on his wrist, he tugged her forward, bent his knees, and lifted her up and over his shoulder in a fireman’s hold. Kara’s muffled “oof” made him grin. She slammed her water bottle into his hip, and he swatted her on her ass again in reprimand as he walked down the trail towards the cave entrance.

“Luke, what are you doing? I didn’t agree to this.”

“Didn’t you?” he asked mildly, spotting the dark entryway. The park had cleared out by now, and he doubted there were any park rangers around. Who cared, anyway. He didn’t think he could wait any longer, and the woman he carried obviously couldn’t, either.

“I’d tell you to watch your head, but I think you’re okay,” he told Kara, who bit his back. He smacked her ass again as he entered the cave. Lanterns lit the dark space, and he navigated them around stalagmites and stalactites until he found a spot that seemed free of risk of dismemberment for either of them. Even better, there was a smooth rock face, a perfect surface to bend a willful, needy woman over before shoving himself inside her.

“Down you go,” he said simply, lifting her off his shoulder and maneuvering her so that she was face down on the rock, elbows holding her up. He lifted her hips so her perfect ass was perfectly in line for what he wanted.

She didn’t fight him. Instead, she was breathing hard—not the deep gasps she’d made that day on the climbing wall, when he thought she was about to have a panic attack, but the panting of someone so turned on it hurt.

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