Page 84 of Controlled Burn
He stared at her number. His thumb hovered. He didn’t call.
He drove.
Talia
When Talia opened her apartment door, he filled the frame—six-four, broad shoulders blotting out the hall light, jacket dark with the night, and a haze of whiskey coming off his breath. His eyes were a furnace behind glass—contained, barely.
“You’re drunk,” she said, flat.
“Doesn’t matter.” He pushed past the threshold like the hallway belonged to him.
She planted a hand on his chest. “You don’t get to come here.”
“Watch me.”
He stepped into her heat. She shoved harder. He caught her wrist, turned her, and pinned her to the wall hard enough to rattle the picture frame above her head.
Air left her in a rush. He caged her there with his body—shoulders like a wall, arms bracketing her, thigh hooked between hers until her toes barely skimmed the floor. He was bigger everywhere, heat pouring off him, and the power rolling out of him should have scared her. It just lit the fuse.
“Get out,” she said through her teeth.
“No.” His mouth hovered at her ear, breath hot, voice rough. “You don’t get to tell me to leave. Not tonight.”
“You want a fight?” she snapped. “Go home to your wife.”
“She’s gone.” His thigh pressed harder, a warning and a promise. “You win.”
She flinched, pain flickering under the anger. “I never wanted to win. I just wanted—”
“What?” His fingers slid to her jaw and turned her face up. His gaze pinned her. “To matter?”
She tried to knee him; he blocked without effort. “I hate you.”
His thumb dragged along her lower lip, slow and deliberate. “You want to hate me. But you can’t.”
“Fuck you.”
“You’re still wet for me.” His voice dropped, dangerous and sure. “Try harder.”
Her pulse hammered against the grip he set around her throat. His hand engulfed the column of it, thumbs pressing just enough that she swallowed on instinct, her body betraying her while her glare held.
“You like being handled,” he rasped. “Owned.”
The answer trembled under her skin even if her mouth refused it.
His rough palm slid beneath her tank, mapping ribs and the faint bloom of old bruises he’d left. “You liked it when I pushed you past yourself. When I solved you like a problem that needed to be broken.”
Her spine arched under his touch. Her bones remembered. Her pride hated that they did.
“Tell me to stop,” he said, mouth at her cheek, voice a hard scrape. “Say it, and I walk. But you won’t.”
A sound caught behind her teeth, small and helpless.
“You want to be filled until you forget your name,” he murmured, teeth skimming her skin. “You want to see what you look like wrecked. On your knees. Pride gone.”
Her eyes closed, heat and shame colliding. Her thighs pressed together in reflex.
He didn’t let her hide. His hand slid down the line of her hip and into the shorts she shouldn’t have worn to answer the door. His touch found her heat. She gasped, jerking against the wall.
