Page 9 of The Forbidden Bride He Stole

“Apollo!”

She looked around, expecting someone to come to her rescue at any moment because there was no way they were letting this brute carry her out of here bodily.

But nobody came to her defense. Not even her friends.

“Apollo,”she shouted, kicking until her shoes came off, hitting his shoulder with her closed fists as they exited the club and made their way outside.

His hands were warm, his hold firm, and it was impossible to feel only anger when he was touching her like this. But it was all the same futile emotion that had had hold of her for all this time. She wanted him to touch her as a man touched a woman. He was touching her like an angry parent would carry a child. But that didn’t makeherfeelings change.

“I own that club,agape,” he said, his words hard.

“You donot,” she said.

“Yes, I do. As of about ten minutes ago.”

“You... You bought the club so that you could carry me out of the club?”

“Yes. All things considered, I think it was worth it.”

“You’re unhinged,” she said. “You’re a sociopath.Apsychopath. Put me down.” She wiggled against him, her breasts pressed against his back and sending sparks of arousal through her, even as she wanted to destroy him. Make him feel this same endless need. Make him suffer like she did.

“I am none of those things,” he said. “If I were, I probably wouldn’t be so angry. I would be looking at this with a cool sort of sophisticated calculation, and instead, I wish to dump you into the sea.”

“Good. I would rather tangle with the sharks than deal with you.”

“The sharks may end up being your only option.”

It should terrify her, the idea of losing him. Right now, it didn’t.

“Great. Find me chilling with the hammerheads. But then you wouldn’t be able to control my life, and what fun would that be for you?”

“I will not fail,” he bit out.

He set her down on the sidewalk, the ground gritty and cool beneath her feet. “You are a foolish girl,” he said. “I have been tasked with taking care of you. And I will do so. I will do exactly as your father asked me because he is one of the only people who ever did a damn thing for me and didn’t expect something in return. With him, it wasn’t transactional. And nothing else in my life has been that way. And I will honor that. I will do this with excellence as I have done everything else.”

“I amnot a spreadsheet.” She was made of feelings. Of desire and need and aching hunger, and he was turning her into athing. It outraged her. “You can’t math out the way that you handle this. And what metric would you even use? The successes that I achieve? And then, would any of them be mine?”

“A question you would always have had to ask yourself, as you come from money. As you would always be standing on the shoulders of your father. So, if that’s going to give you an existential crisis, it would have anyway.”

“I’mnothaving an existential crisis.” Sadly she knew what her crisis was.

“Then what is all this?”

He looked at her, and then he looked her up and down, and she suddenly became very conscious of how her dress conformed to her curves. She had chosen the dress because it was provocative, but now beneath his gaze, she felt naked.

But she saw it then. The masculine appreciation in his gaze, even though he tried to bank it, tried to bury it and deny it. She could see all of it.

She thought of what Pablo had said.

The idea filled her with desire and need.

She hadn’t felt any of that when she’d been dancing with Rocco. But the image of getting on her knees before him made her feel liquid. If he dragged her back to the car, she could do that. Slide to the floor, find herself between those powerful thighs, and undo his belt...

She wanted it. So bad. It made her heart throb painfully, and that secret place between her legs ached.

She wanted this man. Even now. She wanted him to tear the dress from her body. And she wanted to wrench the clothes from his. She wanted to have him while they fought. It was like a fever. An illness sweeping through her like a tide.

“What’s the matter,agape? You look flushed.”

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