Ruled

by Angel Payne

  Shit. Shit. Shit.

  The kitten had let her cat out of the bag.

  A fact not missed by the man in bed with her.

  Who, just as swiftly, turned the kitten back into his prey.

  She’d barely blinked before his hand invaded her hair again, twisting in the damp strands and yanking her head back—for the merciless plunge of his mouth. There was no polite pause to part her lips or testing to see if she was ready for his kiss. He invaded her with it, leaving no part of her untouched by it. He was inside her mouth, sweeping and ravaging, taking even the particles of her breath—and certainly the threads of her rational thoughts.

  It was just short of an attack.

  It was one step from heaven.

  Minutes passed—maybe hours, she didn’t care—before he released her. Tracy descended, limp and gasping, back down to her original position on the coverlet.

  “All right, then,” the dark predator murmured, somewhere above her. While his voice trickled into her mind as if in a fog, his touch registered in her senses like piercing blades of sun. “I’m going to make this ass as pink and plump as the cunt I’m going to fuck. Think that’ll take at least ten more swats, kitten—on each side.”

  Belly flip time again. Only this time, accompanied by a slice of fear in her heart…and a clench of arousal through her pussy.

  From the midst of that crazy chaos, her mind managed to push words to her lips. “Yes…Sir.”

  The predator rumbled, making her think of a pacing puma in those shafts of sun. “Oh, that’s so nice. Such a pretty little sound, popoki.” His hands soothed across her buttocks, spreading and rubbing, gradually easing her legs farther apart. Tracy moaned and shook as he neared her quivering center, taking teasing sweeps over the flesh around her intimate core. How did he do this to her? How did he simply know the exact places to caress her, tease her…control her? “Oh, sweet woman. You are ready for the pleasure, aren’t you?”

  “Yes.” Wasn’t necessary to think or hesitate about that one. Ready? She’d leapt past “ready,” hovering somewhere in the ether between needy and nearly passing out. Her sex hadn’t missed one tantalizing second every time he’d deftly passed, her clit perking for his fingers like a flower sprouting for the spring sun. Only inside, she was a flood. A rainstorm of arousal, drenching everything between her womb and her clit. “Yes…please!” she panted. “I—I need—”

  “Say it all.” He drew one finger in a tiny circle at her dripping entrance. “I want the pleasure…”

  Her hands fisted the bed cover. She forced her mind to push through the forest fire of arousal, twirling the flames into words. “I want…the pleasure.”

  “But I also want the pain.”

  “But I also want—”

  Holy shit.

  What the hell was she agreeing to?

  “I also…want the…”

  She was interrupted by a ruthless crack.

  The blow of the man’s first real spank on her bottom.

  “Shit!”

  It spilled before she could even think—when she did, weirdly thanking God for Luke and his loud video games—and process the hot stings now radiating from her ass to her hip and thigh. A second later, he delivered the same agony to her other side. Two more spanks followed to each side before Tracy could even remember this was just the start. Seven more swats loomed ahead.

  Hell no.

  No matter how much her skin now felt like strands of glowing, turned-on heat…or how her senses rejoiced in his deep, satisfied snarl…or how every nerve in her body danced, antsy with anticipation for his next commanding smack…

  Hell, no.

  She didn’t want this. She couldn’t…

  But she did.

  Because as number four came, then number five, her skin still smarted…but her brain began doing something different. Something freaky, fuzzy…a haze of warmth and arousal like nothing she’d ever experienced before…

  The man didn’t just bring the sun anymore.

  He was the sun.

  Dazzling her. Drenching her. Burning her.

  And then, sizzling into her once more. Stabbing through her soft folds, into her weeping tunnel, edging his heat inside, as he delivered the final swats to set her ass fully on fire.

  “Can’t…wait,” came his desire-filled grate. “Need inside you. Need to…fuck you. Now.”

  A moan answered him, shrill and submissive, but she wasn’t sure where it came from. Her responses weren’t her own right now. Her damn mind wasn’t her own. And her body? Long past obeying what she craved—or thought she did.

  She’d let the man spank her. Many times. Had lain here and gasped as he burned each blow into her skin—and now, rejoiced as he parted her pussy lips, making way for his cock to fill her body in a single, brutal slide.

  At last.

  Everything quaked as his flesh took over hers…recalibrating her body to the hard demand of his. Her tissues wept and clenched around him. Her ass burned as he lunged deeper, stabbing his cock in long, brutal strokes. Her consciousness was a smoky mist, latticed by the brilliance of his sexual sun.

  “Hang on.” He enforced the order by sinking his teeth into the back of her neck. “Can’t help it. I’m going to take you so damn hard, kitten.”

  Tracy groaned. He wasn’t doing that already?

  Took him just another thrust to supply that answer. He secured her head with one splayed hand while ramming so deep, she felt his balls trying to squeeze into her passage too. Before she could recover enough from the shock to react, he glided out—and then did it again.

  “Holy…”

  Words left her then.

  And the sobs took over.

  Primal. Carnal. Born in a part of her truly incapable of thought or logic or existing beyond the visceral heaven and hell of this moment. Her mind left her, turning her body into a plank of pure feeling, accepting all the brilliance and boldness her predator had to give.

  And he gave.

  Fire, in every driving, dominant slide of his cock.

  Rain, in every hot gush from her tunnel and wet quiver of her clit.

  Air, in the completion they reached for together. The crash of passion, as her world finally welcomed his sun…

  And was incinerated for it.

  “That’s it.” His lips burned the words into her ear as his body surrounded her, slick with sweat and hard with desire. “Give it to me, woman. Every drop of it.”

  The tremors started, hot and searing, from deep inside. Shot to her sex like sun flares, scorching everything they touched, until everything was a bursting, blazing tongue of fiery need. She hissed from the urgency, arching her head back, needing exactly the contact John waited with. His mouth caught her, saving her. His tongue pulled her, clinching her—

  Before his lips gave the words to deliver her.

  “Scream,” he ordered in a soft snarl. His breaths pumped into her in the same rhythm as his cock. “Let it go. Nobody will hear. I’ll make sure of it, kitten.” He dipped in harder, ravaging her mouth in brutal command. “Scream,” he commanded again against her lips. “Scream for me.”

  Her breaths faltered. He’d plunged so deep inside her body, but how had he found his way into her psyche too? How had he known about the tiny corner of composure to which she’d clung, hoping he wouldn’t see or notice once his own pleasure had come and gone? The man had to be close. She wondered if the condom was even holding together, he’d swollen so huge inside her.

  Big enough to punch into her soul, as well.

  Then seeing it.

  Then demanding it.

  Commanding her to give him even that now.

  Knowing she’d no longer be able to resist. Especially if he angled himself down into her a little higher…then pushed extra hard, pinning her pelvis until her clit smashed against the coverlet—

  She screamed for him.

  She screamed into him.

  He latched their mouths harder as soon as the orgasm hit, keeping her gr
ounded even as her body shot like a rocket into an ether of white-hot bliss. For every wave of her pleasure, John had another trio of savoring growls—until one overrode them all, mighty and masculine, as he pounded her so hard, the smacks of their bodies were almost as loud as his punishing foreplay.

  Oh, God.

  His foreplay.

  Thoughts of it all—the spanks, the ferocity, his commitment, his command—washed another climax upon her, toppling the first. But there was no scream this time. There was only the silent, intense, straining surrender…the surety that everything she once was had just been demolished, and somehow, in some way, she’d have to resurrect a new Tracy from the pile of those sated cinders. Even if she didn’t want to.

  Which was why, the moment Franz rose to get rid of the condom, she forced her muscles to work once more. With a tight groan, she rolled to her back—but was only pushed back to her elbows when the man reentered from the bathroom.

  “Well, isn’t this a nice dessert.” He crossed the tattooed masterpieces the rest of the world knew as his arms. To her, they had entirely new definitions—especially the hands and fingers into which they tapered.

  She swallowed, pushing those thoughts back. Way back. With a soft huff, she rolled toward the end of the bed—

  Until her ankle was seized by one of the hands she’d been fantasizing about.

  “Hey!”

  “Hey?” How had he moved with the same measured calm as his voice? He was like a damn ninja…

  “What are you doing?”

  “Where you going?”

  “John.”

  “Tracy.”

  “Let me go.”

  “Answer my question.”

  She expelled a long breath. At least he hadn’t used one of those nicknames, infused with the island accent capable of melting her like sugar in water. Right now, she’d take any scrap of strength she could get. “You know where I’m going. This—you—were—”

  “What?” His voice was like his hold. Gentle but ready to clench if he had to. Strangely, it made her feel…safe. Secure enough to preface her answer with a soft laugh.

  “Truth? I was trying to think of a better superlative than incredible, amazing, or mind-blowing.”

  He twisted his hand, moving his thumb in order to stroke the curve of her ankle. “Which is why you’re trying to leave before your blood pressure returns to normal?”

  Humor, exit stage right. Arrogant god who knew he’d just fucked a woman’s mind into next Tuesday? Enter stage left. “My blood pressure is fine.”

  “Tell that to the pulse in your neck. And the flush on your face.”

  “Tell that to my life, Captain Franzen.”

  He slid his hand away.

  Leaving a gulf of silence behind.

  Silence bearing a weird mix of shit for her. Regret but indignation. Flinging out the formality, when her body was still flushed from sex she couldn’t find a descriptor for? Not so copasetic. But neither was his clingy act, when all they’d done was find a great way for relieving a little tension.

  Okay, a lot of tension.

  In a really great way.

  “Your life?” Though he’d dropped the hand, he remained close to the bed. Too damn close. His voice persisted with the intimacy too. Damn it. “You mean the life that officially doesn’t exist right now?”

  Double damn it.

  She rocked her head back on her shoulders. Tore the man’s own page from his own playbook, crossing her arms and steeling her features. “For an island boy, you sure as hell know how to skate on thin ice.”

  If the guy was smart, he’d recognize that as the Zamboni truck on his ice and clear off.

  The guy was not smart.

  His own head shifted on its shoulders—to lean over her with lips all but snickering. Even more stupid, as he fitted those lips atop hers. The king of stupid, as he caught the hand she raised with intention to shove him the hell off.

  “For an island boy,” he murmured, as soon as they pulled apart, “I’m also being pretty lolo for a mainland wahine.”

  Tracy twisted free from his grip—but her hand didn’t drop. It was drawn, like a damn electromagnet, toward the muscled slope between his neck and shoulder. “But she can’t be lolo for you.” She dug in with her nails, underlining the ache of her retort. “Because her life will have to exist again one day…and she’ll be somewhat of a working mom.”

  Franz laid his chuff atop her watery laugh. “Somewhat.”

  He drew a hand across his chest as if pledging an allegiance, only his fingers ended atop her hand. The pressure in his hold was the physical form of the new texture in his gaze. Quiet reassurance…penetrating attention…as if he were trying to memorize her…

  Though she already knew she’d never forget him. Tried, probably in vain, to tell him with her deeper grip into his neck. She didn’t even care about marking him now. Perhaps even wished she did.

  “John…” Leaden swallow. Why was this so hard? They’d had fun. He’d even been a big boy, ensuring that was all it could be. “I’m—I’m sorry.”

  “Why?” The query was sincere.

  “You deserve…” She looked away. “More than this. So much more.”

  He unpeeled her hand off his neck. Dragged it forward so he could press lips to the inside of her wrist. The whole time, the dark certitude of his stare didn’t falter. “But right now, this is all I want. So…” He hitched the top of his head toward the artistically arranged pillows against the headboard. “Let me have just a few minutes more?”

  Tracy giggled. Couldn’t be helped. There was plenty of cocky arrogance left in the silken words, but they were also husky…in all the right ways. Grating just enough to nick at the edges of her heart, exactly as he’d tempted the fringe of her libido…until there was nothing left to resist him with.

  As she nestled with him under the covers, she mitigated her actions by knowing Luke was, for the moment, safe and happy with Zeke Hayes and Ethan Archer nearby. Gem and Ronnie were probably still passed out where she’d left them, with nothing left to do but wait until Sol contacted them through the dark channels he and Franz had established.

  So in several ways, the smug bastard was right.

  For all intents and purposes, her life was still pretty much a giant blank.

  Which was kind of funny…considering she couldn’t remember the last time she felt this perfectly sated.

  And finally, at last, exhausted.

  Recognizing, as she yawned and settled her cheek against a warm, hard slab of pectoral muscle, that sleep was a lot like Keoni John Franzen. Best when simply surrendered to.

  Chapter Twelve

  She even mesmerized him when she was asleep.

  Especially when he was the one who’d exhausted her like this.

  Yeah, that probably turned him into fifteen kinds of a creeper-stalker bozo dork, but right now, Franz was ready to let that freak flag fly. He hadn’t been able to help a bunch of lingering gawks even when they weren’t in the same bed together, and now with her just inches away, he flipped a mental middle finger at the resistance.

  It was time to indulge because it would soon be time to give this up.

  Yeah, even the gawking.

  He noticed the things that always turned him crazy caveman for her, of course. The wild tumble of her brown-sugar hair. The sleek curves of her mouth, expressive as hell even as she slept, twitching as if even her subconscious was dictating to-do lists. The determined line of her jaw, turning into the elegant line of her neck, becoming the beginning of her slender shoulders…

  A sight drawing him to all the details he didn’t know yet.

  The sprays of light freckles across both those shoulders. Her really long fingers. Her really big ears. The fact that he’d never believed in heart-shaped faces before confronting the truth, beautiful and breathtaking, in hers.

  He looked longer, determined now. He wanted to discover it all—but at the same time, knew he never would. The woman was going to be his
president yet still looked at so many things about the world, and people, as if they were brand-new. Many people mistook that as naiveté, discounting her because of it. Many others were captivated by it, as he’d seen firsthand in Zeke and Rayna when they’d arrived last night. He wondered how the crowd in DC split on those spectrums, though from what he knew of politicians, he guessed the former—and barely muffled a snarl of outrage because of it.

  Not that the heavy huff with which he replaced it any better, proved by the restless twitches of Tracy’s lashes. She interrupted her dreamtime list-making with a harsh shake of her head, a move Franz recognized at once. He’d made the same move himself, having to haul his brain from sound asleep to wide awake in seconds. Most days he still woke up the same way, only to be pissed he couldn’t break the habit.

  The woman’s face contorted with the same frustration. He didn’t know whether to be delighted or aggravated about it. She was still so gorgeous, even in her ire, he almost expected cartoon birds to flit in and help with little ribbons in her hair—which made no sense at all, considering he hadn’t seen a cartoon in a long goddamn time.

  “Oh.” She murmured it as if answering a question to herself, also a move he understood. After realizing she wasn’t in the bed of her mind’s default—for him, it was always the futon on the back-garden lanai at home—she’d likely wondered where she was and then fast-tracked the memory up to now. That’d explain her sudden flush as well as the embarrassed flicker of her gaze around the room.

  Anywhere but at him.

  “Aloha, ku`uipo.” He went on, answering the query in her eyes, “It translates to something like sweetheart or adored one.”

  She accepted the information with a thoughtful smile. Shot him a tiny side-eye before murmuring, “You have an interesting way of ‘adoring’ a woman, Captain.”

  He nestled his head on a bent elbow. Contemplated the woman with a look of raw fascination. How had this happened? She’d thrown out the formality as a conversational spike strip, but it had failed. Though he saw through her ploy, he wasn’t pissed by it. He was challenged. Captivated. And hard as a damn rock.