by Lana Grayson
Three men.
Three frustrations.
Three instinctual urges to rut, seed, and claim.
And I lost myself within my own agony—the fading line between pride and surrender, instinct and protection, sensuality and arrogance.
The fizzling, heated, painful longing rent my muscles in sheer pain to release. I’d never denied myself before, never thought my step-brothers would deny me.
The words were a dark temptation.
Just a peep. A whisper. They listened for it. They played me and rutted me and tortured me to earn that moment of satisfaction when my body collapsed, my mind broke, and my will shattered to their own obsessions.
But maybe…
I arched.
What if I didn’t say it? What if I teased and just took what they had denied?
What would they do?
Max’s cock slammed into me once more.
I willed him deeper, harder, fuller…
The crack against my behind fractured my reverie, but the blinding pain of the spank only heightened the cruel invasion and endless sensations. I clenched.
“No, you don’t!” Max hauled me off his lap and tossed me onto the chair.
So.
Close.
He loomed over my spread legs. “Naughty fucking slut.”
Slut.
The slur might have insulted me if I hadn’t squirmed on the leather, soaked in my own slickness and the seed of a man who had already taken what he wanted. Max tugged my legs to the edge of the chair, spreading me in ways that exposed the swollen, silken puff of my slit. He fisted his cock as I tried to escape, to breathe.
Max slapped my thigh. I went still.
“You know the words. You’re not getting off that easy.”
Christ, I wasn’t getting off at all. And now? I was getting a punishment.
He leaned over me, raging cock in hand. I bolted. He moved faster, determined to impale me with what I had almost taken in my fevered madness. A reprimand for assuming I could challenge him, oppose him, defeat him…
The slice of his cock almost broke me in half. Max pounded my slit, his fists gripping the back of the chair as his fury drove his motions. My legs spread, and he trapped me under the force of his body again and again. The air squeezed from my chest and the courage from my trembling form. I whimpered, fighting his power over me and the quaking demand of my core to accept his violation.
Deeper.
Harder.
Faster.
I turned my head, and it was my greatest mistake yet.
Nicholas watched every stroke, every tightening of my body, every second another man—his own brother—thrust within me. My struggle didn’t move him. He ignored my pleas. Nicholas merely waited for the moment to grant me permission to come and sate my exhausted body.
He wanted this for me.
His brothers weren’t a threat to him. He didn’t dread offering me to them or watching me fight my own need for two other men. Nicholas wielded an absolute control over each of us, and that power excited him more than money, success, or the empire he might have built from the claiming of my body.
Christ, how was I supposed to oppose him? How was I supposed to survive this?
I had to trust him.
Falling in love with Nicholas Bennett was my only defense against his limitless power.
Max roared, his strikes too hard and fast for anything but his own excitement. He seized my hips and held me in place, slamming his cock deep inside.
For the second time, masculine heat filled me.
For the second time, I panted in sheer frustration and madness.
I didn’t have the strength to fight anymore.
Especially as Nicholas rose to take his turn.
“I’m impressed, Ms. Atwood.”
He unbuttoned his cufflinks only to roll the sleeves of his dress shirt to his elbows. I read every secret in the golden flare of his eyes—a brightness so righteous I believed I was the villain for opposing him and not the victim of a cruel game with crueler expectations.
“Stronger than you thought?” My voice weakened in his shadow.
He tilted his head, his finger pressed to his lips. “No speaking, Ms. Atwood, not unless I give you permission.”
More restrictions.
More rules.
More insanity.
My body ached everywhere—my head, my chest, the pounded and neglected pussy that coated with seed and yet still demanded more.
He pointed to the ottoman at his feet.
I don’t know why I did it. I don’t know why I surrendered.
But I gave into him.
And my reward? Nicholas peeled the dress from my body. He dropped me, naked and trembling, onto my knees upon the ottoman. I exposed everything to him and offered my step-brothers the vision of my surrendered form waiting for the next man, the final man, to claim me as his own.
Only this time, it wasn’t just a game.
It wasn’t a quick thrill or practiced sadism.
Nicholas permitted his brothers to take me, but I belonged only to him.
And he would prove his dominance.
I held my breath, but the heat of his swollen cock pressing against my abused slit was every relief I demanded, every reassurance my body craved, and every pleasure I denied to myself. I gripped the leather. Nicholas chuckled.
His thrust would end me.
A blitz of sensation rampaged through my tender core. Harsh and soft, pleasing and painful, demanding and loving.
I was lost before he started. He possessed me. He owned me. He stole me.
I hadn’t the strength to fight him. No way to resist the invasion of his cock. No reason to not accept every gifted inch of his devotion. I shuddered, but Nicholas didn’t hurt me. He didn’t tease me.
His hands gently caressed my curves, savoring the surrendered shivers and delicate secrets so helpless under his hold.
His movements stirred too deep in me. The emotion stole my thoughts, layering me in a whimpering helplessness for his touch, his embrace, his whispered promises. The velvet cadence of his words guided me from one shudder to the next, comforting me as his thrusts increased and his demands nearly broke the last of my resistance.
“Don’t give in now, Sarah.” His arms wrapped over me, arching me to him as his cock buried completely within my aching slit. “You’re so close.”
“Can’t…”
“Yes, you can.” His teeth nipped my neck. “Wait for me.”
“So…close…”
“I want to hear you say it.”
Even if I had the strength to speak a safe word, the last phrase I’d ever utter within Nicholas’s arms was something so dreadful. Not when every moment spent tortured by his body delivered me closer to an endless, savory, mythical satisfaction I could no longer deny.
I shook my head. “But…love you…”
Nicholas laughed, his lips kissing my neck as his thrusts pounded me with demanding, unyielding instinct.
“You’re right.” He gripped me tighter. “I don’t like the safe word either.”
“But...please….”
“I do like please, but you can do better than that.” His words weighed with a strict, undeniable command. They tortured with darkness and savored with permissions for me to repeat. “Come with me.”
“Oh, God, yes.”
Easily. Eagerly. Desperately.
But I should have expected a challenge from Nicholas Bennett.
“Tell me where you want me to come.”
And there it was.
I stiffened. Reed and Max smirked, but nothing about Nicholas’s tone shared their amusement.
He wanted to hear it.
He wanted to feel it.
He wanted me to think about the alert on his app and the implications and the risk involved with offering myself so bare and vulnerable and unprotected against all three of my step-brothers.
It was a wicked game, and it meant nothing.
But the words dusted upon my lips.
His thrusts beat me, driving me to a brink I didn’t know existed and a pain that seared me in an eternity of heartbeats and mind-shattering ache.
I couldn’t fight it anymore.
I couldn’t fight him.
His cock thickened, and his breath raged within my ear. I tensed with him, bound to the same relief and weeping for a release before I collapsed in utter defeat.
“Nick…” My voice trembled, ineloquent and desperate. “Nick, please…”
“Say it.”
Submission.
Submission of my mind. Of my soul. Of my body.
He wanted me in every way a man could possess, but I denied him that, every time he touched me, every time they took me.
Something in his confidence rattled me. I feared saying it, almost as though it would come true, almost as though he could control a part of me I shielded from even the will of a Bennett...
Need blinded me. I panted, arched, and cried his name.
“Nick, please.” I deserved every last strike, every pain, every pleasure. “Come inside me!”
The words delivered us to the brink, dazzled us in pain, and lost us both within a burst of heat that crippled me from the inside out.
Without Nicholas’s grip, I would have collapsed upon the ottoman or floor or dissolved into a nothingness that existed beyond my tired, spent, and broken form. I convulsed within the sudden freedom granted by the fracturing of my pride.
Wave after wave, heat after heat, breath after breath.
The world slowed and crumbled.
Nicholas’s touch melted me, blistering with the same heat he poured within me.
An eruption of warmth soothed my tormented core, but it only enhanced the daze of my submission that lost me to vision, sound, and everything that wasn’t Nicholas.
I shuddered, again and again, crying his name and bursting to tears. He took me into the strength of his arms before I crumbled. I clutched the power and heat and scent and him, but still the damning waves of cresting, unending ecstasy tore my muscles and leaded my body. I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t move. Couldn’t feel anything over the stillness of my heart—or maybe it was a raging, fluttering pulse that so ceaselessly beat.
His kiss stole my precious air. The wracking pressure clenched everything inside me, and my slickness coated my slit and thighs with more excitement, more seed.
Nicholas murmured words of affection and love and admissions I couldn’t yet return.
He shattered me.
His hand brushed my cheek.
He put me back together.
He cradled me within his lap, and I stole any bit of strength he could offer. He gave it all, holding me close as the world faded into the comforting darkness and shielded shadow.
He kissed the tears away. I braved the golden stare. It saw through me, but I forced a smile anyway.
Nicholas’s whisper bound me under his control. “I didn’t expect you to last.”
Me either, but I’d never admit it.
“You can’t break me, Nicholas Bennett.”
His words promised only ravaging domination. “There’s no need. You’re already mine.”
His kiss exhausted me. I fell limp in his arms, just how he had planned. I rested, granted only a moment of peace.
“Damn.” Reed’s laugh was wicked. “Let’s make her do that again!”
8
Sarah
The Bennetts often boasted of their twenty-five thousand square foot mansion.
And every inch of it had trapped me like a prison. No freedom. No escape. They tucked me away and the real world carried on without me.
Even worse, I measured my captivity in humiliating cycles.
Three failed pregnancy tests since Nicholas kidnapped me. Three failed tests since I last drove, made a phone call, or answered my email. Three tests since I last lived like a normal person without a collar around my neck.
The estate was always so quiet, like a lingering despair leeched from the walls. If I couldn’t steal the keys Nicholas’s Mercedes, Max’s Aston Marten, or Reed’s bike, the least I could do was sneak outside.
A bikini packed within my dresser. I hesitated before changing into the vulnerable suit.
I never used to fear being exposed. I hated it.
Cowering in my bedroom only gave Darius more power over me, but it also kept me safe.
Christ.
It wasn’t as though I had a lock on my door anyway. Nicholas was my chain and deadbolt, but hell if I knew which side of the door he secured.
“Come on, Hamlet.” I whistled for him to follow. “Time for some fresh air.”
He bumbled along beside me, droopy with sleep. At least I had a bodyguard…even if he’d trip over his own feet before charging to my side.
The pool was my first real test of the estate’s boundaries, and it shamed me that it took so long to make my break. I ignored the fear that prickled my spine. I wasn’t letting Darius get to me, not now that we finally had a chance to defeat him. Once I earned my trust, I’d bury Darius Bennett in stolen shares.
Big talk for someone who tip-toed onto the patio so no one would hear.
I shivered in the cold shadow of the estate’s Corinthian stone. The wings and windows, arches and balconies jutted against the pristine landscape. Darius built a temple of wealth and opulence without regard for the natural beauty inherent in the Santa Cruz Mountains.
The gardens shielded me behind roses and grape arbors. The serene salt-water pool, licked with fountains and teased into infinity edges, circled the mansion and trickled to the garden with a clean, blue and white tile. Artificial and cold, like all things Darius.
But the space was charming, and the poolside cabana offered me a lounger and radio. I turned the music on low and collapsed on the chaise with a book. The mini-bar was stocked with soda, and I tossed Hamlet a couple ice cubes. He chased after three before falling face-first into the pool. About what I expected. He crawled out and snoozed in the sunshine while I relaxed and enjoyed my book.
We both flinched when Reed jogged through the garden, shouting my name.
“Sarah? Where the hell are you?”
I sighed. Hamlet flipped out, bursting from the pool only to dive onto the grass and roll his way to my step-brother.
“Christ, there you are.” Reed hobbled between Hamlet’s darting circles. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”
I glanced around the cabana—perfectly still, quiet, and serene before he excited my dog. Reed faked throwing a ball. Hamlet stumbled into the pool and dove to find the imaginary toy.
“Should I have left a note?” I asked.
Reed rummaged through the mini-bar and found a beer. He chugged it despite the sun hardly reaching its prime.
“Don’t pull that passive aggressive bullshit with me. Nick’s the heir. He can afford to fuck around.”
I snickered. “Your panties are wound today.”
“I’m supposed to be babysitting you. I answer one call, and you’re gone.”
I tugged on his arm to read his watch. “I’ve been out here for like, two hours.”
“Christ.”
“Hell of a phone call.”
“It’s a disaster. We lost the cream puffs.”
I closed my book. “My God. Have you informed the president?”
“They’re for the Bennett Foundation Gala, smartass. I’m trying to finalize these preparations.” He jiggled his bottle for the last few drops. “Jesus, it’s one crisis after another. The lights, the band, the food. The bakery called to cancel, said they had a fire. I told them to get in line. I’ve been putting mine out all week.”
“Time to bust out the apron.”
Reed didn’t look at me. “I gotta do something. They’re…kinda my mom’s thing.”
I quieted.
“She used to be the one managing our charity events. She had one signature dessert—these cream puffs. People would attend just to taste them
. It’s pretty much the only thing of hers I tried to…replicate.”
It wasn’t my place to feel guilt for her death, and yet the weight of my surname would have sunk me to the bottom of the pool.
“There’s a place in Cherrywood Valley,” I said. “Josiah dated the owner for a while—Chocolate Haven. She helped…” My turn to wade through grief. “She helped with their funerals and wakes. If you give her my name, she’ll drop everything.”
Reed grinned. “Look at you. Helping a Bennett.”
“You’re no Bennett. You’re my Reed.”
“You mean it?”
“Of course.”
The dimple flashed. “I wonder what you’ll call me when it’s my baby in your belly.”
“You really have no tact.”
He held his hands up. “Just saying. I got a good feeling.”
“Maybe next time.”
The smile faded, like the sun hid behind a cloud. “Fuck, seriously?”
“Took the test this morning.” I winked. “Atwood Industries is safe for another month.”
“Damn it.”
I flicked through my book. “Yeah, well, you tried your best. Made hay while the sun shone and whatnot.”
Reed snickered. “You fucking love this.”
“Don’t you?”
“Yeah, but I don’t broadcast it.”
“How am I broadcasting it?”
He gestured over my bikini. “Exhibit Fucking A.”
“Oh, come on.”
“That little string thing?” Reed grinned. “You’re begging me to rip it off, bend you over, and fuck you right here.”
“Wishful thinking.”
“You’d love it.”
I shook my head.
“I’d let you love it.”
Now he had my attention.
The book closed. Reed charmed, though he didn’t apologize for the agonized pleasure he and his brothers forced me to endure only a few nights before.
“You know me.” He leaned close, the sea-green of his eyes revealing everything. He’d be sinful if he dropped the smirk. Reed didn’t hide his excitement, not in his voice, and certainly not in the hardness testing his jeans. “I just want to give you the experience of a lifetime.”
