by Linzi Basset
For a moment, Rachel was too shocked to move. The last thing she expected was for him to remind her of that night. She pushed the chair back and got up.
“I’m leaving.”
“Sit down, Rachel.”
Her buttocks hit the chair without her brain issuing the order. His dark voice echoed in her mind and once again toggled at an emotion deep inside her that was confusing the living daylights out of her.
What the freaking hell just happened? It was inconceivable that her body would react to his command. He wasn’t the boss of her and she’d be damned if he bullied her into staying. Then why the devil am I still sitting and not running out the door?
“We started something that night, Rachel and I for one haven’t forgotten one second of it. I have every intention of building on the foundation we laid.”
“The foundation crumbled the morning after, Mr. Scott. Surely, the fact that I’ve shunned your efforts since is proof I’m not interested.”
“Had it been any other woman, I’d concede, but you’re different, Rachel.” He stretched out his legs under the table. He smiled at her gasp as he tangled them with hers. She wondered briefly why she just sat there and didn’t yank them from between his hard calves. “You intrigue me and awakened a beast inside me that has become exceedingly impatient for another taste of you.”
“I suggest you reign in your beast, Hunter Scott. If there’s one thing I’m not interested in, it’s a repeat of the vile encounter you offered that night.”
“Vile?” His eyes sharpened as they traced over the darkening blush covering her cheeks. “Hmm, if my memory serves me correctly, you became a sexual siren under my tutelage, little one.” He held up his hand when her lips parted to snap at him. “Spare me the attempt at contempt, Rachel. I expect more from you. Honesty, at the very least.”
Rachel pressed her lips together but the glare she shot at him spoke volumes. She grabbed another bread roll and took her time buttering it in an effort to calm her frayed nerves. She should’ve left when she had the chance. There was a reason she’d avoided Hunter Scott for the past two years. He awakened desires and needs inside her that were—well, lascivious and completely unaccepted by any of the social standards her parents had instilled. The one time she’d indulged in relaxing her stringent morals, she’d been left like a zombie for months afterwards. One that couldn’t touch any part of her body without being inundated with memories of his hands, his lips, and tongue doing unspeakable things to her.
All had culminated in drowning her with guilt. Torment that she’d turned to sexual gratification the day after her parents’ funeral and it was all she could think about for months after instead of mourning the loss of her beloved family.
Six hours in the presence of this man would be detrimental to her senses, not to mention her libido that was already hovering on the edge.
Rachel took a sip of wine to wash down the bread and for some added courage before she looked at him. “Here’s honesty for you, Hunter. I indulged in one night of debauchery. I have no desire to repeat it.”
Liar! She ignored the voice in her head and returned his speculative stare unflinchingly.
“Come here, Rachel.” He patted his lap. “Right here. Now.”
Once again, her body reacted without any thought of complying.
What the hell is going on? She glared at him like it was his fault she was planted on his lap, perched like a willing chicken on a coop. Her muscles gathered to jump up but his large hand settled on her hip and the other across her thighs.
“No.” One word but it packed a punch of such command, she had no option but to obey. “It’s time you acknowledge the needs deep inside you yearning for escape, Rachel. You’ve hidden behind the death of your parents long enough. It’s time to start living again, little one.”
“And I suppose you’re the man to show me how,” she said.
Her voice lowered to a husky lilt that packed a formidable punch to his cock twitching in reaction. Her gasp was testament that she’d felt the hardening under her soft cheeks.
“I’m the only man capable of unshackling those chains holding you hostage, Rachel.”
“You’re delusional. I’m not shackled by anything and you’re the last man I’d—what the devil do you think you’re doing?” she ended in a shriek and grabbed at his hand inching up under her skirt.
“Let go.”
The grip on his wrist relaxed as she glanced around, expecting Liam to walk in on them any moment.
“Put your hands around my neck and spread your legs.”
“I have no … dammit! How do you do that?” she snapped as she found her arms locked around his broad shoulders and worse! Her knees fell apart.
“You have to ask? No matter how hard you try to pretend you don’t remember our night together, I have no doubt you know what I’m all about and exactly what it is I want from you.”
“Stop,” she begged softly as his hand trailed higher and caressed the soft insides of her thighs.
“After.” His eyes held hers captive with such heat in his darkening gray irises it felt like she was about to melt.
“A-after what?”
“I verified that your little pussy is still as hot and tight as I remember.”
Rachel’s nails cut into his skin as his fingers deftly made their way under the black lace panties and tapped her clit before he brushed them with tormenting slowness over her slit.
“Ah, fuck, little one. My memory didn’t deceive me,” he growled as he pushed two fingers deep inside her. Her breathing hitched before it exploded in breathless gasps as he twirled them in seductive circles, deliberately stoking the dormant fires to life.
“You have to stop,” she croaked.
Her lip suffered the abuse of her teeth as he twisted his hand to toggle her clit with his thumb. He started to pump his fingers in and out, finger fucking her with an expression of dark delight on his face. He watched her with glittering eyes until her face crystallized in a grimace of pleasure-pain. With a wicked grin, he withdrew his fingers. Her mewl-like groan was proof she’d been on the brink of a climax. He tipped back her chin to force her gaze to his. Her eyes widened as he lifted his fingers and with deliberate pleasure, licked her essence from them.
“And you still taste like the sweetest honey.”
Rachel’s cheeks flamed. She refused to give credence to how sexy and deeply enjoyable it was to watch this powerful man lick the proof of her sexual enjoyment from his fingers. She dropped her hands and struggled to get off his lap. His hand on her hip kept her in place.
“Enough. I refuse to be played with like a puppet in a public place. This isn’t the kind of date I paid for. I’m leaving.”
“No, you’re not. I wasn’t playing with you. This was so you realize just how much you crave what I have to offer.” Hunter’s sigh dragged out like the midday sun over a long Texas afternoon at her obstinate expression. “Okay, I promise to behave. I meant what I said earlier, Rachel. I want us to get to know each other.”
She glared at him with suspicion painted on every line of her face. “Fine, but know this, the first time you break your promise, I’m outta here.”
“I’m a man of my word and I’ll behave until midnight. Then, my little dove, the beast is coming out to play.”
Chapter Three
Rachel had been in two minds all the way to his ranch as she followed him from the restaurant later that evening. Here, it would be all too easy to give in the lure of seduction every line of his body promised.
“Well, you’re here now. Just keep your head, Rachel. Don’t let him bamboozle you into his bed!”
She cut the engine of the Chevrolet Silverado and stared at the lit house with wide eyes. She’d never been on Hunter’s ranch and didn’t know what to expect but would never have envisioned such a modern place in an area filled with historical ranch houses.
It looked like a cut out from Architects Today Magazine. It was beautiful but not in the old-world q
uaint kind of way she was usually drawn to. Everything was geometric, which could be said about almost any pitched roof abode with square windows, but on this house, it was more prominent. The roof was flat for a start and the door was as wide as it was tall. The windows took up entire walls with only dark wood beams to break them into more rectangles. The look would have been entirely modern, like a mini downtown skyscraper, had it not been for the cedar beams of the external porch and the matching raised plant beds that contained only white blooms.
All in all, it portrayed the man Hunter was. Bold, confident, and powerful.
“And I shouldn’t be here,” she whispered. She’d been sitting on eggshells throughout dinner as his graveled promise kept running through her mind.
“... the beast is coming out to play.”
She wasn’t naive about what he’d meant, and yet, here she was, in front of his house like a proverbial lamb walking to its own slaughter.
“Gawd, no man should look as gorgeously fuckable,” she complained as she watched him get out of the truck. The times she’d seen him in town he was usually dressed in jeans and flannels or t-shirts. Tonight, he’d paired black jeans with a white shirt and a tailored black jacket. He looked good enough to eat … or lick. Definitely to lick! He stopped at the back of his truck with his hands pushed into the pockets of his jeans. She could imagine the look in his eyes was dark and contemplating and she felt it daring her over the distance.
“I’m so going to regret this,” she moaned as she opened the door and got out, aware of his eyes trailing over her from top to bottom as she approached.
“I have to say, little one, it’s very refreshing to see you in a dress.” His voice lowered. “You look very beautiful.”
“Thank you.” She looked pointedly at the door. Lately, she wasn’t one for compliments and didn’t really know how to react to them. Just another reminder of how reclusive her life had become over the past two years. “Shall we go inside?”
He chuckled but took her arm and led her to the porch. His breath teased the hair at her temple. “You better get used to hearing it, baby, because I say what I see and feel.”
Rachel chose not to respond. It was feeble to start another debate about their future. His constant reference to it proved he was adamant they would be in a relationship. Almost as much as she was convincing herself the opposite. It didn’t slip her mind that she had to constantly remind herself of that, like it hadn’t been a firm decision already made.
“You have a beautiful home,” she said as they walked inside and she looked around the vast open space. The walls were fashionable shades of white and the floor warm and inviting wood, covered here and there with deep red and green Persian carpets. There was no sentimentality for curtains in favor of allowing light in during the day and offering an uninterrupted view of the gorgeous lake and landscape she knew surrounded the property. She walked over to the wall next to the staircase.
“These are gorgeous,” she gushed as she examined the most astonishing black and white family and landscape photographs. “Who took them?”
“I did.”
Rachel glanced at him sideways. She noticed the sad expression on his face as he stared at the pictures.
“Photography is a hobby of mine.” The slight tremor in his voice hinted at hiraeth and found resonance deep inside her. It was how she felt every day about leaving her practice. She loved the ranch, and working with the animals eased the pain, but it could never fulfill the emptiness inside her; the pleasure of nursing horses to health, the challenge of saving an injured animal when others believed it impossible.
“You wanted to become a professional photographer,” she said on impulse.
His eyes darkened as he looked down at her, his expression turned stark. He shrugged and cast another glance at the photos. “I learned early in life that fate can be a hard taskmaster. Life dealt me a bad hand of cards at a very young age.” He smiled wryly and pointed at them. “At least I haven’t lost it all. I can still do these.”
Rachel was disappointed when he didn’t continue. She didn’t know anything about his family or where he came from. All she knew was what was available on the internet. Apart from his corporate achievements and success as a horse breeder who had many ranches across the States, there was nothing about his private life. Nothing but what the tabloids raved over—his roguish ways of consorting with every eligible woman in Texas.
She scrutinized the pictures, trying to find something of Hunter in those images that said so much in the emotions portrayed in the monochrome capture.
“Come sit with me, little one.”
She turned away reluctantly to join him in the living room. He sat on a sofa facing the window, which she imagined during the daytime would offer a magnificent view of the lake.
“No, here, next to me.” His deep voice timbered over her. She hesitated and stared at him indecisively. “Nothing will happen that you don’t want to, Rachel. All I ask is that you open your mind to the possibilities of unbound pleasure I offer.”
“Like you did that night?”
“You seem to have an unhealthy fixation on that night; for whatever reason, which I find hard to fathom. So, let’s cast it aside and start fresh. A new page so to speak.”
“I’ll sit with you on one condition.”
His one eyebrow did a slow crawl toward his hairline. It was so damn sexy; all Rachel could do was stare at the bad boy look it gave him. Debonair but as sexy as the devil himself.
“We’re not having sex tonight.”
“That had never been the plan, little one, but I do have something … intimate in mind.” He patted the sofa next to him. “Sit.”
She plonked onto the sofa, but try as she might, she couldn’t relax. The roughness in his voice when he’d promised something intimate was too seductive to ignore. Why she even sat down after he’d said it was a mystery to Rachel’s once again frayed mind. He was shifting gears too fast for her to keep up with him. She looked at her watch. It was just after ten.
“It’s not midnight yet.”
He guffawed with such delight she could feel the heat turning her face rosy.
“Indeed, but again, all you need to do is say no … and mean it, and I’ll stop whatever I’m doing.” He turned her face to look into her eyes. “Agreed?”
“What exactly do you have in mind?”
Hunter studied her for a couple of silent moments. His lips flattened as he came to a decision.
“You are a very intriguing and complex woman, Rachel, but one thing I learned without a shadow of a doubt on that night two years ago is that you’re a natural submissive.”
Rachel blinked as the implication of what he was saying drove home. She hadn’t really understood what was happening that night, except that the way he’d sexually dominated her had completely fried her mind. She’d been unable to reach the same level of sexual satisfaction ever since. And she’d tried. The books she’d gobbled up over the past two years and the abundance of research had been informative. Because of that, she knew exactly what he was alluding to.
And she was damned that deep inside she echoed his conviction. She might not be a submissive in the true sense of the word, but she yearned to experience what he’d given her a glimpse of before. She knew enough about BDSM now to know Hunter was a powerful Dom.
“How do you know?” She was surprised as the words echoed back at her, since she’d had no intention of voicing her thoughts.
“Your reaction to me that night as well as earlier at the restaurant. The way your body obeyed my commands while your mind denied it.” He took her hand in his and traced the veins lightly before he turned it over and teased the lines on the inside of her palm.
The soft caresses triggered her libido like it had been zapped by a bolt of lightning.
“From your reaction, I assume you’re not completely ignorant about domination and submission.” He hesitated briefly. “Or what a BDSM lifestyle entails.”
“I’v
e read fiction about it and as a result did research to completely understand the dynamics involved.”
“And?”
Rachel was hard pressed not to run out the door. He was too intense, too there and she had a suspicion he knew exactly she was at war with the feelings in her mind. She wasn’t sure she was ready for such a leap in her life. One thing she’d learned was that a Dom/sub relationship didn’t automatically mean there would develop anything more between them. Love and marriage were completely separate in many cases from living a BDSM lifestyle. She’d read about women who were involved with a Dom while married to a vanilla man.
It wasn’t something Rachel would ever be able to do. For one thing, she was too possessive. Secondly, Hunter gave credence to his name. He was a hunter, through and through, and from what the tabloids reported, he enjoyed catching his prey. As a powerful Dom, she highly doubted he’d be willing to give up on the variety offered to be with one woman.
“And no matter how my body reacted, as a woman I’m not interested in changing my lifestyle or submitting to a sexually Dominated relationship.”
Liar! She cringed at the amused expression on Hunter’s face that echoed the taunting of her inner voice.
“Care to test that theory, Rachel?” He lifted her hand and nibbled on her palm before placing a deeply sensual open-mouthed kiss in the center.
She bit back the moan as a rush of pheromones soared through her veins to present itself in a wet patch between her legs. She pressed her thighs together to contain the wild lust that set her loins throbbing and her clit pulsing in a demanding rhythm.
“There’s nothing to test,” she managed to croak lamely. For the life of her, she couldn’t gather the strength to pull her hand from his grasp. A soft moan escaped her lips as he dragged his tongue back and forth over the length of her palm.
Good lord! I’m on the verge of a climax!
“I disagree.” He caught her eyes with a scorching look.
