With the second shove came bared teeth from Agent Reyes, lips pulling back in a snarl as the black of his eyes swallowed the sun whole. All that was left was midnight beauty and the promise of hellfire.
“Stop fucking pushing me,” he lashed out, the cruel cut of his features kindling to my pervasive flames. They surged inside of me, charging all the way to my lungs, stealing the breath right out of me to the point I literally had to think to breathe.
His handsome face was obscured by rage, and I reared my arm back in preparation to turn that rage to something murderous.
With a cry, I slapped my hand forward, picturing the target on the hollow of Agent Reyes’ cheek. That cry snapped in half as he caught my attempt, fingers rolling around my wrist with bruising possibilities. Yes.
“There’s that fire, Agent! Let's see if we can make it roar.” My voice vibrated, low and ominous, and in a second, I was jumping off of the bed and beelining it for the door.
The lock was flipped in place, and I knew my attempt was nothing more than stimulant to his temper, but when an arm looped around my waist and crushed—I knew it was working.
My feet left the ground as he hoisted me up and over his shoulder, scorching blood sliding down my veins to fill my head. A howl sung from deep inside of me as an unexpected sting raced hot across my ass.
“That didn’t work the first few times you tried it, so I suggest you fucking stop.”
He spanked me. He actually fucking spanked me.
My ass still burned with the slap of his hand, my lips twitched and I almost smiled. I knew he had it in him. Hanging over his shoulder as I was as he walked back to the middle of the room, I found myself face to face with his perfect ass and smirked.
“Shit!” A delighted cackle broke out of me as I ran my fingers over my reddening hand, the favor more than repaid.
“Okay, fuck this.”
Those were the last words I heard before the world flipped around me, and I fell with an ‘oof’, my back catching my fall on the mattress. I bounced, the hot blood filling out to my ears throwing my vision around before a large hand around my throat brought me full-focus.
The hand pressed to my collarbone, threatening just enough to excite the fire.
“That’s enough,” Reyes hissed, eyes slits of dominance as he hovered over me.
“Careful there, James,” I breathed. “Your kink is showing again.”
Before he could respond or retract his hand from around my throat, I circled his hips with my legs, forcing him between me and tugging him down close. His body fell with my movements, fingers squeezing around my windpipe as he used my neck to steady himself.
My hand flashed out, securing around his thick neck just the same, and clenched just enough to watch the surprise in his eyes soar.
Agent Reyes’ hips pressed between my legs, the roughness of his jeans sliding along my bare thighs as I locked my feet behind his back, fixing him to me. Locks of disheveled dark hair fell across his hooded eyes, fracturing their intensity.
His pulse was flying beneath my grip, fluttering as his eyes roved my face, jumping to my parted mouth down to his hand coiled around my thin neck, like he couldn’t catch up to the moment fast enough to react to it.
Purposefully, I swallowed hard, watching stars billow across his midnight eyes as I teased the feeling of my weakness beneath him. He felt me, how easy it would be to hurt me, to break me, to snap me in half if he wanted to.
Agent Reyes had a darkness lurking, hiding in the shadows of his prickly façade, and I wanted to meet it. Have a go at it and rip it front and center, watch it bleed his goodness dry to a husk of wickedness and consume me whole. The fire demanded it, clawing with razor-like talons beneath my skin.
I wanted Reyes to rip my fucking skin off and smother the fire with his darkness, suffocate me until I was smoke and sin.
“You did this to me, James.” A heaviness dropped his eyelids a fraction as his name occupied my mouth. It was a murmur. A taunt of wills. “You took me on that plane. You pulled my trigger without a second thought, and now I want you to fix it.”
Rays of guilt streaked his gaze, like beams of sunlight breaking through plumes of black clouds.
“I said I’m sorry. I meant that I’m sorry. What do you want from me, Scarlett?” The husk of his voice was practically a plea, begging me to instruct him on exactly what it was I wanted him to do next with that stalking darkness of his.
“Hurt me,” I whispered, my own desperation clotting my throat.
Make the fire stop.
“Choke me.”
Make the fire stop.