He fixed that steady gaze on me. There was power in every angle of his body, radiating from the lithe curve of his shoulders and down to his fine hands. A little shiver climbed down my spine as the image of those fingers sliding over my body flashed through my mind. Rough hands over my flesh, pushing between my legs.
My stomach turned with disgust. My thighs were tight beneath my coat and my pussy gave a quick throb, a wanton little flutter against the seat. I hoped desperately that he hadn’t noticed the way I clenched my legs, but his gaze had already lowered to my hips. A flicker of amusement crossed his face and his mouth twisted a little at the corner.
Damn him. Less than an hour in the car with me and he was making my head spin. Although, I wasn’t sure if it was from anger or something far more disturbing. I gritted my teeth, digging my fingers into the inner lining of my coat. Something about this man brought out the fire and fight in me. Perhaps it was the way his pale eyes were so guarded and controlled or perhaps it was all that power, coiled up and waiting like a snake.
A little part of me wondered what it would be like if he unleashed it. But the practical part of me never wanted to know. I had been used and bullied by made men, primarily my bastard of a cousin, and I wasn’t eager to slide under the thumb of a new tyrant.
Although, I really didn’t have a choice.
We kept quiet for the rest of the car ride. After another hour of painfully awkward silence, the car pulled up outside a private plane parked on a long runway that faded into the dark. As he walked me across the tarmac, striding at my side without touching my wrist or lower back to guide me, I glanced sideways at his broad frame. His jaw was set, that gash of a mouth like stone. At some point, he’d lit a cigarette and put it to his lips. The smoke trailed behind him as we walked.
I wrinkled my nose. The smell of cigarettes turned my stomach and I veered a few steps further from him. He made a noise in his throat and reached out, his hand curling around my elbow as he pulled me closer.
“Stay with me,” he said.
“I don’t like cigarettes,” I said, pausing at the bottom of the stairs leading up to the private plane. “They wreck your lungs.”
His pale eyes rested on me, washed out in the floodlights. “Really? I never knew that.”
“Yes, they—you’re making fun of me,” I said, scowling.
“I am. Up you go.”
This time his hand rested flat on my lower back, warm and wide just above my backside. A hot, little knot began forming in my stomach, and I dug my fingers into the draping skirt of my dress. A rush of cold air hit my legs and my skin pimpled with goosebumps.
I couldn’t do this, I couldn’t let him take me.
Panic surged like a hot river through me and I turned on my heel and made a mad dash for the darkness outside the tarmac. I hadn’t thought through what I intended to do if I could get away, there was only the overwhelming desire to run pounding through me like a drum. A primal urge to flee like a hunted deer into the forest in the desperate hope that the shadows could offer some protection.
I hadn’t gotten more than a step when a hard arm wrapped around my stomach and dragged me backwards into a wall of stone. The air around me filled with a clean, spicy scent, like cologne and vodka. There was no trace of cigarette smell on him.
“Where were you going?” His breath was warm against the side of my neck and his tone was almost amused.
“Away from you,” I said, teeth gritted.
“You know, you do belong to me according to the barbaric codes of your outfit.”
I glanced up, taking in the sky laden with heavy stars overhead, snow swirling down in thin flurries. No, he was wrong. He had to be wrong because I wouldn’t accept it. Lucien might have traded me over like chattel, but I would never belong to this man. No part of me would ever surrender to him or accept the words he had so boldly murmured into my ear.
“No,” I whispered.
He turned me around and I looked up into the godfather’s pale gaze. There was only a few inches between us and our hot breath filled up the space in a white cloud. If he hadn’t had his big hands wrapped firmly around my wrists, holding me captive, I would have slapped him. I would have fought him like a wildcat, just for the pure pleasure of it. Just to let him know I wasn’t going down without a fight.
“You do,” he said.
I bit my lower lip, chewing furiously on the sensitive flesh. “I will never love you. I don’t give a shit that Lucien gave me to you. I’m not his to give away.”
His heavy eyes flicked over my face. “Pity.”
“Pity?”
“You’ll just wear yourself out. I’ve been fighting a lot longer than you have and I fight dirtier than you know how.”
“Try me.” I jutted my jaw, fixing my gaze on his.
“Oh, I will.”
He took me by the upper arm and hauled me back to the stairs, his grip like iron. My feet skimmed the stairs as he slipped an arm around my waist and lifted me up, carrying me into the plane.