I swallowed. He wasn’t quite choking me. He was angry at me, and the reasons were stupid and illogical, and what else did he think I would do?
“What choice do I have? Youknowthat. You knew it already, that I agreed to this island, to CNC here.”
“I did. I still hate it. I hate that you let him…” He let his head flop back and gazed skyward. “Fuck. God. Fuck me, I’m—”
“Oh.” Cassius was supposed to be the man with even more control than the doctor, and I was sowrong.
But the more he talked the less afraid I was, in spite of his hold on my throat. My terror had gone back into hiding, leaving only the twitch of its tail to remind me it existed.
I rallied, and my ornery streak pushed me forward.
“I can’tnotdo this…” Trailing off in my reply, I figured out why he was so annoyed, why this irrational outburst and it was ridiculous. “Let me go?”
He scowled, pulled me nearer, and kissed my forehead then slowly maneuvered me until my back was against the trunk of a dead tree, an outlier from the forest. “Why?” He pushed his leg between mine. The dress was thin. The muscle in his leg was obvious as he pressed in.
I swallowed a lustful whimper and gasped a sigh so soft it was nothing. He couldn’t have heard it—it was lost in the backdrop of his harsh breathing, in the wind ruffling the leaves, and in that fucking incandescent fire in his gaze.
Crap.Doms had a possessive streak, but I didn’t know him. I didn’tlikehim.
“I can’t defy the doctor.” I frowned and thought some more. “I never thought this would turn me on—struggling against what he wants from me. But it does.” Gently, I touched his hand where it lay at my neck. My fingertips grazed his knuckles one by one. “Let me go, please?”
“Get on your knees. Open that mouth.” He fumbled at his belt while he pushed me down. I dropped to the beach, and my knees buried in cold sand.
I was still aware of my desires, those leftovers from the spanking—wanting and wishing for more.
But not this. Not like this.
“No. This isn’t you. Did I see you so badly? Are you the sort of man who forces? I haven’t agreed to this.” I resisted, maintaining full eye contact until he gave way. He begrudged every inch I took back, but he gave way. Slowly, I rose to my feet. “Is this who you are?”
He was still seething, but he had let me rise.
“You have some balls, Charity.” He raised his hands to shoulder height. “You’re right. This island, this fucked-up setting, it got to me.”
We should have returned to the house, then and there. When he tentatively reached for me again, I put up my hand as if to stop him, I swayed backward, but I stayed.
I had a feeling my curiosity was about to bite me.
His hand found my face and cradled my jaw; his thumb pushed inside my mouth then pulled out to paint my lips with my own saliva. I swear I heard a rumble, a growl from him. He dragged me closer and lowered his head as if to kiss me. I placed my hand on his chest.
He paused a breath away from meeting my mouth. “You’re not struggling.”
I blinked. “I don’t trust you enough for that.” Should I tell him I kind of hated him for what he’d just done?
The gears were turning in his head. “Trust. I get it. The doctor touching you made me a little crazy.”
“A little?”
“I’m only human. Whenever I’m here, I could give you what you need. We can do it away from him.” With his thumb, he rolled out my bottom lip. “I love watching women struggle to get away. Why else do you think I was at a CNC party?”
“You forgot the consent part.” I poked him with my forefinger, and he grabbed it and kept it.
“You think?”
Had he not just despised me for having a kink that he shared? He was the opposite side of the coin, of course. Heads you get to be the victim. Tails you’re the scary predator, the hunter, the man-monster who makes girls cry then suck their dick.
“I can give you what you need,” he repeated.
“I’m not deaf.” He wanted me, but I wanted to leave the island and return to the real world. “Get me out of this, and we can be together?” Was I lying? I would do and say anything in that moment, for freedom.