My aggressor stared at me, curiosity lighting his darkened gaze.
Maybe I can be his biology experiment.He could take my body back to the university and leave me there as a failed experiment or cage me as a freak show.
Both thoughts tightened my ribcage to the point of implosion, and I gasped for air in short gulps.
“Easy, pretty face. Nice and easy.” His palms stroked my thighs in long, soothing motions.
I nodded and rested my head back, my heart slowing from its frantic beat inside my chest.
His next question ruined the peace he’d managed to blanket me with. “Why did you come to the club tonight?” Deadly light, his teasing touch became intimate, gliding along the crease of my inner thighs, though the coldness in his gaze left a different variety of goose bumps rioting over my bare skin.
I shook my head. The one question he’d asked, and I couldn’t answer it—at least, not in the way he wanted.
My boss kept telling me that honesty wasn’t a desired trait in a journalist, that I needed to be able to hide my feelings, but that had never been the case with me. Everything I thought got displayed straight across my face. Right when I wanted to be dishonest, I knew he would be able to see my lie as soon as I opened my mouth.
“Why did you come to the club tonight?” His tone hardened as his fingertips dug pinpricks into my skin.
The whimpers slipping past my lips transformed into a fully fledged squeal. I shrank back into the shelving, ignoring the brutal razor edges digging into my spine. “I-I-I—”
“Come on, Josie. You can come up with a better lie than that.”
His sneer told me exactly what he would do to me if I did fib, and I swallowed down the truth, burying it deep, and sent a desperate, silent prayer to a god who had never spoken to me.
“I wanted to see what Fray’s Christmas party was like. The legend and all.” The lie left my lips on a trembling breath that might’ve been excused if I hadn’t tried to hold his jet gaze at the same time.
Induct me into the fail army hall of fame right now, please.
Knox didn’t buy into my half-truth for a minute. I knew, reading it in those unforgiving voids where his eyes should be before he opened his mouth that I’d sealed my fate.
“Bullshit.” His claws dug a little deeper, not enough to draw blood, but enough to leave tiny depressions, like the sort you’d get from a pincushion if you pressed too hard. I’d be full of little perforations by the time he released me.
Ifhe released me at all.
“I don’t want to lie to you!” The admission sprang from my lips before I could bite it back. “I don’t want you to hurt me. Please,” I begged, wishing I had a real truth to tell him, but I couldn’t.
Knox stared up at me and canted his head to one side. Disappointment rolled off him in waves. “Fuck me, chipmunk.” His teeth elongated, his claws forming fully where they already pressed into my skin, so fragile against something designed to rip and tear creatures just like me.
I screamed, and his smooth, easygoing features twisted. If I hadn’t been looking down at that moment, I mightn’t have believed that his violence toward me caused him pain as well.
“Let’s try this again.” His claws and teeth retracted, leaving smoothness in their wake. I whimpered as he rubbed over the tenderized spots, encouraging blood flow to return as he seemed to consider his word. “What’s your favorite fantasy?”
Oh, that one I could answer. Leaping into the peace offering he extended, I opened my mouth and let all my truths fall out. “I love being licked,” I replied honestly, looking down at him so he could read whatever he wanted out of my face. “And I love returning the favor.”
“I didn’t ask what you liked, chipmunk.” Disappointment framed his features again. “I asked about your favorite fantasy.”
“Oh.”
People had more than one? I worked, studied, slept, andworked again. The only fantasy I had was of going to sleep without setting an alarm to get up with the sun, but I doubted Knox would like that response, either.
Or maybe he would—but I wasn’t prepared to risk it. I didn’t get the time to consider more than that as his claws skated along my ribs, and he licked my inner thighs in a matching stroke. Heady and spiraling, I could barely think.
“Stop doing that!” I cussed without thinking it through. Knox paused and narrowed his gaze. My tongue tripped over itself as I threw the first thing at him that came to the front of my mind. Again. “My favorite fantasy is… Being held down by two men while one kisses me and the other fucks me.” I blinked at what erupted from my mouth in desperation. “I—”
My God, what had I just admitted? And to who? He already had me strung across the shelving like I was meat. Would he invite a friend in to fulfill this fantasy, too? Horror and more than a little arousal washed over me at the thought.
“I don’t know where that came from!” I blurted, yanking at my bonds.
“Interesting, isn’t it, what our minds say when the body’s defenses are down? Good girl.” He growled this last part, sweeping his tongue across my pussy.