Page 29

Beckett Sinclair.The name reverberates through my mind like a warning bell. Not just any man—Beckett fucking Sinclair. The same man whose name makes rooms go silent. The same man who built an empire from nothing and then vanished behind it like a ghost. The man who never shows his face unless he wants something.

My body goes rigid beneath him. The pleasure that had consumed me seconds ago turns to ice in my veins. This isn't some game anymore. This isn't just a masked stranger in the woods playing predator and prey.

"You know who I am," he says. Not a question but a statement, his eyes studying my face with clinical precision.

I swallow hard. "Everyone knows who you are."

A ghost of a smile touches his lips. "And yet you still asked me to remove my mask."

My heart hammers against my ribs. What was I thinking? Men like Beckett Sinclair don't just appear in the woods andclaim random women. This was calculated. Deliberate. Everything with him has a purpose—that's what they say about him. He doesn't chase; he simply decides what's his.

And somehow, impossibly, he decided on me.

"Why me?" The question escapes before I can stop it.

His finger traces my jawline, gentle yet possessive. "Why not you?"

The casual arrogance in his tone sends a shiver down my spine—equal parts fear and something far more dangerous. Something that makes me want to lean into his touch even as every instinct screams at me to run.

I try to focus, to think clearly despite the warmth of his body still pressed against mine. This is Beckett Sinclair. The man doesn't play games—he orchestrates them. And somehow, I've become his latest acquisition.

God help me.

"Don't act like this was anything more than?—"

"Than what?" He cuts me off, fingers tracing the edge of the collar. "A hunt? A claim?"

I swallow hard. "Than a game."

"Games have rules," he murmurs, leaning closer. "This? This turned into something else entirely."

And God help me, I don't want him to let go.

My body is still trembling, muscles clenching around the memory of him. Each shallow breath feels like another wave of sensation, my skin oversensitive, marked, claimed. When his hips roll once—slow and deliberately cruel—I can't help the gasp that escapes.

"You took that so well," he murmurs, voice thick with satisfaction. The words should infuriate me. Instead, they send another shiver through my body.

I should push him away. Slap him. Something. But when he finally pulls out, so slowly, I whimper instead.

Then he moves, pulling his black shirt off in one fluid motion that makes me forget how to breathe. Tattoos dance across his skin like shadows—black ink tracing lines of muscle, telling stories I'm desperate to understand. He's brutal beauty incarnate—hard lines, no softness, pure Beckett Sinclair.

His eyes rake over me, something unreadable behind his expression. Then, surprisingly gentle, he pulls the shirt over my head.

I flinch—but only because the softness feels more dangerous than his earlier roughness.

The fabric smells like him. Leather. Fire. Ruin. It swallows me whole, covering everything and somehow feeling more intimate than the way he just claimed me.

When I look up, my voice is a rasp. "Why did you?—"

But he's already moving, fingers brushing my cheek, pushing hair back, tracing my jaw. He touches me like he's waiting for me to break, to flinch. To give him some reason to reassert control.

I don't.

His fingers curl under my chin, firm but not cruel. Tilting my face up to meet his gaze.

"Shhh," he whispers.

The sound settles into my ribs, soft and absolute.