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“That was definitely an adjustment,” I admit, feeling my stomach tighten with anxiety. He doesn’t seem angry. Not yet. But it sure seems like he’s looking for a reason to be. “And the circumstances were different with the Dukes and their Duchess.” Nick Bruin wanted Lavinia. Fought for her. She wasn’t hoisted on the Dukes the way I was with the Princes after an open cattle call.

He props up on his elbow and reaches for my breast, tweaking the nipple. “I sure as fuck wouldn’t trust her. Once a snake, always a snake. Lucia blood is venom. You’d do well to fucking remember that.”

I don’t respond. The Dukes, West End,Lavinia, they’re all the kind of thing that fuel’s Pace’s paranoia. Instead, I bend and lick the head of his cock, tasting the salty fluid at the tip. Opening my mouth, I suck him, hoping to provide the comfort I know he seeks.

Unfortunately not. “Nothing to say to that, Rosi?”

Pulling off, I sigh, already knowing I’m going to regret it. “I’d say a person is probably more than the name they’re given or the DNA that made them.” Arching a brow, I add, “If anyone could understand that, it should be you and your brothers.”

His eyes flash in a hot, violent way that makes my spine stiffen. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing,” I rush to say. “Just that family is sometimes what we make it.”

He sneers, “And who’s your family, Princess?” Whatever attempt I’ve made to placate him is too little too late, and he rises up on his knees, grabbing my hair at the base of my skull.

Wordlessly, he yanks me up.

Grabbing at his wrist, I cry out, “Pace!”

“You know the thing about snakes?” he asks, breath hot, our faces inches apart. “They live in nests. Is that why you keep going over there, Rosilocks? To slither around with a snake?”

“I-I don’t know what you’re talking about!” My head and neck are bent, trying to keep him from yanking out my hair. “I barely know Lavinia! She’s a Royal and I’m—Iwas—just a cutslut.”

He releases me with a thrust, tossing me off the bed. I land in an inelegant heap, internally berating myself for giving him this. It seems to be a pattern with the Ashby brothers. They have a bad day and decide I should be the one to pay for it.

He looms above me, nostrils flaring as he gives his cock a rough stroke. If he was hard before, now he’s steel, snarling out, “Prove it. Say the fucking words.”

I freeze, knowing full well what he wants. It’s been a while since he’s asked it of me, knowing that I’ll refuse. I’ve been waiting for him to ask again, readying myself for whatever answer I give. The refusal is on the tip of my tongue, but when I look into his obsidian eyes, all I can think to do is comply.

Wetting my lips, I hold his gaze. “I want it,” I whisper, feeling something in my chest wind itself into a tight, worried knot at the lie. “I… want your baby inside of me.”

He told me once I didn’t have to mean it, and I don’t. It’s not about sincerity for him. It’s about the win. The conquered insistence. The knowledge that I’d stoop low enough to abandon my principles, even if it’s only pretend. It’s about subjugation.

And his eyes flash in bright, hot satisfaction at the sound of it. “Show me,” he demands in a low, rough voice. “Show me how much you want your Prince’s seed.”

Slowly, I edge closer, knees inching toward him on the rug, and reach for him, cupping his balls in my hand. I squeeze, eliciting a hiss. His fingers curl in my hair and force my face closer. Opening my mouth, I take in the smooth, swollen crown.

“Fuck,” he mutters, a tremor running through him as he holds my head close. “Knew you wanted it, Rosi.” Trying not to gag, I take him deeper, flattening my tongue over the sensitive underside. Reaching around his body, I dig my nails into his ass cheeks, giving him as much pain as he’s giving me. This is how it eventually goes with Pace. Manipulative and hard. Greedy and paranoid. Mood swings and epic orgasms.

His hand tilts my chin up and he looks down at me, a devilish god. “I’m going to fuck your mouth,” he says, “then I’m going to come in your pussy, filling you up with so much of my seed, there’s no fucking way it won’t make a baby.”

He pulls out, stroking his cock twice with his hand, then slots it back in with a hard thrust. He’s thicker, harder, and I take him deeper than before, wincing at the ache in my throat.

“That’s a girl,” he says, picking up the pace. I sink my nails in deeper, anchoring myself to him, and he gives a breathy, sinister laugh. “You dirty fucking girl.”

I tease him, using my tongue and my teeth, taking long licks over his sensitive slit. He fucks into my lips like a man on a mission. I guess that’s what he is. But what’s the mission? To terrorize me? To break me? Or do we have the same goal? To knock me up.

Over and over again, he pumps inside, and I get the sense that he’s lost in it. Lost in the feel of me on my knees below him, pleasing him. I see it in the glassy haze of eyes as he stares down at me, that hood shading his face. I see it In the way his abdomen tenses with every thrust. I feel it in the thickening of his cock, his fists clenching tightly,painfully,in my hair.

“Oh shit,” he says, spine straightening. The first hot squirt against my tongue is unexpected– just as much as the flash of panic in his eyes. The second hot spurt of semen jolts me into action, and I grab him by the shaft—like that’s going to do anything—but he’s already got me under the arms, lifting me off the ground, and throwing me onto the massive bed.

“Do not,” he growls, wrenching my legs apart, “swallow that.” The look in his eyes is wild and urgent as a thick ribbon of his cum lands on my clit, but he immediately mounts me, slamming inside. Our slickness mingles there, making his entry slick and hot, every fat inch of his cock sliding right into me. I’m propelled, both across the bed and into another world, so hot from the need he has for me, so overcome by the feel of his cock twitching with release.

Pace transforms when he comes.

His jaw gets tighter, brows tugging together with silent agony as I feel him pulsing within my core. Sometimes, like now, he twists his head, looking away with clenched eyes. “Fucking hell, Verity.” Even though he’s as deep as he can possibly go, his hips give these little mindless nudges into mine, like he wishes he could go deeper, and when he finally swings his eyes back to mine, they’re glazed with ecstasy.

“Give it to me,” he says, dipping down to fix his mouth to mine.