Page 27 of Dirty Game

I stare at him. "What?"

"Open your mouth."

My lips part automatically at the command in his voice.

He steps closer, holds the strawberry to my lips. "Bite."

I bite.

Chocolate cracks under my teeth, then the burst of sweet fruit.

Juice runs down my chin, and his thumb catches it, wipes it away slowly. We both freeze at the contact.

His thumb traces my bottom lip, and I can't breathe, can't think.

There's chocolate there too, and he wipes it away with deliberate slowness, his thumb dragging across my lip in a way that makes my whole body go hot.

"You have no idea, do you?" His voice is rough, dark. "No idea what you look like. What you do to me."

"I don't understand."

"I know." His thumb presses slightly against my bottom lip, and my mouth parts involuntarily. "That's what makes it worse. You sit there and take their abuse because you think you deserve it. You let them reduce you to parts—mouth, cunt, the space between your thighs. But you don't even know what those parts are for. What they could be for."

"I know what I'm for," I whisper against his thumb. "Uncle Enzo made it very clear. I'm currency."

"No." He cups my face with his whole hand, thumb still on my lip. "You're not currency. You're not payment. You're mine. And that means something different than what your uncle taught you."

"What does it mean?"

He leans closer, and I can smell him—whiskey and blood and that dark cologne. "It means I protect you. Defend you. Break anyone who tries to hurt you." His thumb traces my lip again. "It means you eat when I tell you to eat. Sleep when I tell you to sleep. It means you're safe."

"And what do you get?"

His eyes darken. "I get to watch you learn that you're worth more than your virginity. Worth more than six million dollars. Worth breaking bones over."

He pulls back, and I want to chase his touch.

Want to lean into his hand.

Want things I don't have words for.

"Why did youreallybreak his nose?" I ask. "And his wrist?"

"They insulted what's mine."

"You let them insult me for fifteen minutes before that."

His jaw tightens. "I was testing something."

"What?"

"How much you'd take. How deep the conditioning goes." He moves back to the window, the distance between us like cold water. "Your uncle did a number on you. Your brother, too. Made you think you deserve that kind of treatment."

"Maybe I do."

He turns on me so fast I gasp.

In two strides, he's back, hands on either side of me on the bed, caging me in.