Page 57 of His Haunted Desire

No one says anything.

Raiden stands slowly, looks around the room, holding his hands out at his sides. “If that knife was meant for me, like everyone seems to think, step forward. Make yourself known. We’ll settle this like men, not like rats scurrying around in the goddamn dark.”

He glares around the room, earning thesirI call him in private. He looks firmly in control.

Still–nothing.

After the meeting, we head back to our room. A staff member stands outside our door, mask on his face. Raiden barges through the open door, pacing.

Outside, the storm still rages.

“Was Evangeline telling the truth about the storm stopping?”

“Yeah,” Raiden grunts, still pacing.

I sit on the bed, twisting my hands together. “Can you really not think of anyone who would want you dead? If you die, does Julian get the Blackwell fortune?”

“Not if Grandma has amended her will.”

“What about the other family?”

“There is no one else,” he says gruffly.

“Personal enemies, then. Ex-girlfriends who might’ve hired someone?—”

He walks briskly up to me and takes my hands, hauling me to my feet. “That’s the second time you’ve mentioned ex-girlfriends. Anybody would think you’re using this as an excuse to make sure I’m completely free… completely yours.”

“Completelymine?” I say, placing my hand on his chest, meaning to push him away, but somehow, I tighten my grip on him and pull him closer. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

It’s like something within leaves me with no choice.

“You’re forgetting something,” he snarls, smoothing his hand down my back, aiming a kissing spank against my ass.

“No,you’reforgetting that this is ending in just a matter of hours… sir.”

He spanks me again.

“You moan like you fucking love it,” he says roughly, warm breath whispering over me as he kisses me on the cheek, moving toward my lips.

“I don’t,” I tell him.

“Say that like you mean it.”

“I don’t, sir.”

“You can pretend you don’t want it, Aurora, but every damn time you call me sir, I get so hard I think I might explode. And you know that. But you call me it anyway.Because you want me to be rock hard for you.”

He growls the last sentence like an animal barely holding himself back.

“You wish,” I whisper.

He kisses my neck, then whispers against my ear, “So you’re saying if I touched you, you wouldn’t be wet for me? Tell me, Aurora. Go on–lie to me.”

I lean back in his tight embrace. He stares down at me with feral, hungry eyes, like I’m the solution to all his problems. He looks at me as if he can forget about everything–his past, the murder, his family troubles–when we’re together.

The crazy thing is, I can forget too. Well, almost.

I push against him. “Keep dreaming… sir.”