Page 15 of Hunting Gianna (Stalkers in the Woods #3)

My body hums with need, with the absolute certainty that soon I’ll have her.

I can almost taste the sweat and salt of her skin, the sound of her heartbeat stampeding against her ribs as I pin her down and make her understand.

The anticipation burns through me, crawling up my arms, winding around my neck until my vision sharpens and everything else falls away.

When the sun cracks the horizon, I move.

The outpost is silent, but I feel her inside—coiled and bristling, the way a wild animal waits in the trap, unsure if it should fight or die. I throw my shoulder into the door. The barricade gives way with a splintered shriek, wood exploding into the room as I step through the dust.

I wear the mask. I want her to see it first. Want her to see the demon before she sees the man, so she knows that both are real, and both are hers.

She’s waiting, pressed against the far wall, lips cracked and white with fear. Her eyes are blown wide, whites stained pink with the sleepless dark. For a second, she freezes, and in that second I see the math running behind her stare—run, plead, scream, or maybe just let go.

She doesn’t. She’s better than that.

Instead, she raises an old rifle I must have missed seeing her grab, an old Winchester crusted with rust and spider webs.

She rips it down, aims it straight at my heart.

The barrel trembles in her hands, but her arms are steady.

I see the moment of hope flare inside her, the sick hope that maybe this time, something will break her way.

She pulls the trigger.

The click is so loud it might as well be a gunshot. The room echoes with it, the vacuum of failure. The smell of her despair hits me, metallic and sharp.

I laugh, the sound raw through the mask.

“That hasn’t worked in years,” I tell her, voice thick with delight.

“You really think I’d let you ever raise a gun to me?

Tsk, tsk, little bird, you should understand me a bit better than that, though, I do understand we haven’t exchanged life stories. Yet.”

She screams, a perfect, wordless animal sound.

She hurls the rifle at me, and I let it hit—pain blossoms across my ribs, but it’s nothing compared to the high of watching her fight.

She bolts for the window, tries to pry it open with her bare hands.

I’m on her before she can get a finger beneath the wood.

Funny. The very same window she tried to reinforce to keep me out, is the one keeping her in.

I grab her by the waist, hauling her back towards me.

She rakes her nails across my forearm, drawing blood, then turns and sinks her teeth into my wrist. She bites down hard, hard enough to break skin.

God it hurts so good. Maybe I’ll tattoo her teeth marks on me.

My pulse spikes and I grip her harder, dragging her back against my chest.

She kicks, she twists, every muscle in her body dedicated to the single cause of not being mine.

But that’s the thing: she is.

There is no choice here.

I throw her to the floor, pin her wrists above her head, my body pressing her into the filthy planks.

She spits at me, a feral, furious gesture, and I let it drip down my chin before swiping my tongue over it.

Delicious . It’s perfect, and I want to ruin her, to take every last drop of defiance and squeeze it into something I can keep forever.

She thrashes, screaming again, then grinds her heel into my thigh, aiming for my balls. She almost makes it—I block her with my knee and press down, hard. Her eyes fill with tears, not from pain, but from the bright, helpless rage of it.

I wrench her arms above her, locking them with one hand while I tear the mask off with the other. I want her to see my face when I break her. I want her to remember exactly who she lost to.

Her breath comes in frantic, shallow gasps. Her skin is hot, burning, the veins in her neck blue and perfect against the red flush rising up her cheeks. She hurls a string of curses at me, her voice wrecked, each word a blunt weapon aimed at my skull. I take every one and let it hammer into me.

I grab her jaw, force her to look at me.

“Done?” I ask, voice so low it barely registers over the beat of her pulse.

She bares her teeth, every inch of her vibrating with hate and fear and something else—something that makes her even prettier than before.

“No,” she spits. “Not even fucking close.”

Good girl.

I keep her pinned, feeling her body go slack as the fight drains out. But even then, even when she’s limp in my grip, her eyes never break away. She won’t give me the satisfaction of surrender. Not with her voice. Not with her face.

She doesn’t have to. I love this, I love her, just the way she is, because even behind her anger, her blatantly disrespect, I can see the way her nipples harden. The way her body sighs as it’s forced to submit.

I can feel it in the way her body molds to mine, in the way her hips shift against my thigh even as she tries to pull away. I can feel it in the way her breathing changes, in the way her nails curl and uncurl against my skin, desperate for a grip that isn’t there.

I press my mouth to her ear, close enough to feel her flinch.

“You’re mine now,” I whisper. “Every piece of you. Every fucking thought in your pretty little head.”

She tries to jerk away, but I bite her neck, just below the ear, hard enough to leave a mark. Her gasp is sharp, wounded, but I hear the edge of something else riding under it, a current of need that terrifies her more than I ever could.

I stand, hauling her up with me. She doesn’t fight now, just sags in my grip, the knife edge of exhaustion finally carving its way through the adrenaline.

I drag her out of the outpost, back into the cold morning, both of us drenched in sweat.

The hunt is over. The real work starts now.

It takes an hour to drag her back through the forest.

She puts up a fight for the first fifty yards—threshes, claws, tries to dig in her heels or break free.

She fails, every time, but I let her believe in the effort.

It’s all a show. To try remind me that she’s still got power.

She doesn’t, and she knows it. I want her to have the story of resistance.

Want her to remember every second she tried, and every second she was outmatched.

She stumbles. The bruises on her arms are already blooming, perfect, blue-black, the kind that will linger for a week or more.

Her face is streaked with dirt and tears, but there’s still a stubborn tilt to her chin, even now.

Even after I’ve ruined her. She’ll keep going, keep hoping, keep pushing the limits of what she can stand.

It makes me want to fuck her right here in the mud, but I don’t.

The cabin looms up out of the trees. She sees it and starts to whimper, low and desperate, but doesn’t beg. Not yet. She’s saving it, hoarding the last of her dignity for the moment she needs it most.

I haul her up the steps and inside. The air is warm—too warm, stifling after the chill outside. I let her breathe it in, let her catch her breath, inhaling the deeper animal funk of sweat and old sex that never truly leaves this place.

She stares at the room, at the bed, at the single heavy iron ring bolted to the footboard, a long chain attached by one end with a leather cuff on the other.

One she didn’t notice before, but has been there this whole time.

She knows what’s coming when she spots it. I put there before going on my hunt.

I throw her down on the mattress, face first. She bounces, tries to scramble away, but I’m already on her, knees on either side of her waist as I wrap the cuff around her wrist. The click of the lock is final.

She goes still, forehead pressed to the sheet, hair fanned around her face.

She shakes, not from cold, but from the hopeless, exhausted rage that she can’t get loose.

I stand over her. I want to see every inch of her.

The way her ribs heave with each breath, the way her ass tenses and unclenches as she realizes there’s no escaping me.

I let her stew. Let her feel the weight of the silence and the newness of her captivity.

She flips over, pushing herself to the back of the bed, just watching me.

I unbutton my shirt and strip it off, peeling it from skin still sticky with sweat and dried blood.

Her eyes flick up, just once, and I catch the glint of something electric in them—a flash of recognition that even now, she’s still looking at me.

Still reading me. Still, against all reason, wanting to know what comes next.

“Now we play by my rules,” I say.

She flinches. “Please,” she whispers. “Please, Knox. You don’t have to do this.”

“I do.” I kick off my boots, strip down to bare skin.

I want her to see me as I am—unadorned, unmasked, the man and the monster fused into something she can’t unsee.

“You ran,” I say, walking to the foot of the bed.

“You made me chase. You made me hunt you.” I kneel, stare her dead in the eye.

“Now you will tell me the truth, Gianna.”

She looks away. I grab her chin, force her to meet my gaze. “Say it,” I growl. “Tell me you understand.”

Her throat works, the words trapped behind her tongue.

I squeeze harder. “Say it.”

“I—” She swallows, her voice barely a wisp. “I understand. I…”

“Yes?” I grin, “Does my little bird have something to confess?”

She looks strained as she tries to figure out what the fuck her feelings are. “I hate you. But I want you too.” Even as she says it, she loathes the words. The emotions.

“Good girl.” I let her go. For a second, she slumps, every muscle in her body slack with defeat. But she’s not really defeated. I can see the way her hands twitch, the way she flexes her legs, calculating. She’ll never give up. She’ll never stop.

She’s perfect.

I climb onto the bed, straddling her legs.

The chain on her wrist gives her about eighteen inches of play—enough for most things, but not enough to hurt me unless I let her.

I pull her up to her knees and push her face down onto the mattress again, ripping off her clothes with the movement.

Her ass is bare, skin marbled with dirt and goosebumps.

I rake my nails across it, drawing a line from hip to hip. She shivers.

I spit into my hand and slick my cock, then line it up with her cunt. There really wasn’t any need. She’s wet. Not just wet—soaked, dripping, a hot, sweet mess even after all the hell I’ve put her through.

I laugh, long and low. “Look at you. Ready for me even now. You may hate me, Gianna, but you want me too.”

She tries to shake her head, to deny it, but I slam into her, burying myself to the hilt in one brutal stroke. She cries out, the sound muffled by the sheets.

I fuck her slow, savoring the way her body clenches around me, the way her thighs tremble with every thrust. I grab her chain and use it as a handle, pulling her back onto me, over and over, until she’s gasping, sobbing, but still trying to buck me off.

“You like this,” I say, bending low to bite the curve of her shoulder. “You fucking love it. You love being ruined.”

She shakes her head again, but it’s a lie. I see the way she arches, the way she grinds her ass against me, desperate for more even as she chokes on the shame of it.

I reach around and slide my fingers between her legs, rubbing her clit in slow, tight circles. She whimpers, tries to twist away, but her hips betray her, tilting up to meet my hand.

“Tell me,” I say, pressing down hard. “Tell me you love it.”

She gags on the words, her voice thick with tears and spit. “I—no—”

I slap her ass, hard enough to leave a handprint. “Louder.”

“I—fuck—” Her voice breaks. “I love it. I love it. Please—”

I lose myself in the rhythm, the slap of skin, the music of her surrender. I keep fucking her until she screams, until her whole body locks up and she comes, wild and broken, around my cock.

I don’t stop. I want her to feel it forever. I want her to carry me inside her until the end of time.

When I finally come, I pull out and shoot all over her back, marking her, painting her skin with the truth of who she belongs to.

She collapses onto the bed, sobbing, the chain rattling with every shudder.

I watch her for a long time, savoring the silence, the utter completeness of the moment.

When I finally move, I kneel at her side, stroke the sweat-soaked hair from her cheek. She doesn’t recoil, but I hold her there, gentle, careful, as if she’s something fragile.

She hates me for it. Hates that I can be both monster and caretaker, abuser and savior.

I love her for it.

I bend low, kiss her eyelids, her temple, the line of her jaw. She shakes, but doesn’t pull away.

I whisper, “You’re perfect like this. Helpless. Owned. Mine.”

She says nothing, but her body tells the truth.

The bed dips as I get off and go get the washcloth, taking due care around the cuts and scrapes and bruises.

She needs a long shower, but not now. Rest is what I’m ordering and as soon as she’s asleep, I’ll undo the cuff. For now, a cloth will have to do.

Gianna sighs as I go back and rewarm it, going over her body a second time. I hate that I want to take care of her like this, but I love it, too. She watches me through slitted eyelids, a small smile playing over her lips.

“I don’t understand you.” She whispers.

“What don’t you understand?”

“How you can slit a mans throat, chase me through the woods, fuck me like a madman, and care for me the way you are.” She looks at me. Really looks at me.

“I don’t either. The only thing I’m certain of is that I’d kill a thousand men if it meant you’d look at me the way you are now, for the rest of my life.”

She whimpers, but doesn’t break eye contact.

“Get some rest, Gianna.”

I lie beside her, arm thrown across her waist, the chain running cool and heavy between us.

She’ll sleep. She’ll dream of running, of fighting, of maybe even winning.

But she won’t.

She never will.

Not while I’m here to love her.