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ADRIAN

“ P lay house?” Marisela laughed until the strain on her throat had her coughing. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” she wheezed out.

“Three days. Seventy-two hours. Just you and me. Here. Alone.”

It wasn’t my most original idea. I know…

Dr. Michaels did it first . His little pet only had a few days left on her clock before he did whatever he was going to do with her in that basement.

But true innovation wasn’t spontaneous. It was taking a concept and improving upon it.

Using what you already knew, conducting research, and controlling the variables.

Except where he had given his girl a cage, I was giving mine a castle.

You see, I was nothing if I wasn’t innovative.

“Three days? That’s a lot of time to kill. Sure you have the stamina for all that?” She made a show of looking me over from head to toe .

“This isn’t about sex, Marisela.”

“So three days, alone in this house, and you have no intentions of fucking me?” She lifted a challenging brow.

“Oh, I’m going to fuck you. But that’s not all I’m going to do. I’m also going to show you what it’s like.”

“What what’s like?” she questioned, her curiosity as piqued as the nipples poking through her nightgown.

“What it’s like to really be mine.” I dropped my hand to her chin, tilted her head, and forced her to look me in the face.

Not that she was avoiding eye contact, just too stubborn to give me her full attention.

“What it’s like to be fucked and fed until going to work is more of a chore than an escape.

Until you’d rather be in bed with me than sitting in a boardroom with anyone else. ”

She jerked back and I let her, shoving my hands into my pockets as I watched her cheeks heat at the thought. At the images I was sure were playing in her head. At least they were playing in mine.

“Thanks for the offer, but I’m gonna have to pass.” She swung her legs off the mattress and started to limp towards the door. She wouldn’t get far.

“This isn’t a negotiation, Marisela,” I called after her.

“It’s always a negotiation, Adrian,” she called back, stopping when she tried to yank the door open, only to realize it wouldn’t budge. She glared at me over a shoulder and I smirked.

“Did I forget to mention I had the security updated? Had the entire estate modernized while you were gone. Automatic windows and locks. Cameras… the whole nine yards.”

“How?” One word with a million accusations behind it.

“Once you had Tate declared dead, it was easy. Seems the board prefers a mut with a DNA test over an outsider with a barren womb— their words, not mine. ” I closed the distance until I was standing in front of her before she could get away again.

Tugging her to my chest as my free hand drifted towards her lower abdomen.

“I know better. I think it just hasn’t been tended to properly.

” I dropped my lips to her neck and pressed a kiss on her pulse point.

“A little effort and plenty of seed, and I think you’d be surprised at what could grow between us. ”

She lifted her leg, rubbing her knee against me before bringing it up. High and hard. I stumbled back a step but it did little to keep my cock from straining in my pants. She should know by now that violence was just foreplay for us.

“If you want something to grow , you’re better off fucking the garden.

” She pooled a mouthful of saliva in her cheeks and quickly launched it at my face.

“I don’t want your bastard any more than I wanted your brother’s heir.

Why the fuck do you think I had the birth control pills?

Don’t you fucking get it? I don’t want to be someone’s mother, someone’s wife, someone’s anything .

I just want to be me even if I don’t know who that is right now. ”

I watched her for a moment. Her chest heaving, her pulse racing, her rage reaching its crest and then plummeting. She really thought that would do it.

She was wrong .

“Okay, then we won’t have kids. I’d rather keep you to myself anyway.”

She shook her head but she didn’t move from her spot by the door. “You have got to be kidding me. Either you’ve gotten denser over the years, or I mistakenly gave you more credit than you deserved.”

“Serious as a drug-induced heart attack, Miss Cruz.” I spun around and made my way across the room, pulling back the curtains on the window until daylight was streaming in. “Besides, I think it’s already working.”

“Yeah, and what’s that?” she asked me.

“My little experiment.” I turned around to face her again, using the remote I’d concealed in my pocket to disengage the lock on the bedroom door. “We’ve already discussed more about our future together in the last five minutes than you and that asshole ex-husband of yours ever did.”