Page 33 of Vengeance and Vipers

‘Where were you with only a cold river to bathe in for so long then?’ he asks with a chuckle. ‘Camping wasn’t really your scene from what I remember.’

I frown. We talked about this in the tacturn sex dream.

‘The Mountain,’ I say.

I feel him stiffen behind me. Maybe he doesn’t remember that we already spoke about this. He was sort ofdemonic.

‘Ah, yes. You mentioned. Who put you in a prison for male supes?’ he asks. His tone is calm, but his body is coiled.

‘Me. I found a back-way in.’

‘If anyone could, it would be you,’ he chuckles, and I relax a little, ‘but why would you go to that place voluntarily, deamhan àlainn?’

‘What does that mean?’ I ask.

‘Don’t avoid the question.’

‘Hiding from the last supe I stole from,’ I say lightly, but as soon as I say the words, I have a feeling he doesn’t buy it.

A rumble comes from his chest, and I’m suddenly pulled backward and turned, so I’m sitting in his lap.

His smoldering eyes make an unwelcome thrum of heat go straight to where I don’t want it, and it has me trying to shift away from where his pelvis and mine are so close.

‘Let me go,’ I breathe.

He clutches me tighter and groans. ‘I don’t think you really want me to, but fine.’

He turns me over quickly but carefully, putting me face-down over his lap with my bare ass in the air.

‘What are you—’

A stinging slap of his massive hand on both cheeks has me gasping and struggling to get away, but he holds me easily.

‘No more lies, my pretty little conwoman,’ he murmurs. ‘I think you’ve given us enough of those, don’t you?’

I go lax under his hands immediately, my angry ego buttoning my lip. I silently refuse to say another word, not even making a sound as he keeps up his punishment. I wriggle around a little, but the pain is nothing, even though it goes on for long enough that I know my ass is going to hurt for a couple of days.

In truth, there’s something happening that’s more embarrassing than being half-naked and spanked by a man …a demonI hardly know.

He finds out a minute later when his hand delves between my legs, and he tuts when it comes out wet.

‘So, you like this too, you naughty girl,’ he murmurs. ‘I’ll have to remember that.’

I refuse to say anything, but he pulls me back up into his arms, and he immediately notes my pink cheeks.

He makes a contemplative noise like he’s learning things about me, and I clench my jaw.

‘I’m not going to get answers out of you that way, am I?’ he says quietly.

My defiant eyes meet his.

It’ll take a lot more than you’re willing to do right now.

‘You’re an interesting woman, Jules,’ he says lightly, but there’s an undercurrent of gravity in his words, and I wonder what else he just found out about me because I suddenly get the impression that this was all just a learning exercise.

I push away from him, but he doesn’t let me go.

Instead, he holds me close, stroking my hair and down my back in soft caresses like he’s calming an angry feline.