Page 31 of Lesson In Forgiveness

“Easy, little tiger.” Grit tossed the phone on the bed before holding both hands up. “Don’t struggle, you’ll only hurt yourself. I’ll take the restraints off when you calm down.”

Fight or flight kicked in like a double-barrel blow from a mule. Channeling the panic into a more useful emotion, she shoved her fear back into the vault and slammed the door behind it.

Last night, she’d broken every rule in the goddamn book. Every damn one. Volunteering information about herself, expressing emotions, letting him put his hands on her. Sitting in the tub like a spaced-out junkie, losing herself in his voice, surrendering little pieces of herself to a fucking mercenary.

No surrender.

It was the one thing she promised herself on every job. Two words she’d inked into her skin by her own hand when she was nineteen and determined to be more than what her father demanded, to never be taken advantage of and used again.

To never surrender anything of herself in the event of capture.

To go down fighting right until the end.

In a moment of weakness, she’d betrayed herself. Denying it was futile; she was a failure, a disgrace to her personal values, all because her moronic body decided it needed a male to satisfy something hormonal in her.

“The binders stay on until you calm down,” Grit reiterated slowly, approaching with a stance that screamed ambush. “Get your breathing under control, Tabitha.”

Oh, he really didn’t want her to be in control of anything. Once the panic receded and the fog in her brain cleared, she was back on form, assessing and planning the fastest route to getting what she wanted—freedom.

Pulling on the chain, she felt the binders tighten around her wrists, just below the heels of her palms. Predicament bondage binders, seriously? He was a tricky fucker, she thought, seething in silence. The more she fought to get them off, the tighter they became.

“It seems bad,” the asshole said casually. “I get that, but you don’t have to be afraid. Being naked and bound has to be unnerving, especially with your history. I’m not a threat to you, Tabitha; I want to keep you safe.”

Wait, what? Alarmed, she glanced down at herself, her mouth dropping open as she realized, yeah, she didn’t have a stitch of clothing on. Not even a bra or panties to protect her modesty.

All of her was on full display from tits to toes and every inch in between. Her body was a weapon, one she was proud of because she’d forged it. Her muscles were toned to perfection because she’d put the work in to hone them for a singular purpose.

Be stronger, faster, more deadly than any opponent.

But having her female weaknesses—breasts, pussy, ass—exposed this way… it was one hell of a trigger. They were the places men liked to hurt, causing pain on a level she never wanted to experience again. She’d broken bones, torn muscles, taken fists to the face. She was no stranger to concussions, had spent hours stitching together wounds in her own damn flesh.

Dominic had taught her how to use sex as a weapon, and in doing so, she’d learned to be afraid of what she was on an elemental scale.

Anxiety throbbed at her temples; fury blinded her.

Dropping her shoulder, Tabitha charged at Grit as though she had an army at her back. The weight of the chain hindered her slightly, the length throwing her off-balance as it caught on the corner of the mattress.

Rather than ramming her shoulder into his ridiculous six-pack stomach, she slammed into him sideways, connecting with a hard thud that knocked the breath from her lungs.

Fuck, she needed her hands. It was impossible to balance her weight without her arms to counter her momentum. As she staggered, she felt his thick forearm curl around her torso, just below her breasts, and stomped on his bare foot in response.

“Christ, I guess you’re feeling more like yourself this morning.” He grunted when her elbow dug into his belly, her repeated jabs battering those stark muscles. “Don’t make me get rough with you, little tiger. If I have to sedate you, I—”

The sound she made wasn’t human. She still bore the track marks in the crooks of her elbows, the backs of her hands, even on her feet, from where Rita spent hours jabbing needles under her flesh, utilizing every available vein to pump drugs into Tabitha’s system.

No surrender.

Twisting in his hold, she landed three hard kicks on his thigh in quick succession, one satisfyingly close to his precious jewels. She aimed the fourth at his knee, hoping to disable him long enough to pin him down and force him into releasing her hands, but he recovered faster than she gave him credit for.

She found herself on her back on the bed, smothering beneath the heat and bulk of a fully mature male. His chest pressed against her breasts, her legs spreading to accommodate the width of his hips. Skin against skin, and only the thin material of his boxers preventing his cock from defiling her core.

Coldness enveloped her, washing over her from her scalp down. Sweat followed in its wake, springing over her skin with every tiny sip of air she sucked into her lungs.

She was better than this. She was better than him. So he’d disabled her hands with these godawful leather mitten-slash-condoms—so what? If he wanted to take her out of commission altogether, he should’ve gagged, hog-tied, and vacuum-sealed her from head to fucking toe because her entire body was a weapon.

Only… she couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t speak.

“An inch or two higher,” Grit told her in a stern voice, “and that kick would’ve turned me into a soprano.” In a rapid switch of mood, he grinned. “Good effort, though. How scared are you now on a scale of one to ten, little tiger?”

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