Page 55 of Fierce Pursuit

A sharp, deliberate crack.

She flinched. Not in fear. Something else.

"You can't do anything to me," she said, voice trembling, cracking.

A lie.

We both knew it.

I took a step forward, the belt still loosely looped in my hand. "Can't I?"

Tossing the belt aside, I reached for her, grabbing her hair with one hand and lifting her off the bed to drag her over to the window.

The city lights were nothing more than an indistinct shimmer in the reflection. "Look at it," I murmured, my breath hot against her cheek. "That is civilization in the far distance. Now you are only surrounded by darkness.”

I also had slipped the bonds of civilization.

Alone in the tense stillness of this train cabin, she and I were the only animals left on the planet. I no longer gave a damn about what was right or wrong. All thoughts of decency and morality had been burned away in my anger and lust. The resulting embers glowed with a primal drive to claim and conquer.

Her body jerked, but I tightened my grasp on her hair before tearing the leather jacket off her shoulders and down her arms. The Russian shawl I noticed in her room floated to the floor at her feet. She was left in her sweater and jeans.

“Put your hands on the window.”

“What are you?—”

“Do it,” I growled.

I had reached my fucking limit. All the fear, all the worry that had built up inside of me over these months ofchasing her had come to a boiling point in my blood, churning into a toxic, obsessive need.

Releasing her hair, I spread my hand over her stomach, pressing her back against me until her ass brushed my already hard cock. With my other hand, I flicked the button of her jeans open.

Her hand flew to cover mine. “What the?—”

I brushed her hand aside and lowered the zipper.

“Kostya, you can’t?—”

Before she could even get the objection past her sweet lips, I’d yanked the jeans down over her hips. Using my arm around her middle, I lifted her off the floor and kicked them and her canvas sneakers out of the way. My hand then slid up her back to wrap around her throat from behind.

The middle finger of my free hand hooked the back of the red thong where it nestled between her ass cheeks. “What the fuck is this, Marina?” I growled, snapping the fabric back into place.

The only reason a woman would wear a red thong was for a man. Earlier today she had on a pair of simple blue silk panties.

She breathed heavily. “They’re just panties.”

My hand gripped her left ass cheek and squeezed. “Which dead man are you wearing these for?”

She rose on her toes. “No one.”

“Don’t fucking lie to me, babygirl, because I’ll find the man and snap his fucking neck.”

It had better not be one of the pasty fuckers she was living with.

Perhaps it was why she was fleeing to New York.

Was she racing into the arms of another man?

Did I have a right to be so jealous? No.

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