Page 17 of Leather & Lies

I wrap her braid around my fist until she’s forced to arch her back. She gasps, her breasts pushing against her shirt, nipples visibly hardening through the thin fabric. Her hands come up to my chest—to push me away or pull me closer, she doesn’t seem to know. I tighten my grip until her lips part on a shaky exhale.

“Look at you. Still pretending you don’t need this.” I trace her jawline with my free hand, feeling the rapid pulse beneath her skin. “Your body’s more honest than your mouth, hellcat. All it took was the threat of violence, to drag you into the tack room, and now you’re wet for me, aren’t you?”

The way she bites her lip, trying to hold back a moan, sends fire through my veins. Her breath stutters, her thighs clenching, as if she could trap the need before I notice.

I use her braid to yank her head back until she gasps. “I said. On. Your. Knees.”

She fights me, but we both know how this ends. I force her down, the fresh hay crackling under her. Her chest heaves with each breath, pride warring with arousal in those magnificent eyes. Even now, she won’t fully submit. It drives me fucking crazy.

“You think you can hide things from me?” I unzip my fly with my free hand, still gripping her hair tight enough to hurt. “That you can have any secrets in my kingdom?”

Her tongue darts out to wet her lips. “I’m not your property.”

“No?” I trace her lower lip with my thumb, smearing the wetness. “Then why are you on your knees in my stable? Why are you yielding so fucking beautifully right now?”

A flush creeps up her neck, but she doesn’t look away. Even now, she challenges me. It makes me want to destroy her. To own every defiant breath until she admits what I already know. She’smine.

“Open your mouth. Show me what a good girl you can be.”

She hesitates, her whole body trembling with the war between pride and need. That spark of rebellion, that moment of decision—it feeds the darkness inside me. Her hands clench into fists at her sides, tendons standing out in her neck as she fights herself. Then her lips part, and the small sound she makes—half surrender, half despair—nearly undoes me. Her eyes never leave mine, burning with a mixture of shame and arousal that makes my control fray. Even on her knees, she wields a power she doesn’t fully understand.

I fuck her mouth with brutal efficiency, letting her feel exactly how much her defiance affects me. Her submission should quench this rage inside me. Instead, it feeds it. Each choked breath, each flutter of her throat around my cock, just makes me want to possess her more completely. To own her so thoroughly she forgets she was ever free.

“Look at me.” My voice is guttural, barely human. “I want to see those eyes when you submit.”

She does. Christ. The gold in her irises has darkened to amber, punishment and pleasure tangled together in her gaze.

My grip on her hair tightens as I recognize my own obsession reflected back at me. My heart pounds against my ribs, blood roaring in my ears. Every muscle in my body strains toward her, my careful control splintering. Sweat breaks out along my spine, my hands almost shaking with the need to possess her completely.

I force myself to maintain the punishing rhythm when I want to lose myself in her entirely. The darkness in me recognizes its match in her, the way she yields without breaking, submitswithout surrendering. My jaw clenches so hard it aches as I fight to maintain dominance over my own need to break her.

When I come, Shiloh swallows every drop, never letting her eyes fall from mine, furiously defiant. I roughly pull her up, shoving her against the stable wall. Her lips are swollen, her chin wet, tears streaking down her face, not from hurt, but from the rough fucking I just gave her mouth. She’s never looked more beautiful. More unbreakable.

“Who do you belong to?”

Her chest heaves, skin flushed and damp with sweat. “Fuck you, Jackson.”

The words come out raw, her voice still raspy from taking me.

I squeeze her throat, just enough to remind her of my power, and feel her pulse jump against my palm. Her back arches involuntarily, her body betraying how much she needs this even as she fights it.

“Even now you can’t admit what you are.” I drag my thumb across her collarbone, feeling her tremble beneath my touch. “My marks are all over you. The taste of me is still in your mouth. And you’re still pretending you don’t belong to me.”

“Never.” Even now, her steel core remains unrelenting.

I brush my thumb across her lower lip, but remain silent, gentling her like she gentles her horses.

Her thighs shift together, as if to relieve the ache I know has grown there. If I were to shove my hand between her legs right now, I’d find her soaked and wanting.

But I won’t.

I’ll wait.

Eventually she’ll relent, and I’ll enjoy every moment of the fight until she does.

Emotion flickers in her hazel eyes—shame warring with need, pride with fury. A bead of sweat trails down her neck, and my fingers itch to follow its path.

The visible marks on her skin and her disheveled clothes make my possessiveness surge—the hay sticking to the knees of her jeans, the bruises blooming on her throat, the way she winces slightly as she moves. But it’s the invisible marks that feed my obsession—the wet heat I know is still pulsing between her thighs, the phantom pressure of my hands she’ll feel for hours, the way her body will remember this submission even as her mind rebels against it.

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