Page 37 of Owned

The edge in his voice caught at my already raw emotions like steel wool. “Then why are you looking at me like I’ve done something wrong?” I snapped before I could think better of it. Then another thought occurred to me. I glanced down at his fly, and sure enough I could see the hard line of his cock pressing against the zipper.

Oh. No wonder he was annoyed.

I licked my dry lips. “Do you want?—”

“No.”

The word was hard and sharp, like a stone flung at me. “I see,” I said woodenly. “Why did you touch me then? What the hell was that even about?”

He stared at me for a long moment, then unexpectedly looked away, biting off a curse. “You don’t understand,” he said. “You don’t understand a single fucking thing.”

“I don’t understand what?” The warm, delicious pleasure was ebbing away now, leaving behind it a cold and sick feeling. “You made me say?—”

“I didn’t make you say anything,” he interrupted. “All I was trying to do was to get you to be honest with me for the first time in your fucking life.”

“And I was.” I shoved myself up and off the sofa, straightening. “Is that why you’re pissed off? You’re angry that I gave you the truth? That I want you?”

His gaze burned like a sunbeam focused through a magnifying glass, intense, scorching. “No. I’m pissed off that I’m hard and I shouldn’t be. You’re too young, you’re too naive, and you have no idea what you’re fucking doing.”

His confession shouldn’t have surprised me, yet I was shocked all the same. Oh, he was hard, I could certainly see that, but surely that had more to do with the situation rather than about me in particular.

“You don’t want me,” I said, angry at him for being annoyed that he was aroused by me, not to mention also for the horrible suspicion that all those things he said about me were true. “My God, if you’re so pressed about your stupid hard-on go and find some other woman to fuck.”

A muscle leapt in his jaw, his shoulders tense. He was furious, I could see that, and part of me relished it, loving that I’d managed to draw his temper out, especially when with one touch he’d wrecked me.

“If it was that simple I’d have done it, believe me,” he bit out. “But it’s not that simple.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s not some random woman I want to fuck.”

Another little shock pulsed down my spine at the implication. So. Apparently it was me he wanted. Almost as soon as I realized that, a surging kind of triumph filled me. I did affect him. Me, as young and inexperienced and naive as I was, had affected him badly enough that he was furious about it.

I swallowed, dry-mouthed all of a sudden. “Well, you know what I want so we could?—”

“No,” he interrupted again, his voice rougher this time. “Christ, no. That will not be happening. In fact, I shouldn’t be doing anything with you at all.”

“So why are you doing things with me?” I asked, unable to keep the edge of hurt from my voice. “Especially after I told you repeatedly that I didn’t need you. And now you’re getting all pissed at me for something that sounds like a you problem.” I took a few steps towards him, closing the gap between us. “You made me beg, Atlas. You made me tell you that I wanted you and I did, and I’m not taking it back. But I didn’t force you to put your hand between my legs.” My voice began to rise and I let it. “You were the one who decided to do that. You were the one who decided to kiss me and hold me by my hair, so how about you stop blaming me and start questioning your own stupid judgement!”

Silence came crashing down, the angry words bouncing off the walls.

I’d gotten close him, perhaps too close, his furious golden gaze burning into mine. I felt as if I was about to burst into flames at any moment. Then it came to me in a second of intense realization, that before he’d put his hand on me, I’d have stiffly apologized and backed down. Pretended that he hadn’t hurt me, that I was fine.

Yet, I wasn’t doing that right now. In fact, I was doing the opposite of pretending. I was admitting that I wanted him, accepting it, and confronting him with his own desires right back. And he didn’t like that. He didn’t like that at all.

I’d made him furious. I’d made him want. I’d affected him and that made me feel powerful in a way I’d never felt before.

For a long moment he just stood there staring at me. Then abruptly he reached out and grabbed me by my upper arms, gripping me hard, making my adrenaline surge and leaving me trembling with a kind of wild anticipation.

In that moment anything could have happened and I wanted it to.

Then the door buzzer sounded and Atlas let me go so suddenly I almost stumbled. “Fuck,” he said viciously, then stalked past me to the front door.

My heart was beating so fast and so loud I could barely hear anything, a seething mix of anticipation, fury, and desire still fizzing in my blood.

I’d only seen Atlas stripped of his easy-going, laid back facade once before and that was last week in the bathroom of La Chouette. Now, I’d seen it again, the lazily amused, playboy persona vanishing as if it had never been. And all because of me. I’d pushed him and now I wanted to push him even harder, and why shouldn’t I? When he’d done the same to me?

There might be consequences. Consequences you won’t like.

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