Page 86 of You Owe Me

“You’re such an asshole,” I mutter, but there’s no heat in it. Just breathless acknowledgment of a truth we both already know.

He smirks—that slow, deadly smile that should come with a warning label. “But you knew that already.”

I sure as hell did. And to be honest, I love it.

I also love how he doesn’t apologize for being intense. How he looks at me like I’m something worth claiming. I love how he makes me feel powerful and fragile at the same time, like I’m the most important thing in his world, yet completely at his mercy.

I should be ashamed of that. Any self-respecting woman should be ashamed of melting for a guy who just basically branded her in a parking lot.

But shame is the furthest thing from my mind right now.

Because he’s looking at me like that again. Like he wants to devour me. Like the only thing stopping him is the fact that we’re sitting in a public parking lot instead of somewhere more private.

My name falls from his lips—“Ainsley”—and it sounds like a prayer and a threat rolled into one.

That’s all it takes.

I’m moving before I fully realize it, leaning across the center console like a magnet pulled toward its opposite pole. He meets me halfway, his hand sliding under my chin, tilting my face up to his with the kind of gentle authority that makes my brain short-circuit.

“You know what that mark means?” His thumb brushes across my bottom lip. His touch is light, almost reverent, but his voice is pure steel. “It means I own you forever.”

The words should make me angry.

Instead, they make me moan.

Actually moan. Like a shameless, desperate mess who’s apparently discovered she has a thing for being claimed by broody control freaks with heart conditions and trust issues.

“And that mark on me?” He takes my hand and presses it against his chest, right over the fresh ink. I can feel the heat radiating from his skin, the slight swelling where the needle did its work. My handwriting. My claim on him. “Means you own me.”

That breaks something inside me. Some last barrier I didn’t even know I’d been holding up.

Because this isn’t just about possession. It’s about reciprocity. He didn’t just mark me—he marked himself. He didn’t just claim me—he surrendered himself. We’re bound now, in the most permanent way possible, and the intensity of that should scare me.

It does scare me.

But it also makes me feel like I could fly.

Then he kisses me, and thinking becomes impossible.

This isn’t the sweet, tentative kiss from our first date, or the sleepy morning kisses we share over coffee. This is something else entirely. This is hunger and need and barely controlled desperation. His tongue slides past my lips like he owns my mouth—which, let’s be honest, he does at this point—and I melt into him like I’m made of nothing but want.

I shift in my seat, trying to get closer, trying to eliminate the space between us. The center console digs into my ribs, my seat belt cuts across my chest, and none of it matters because Maverick’s hands are on me now. One on my hip, anchoring me, the other sliding up under my dress with devastating precision.

When his fingers find the slick heat that’s been building since the moment he first said my name tonight, he groans like he’s been waiting his entire life to confirm what he already knew.

“You’re soaked.”

I should be mortified that I’m this turned on by what essentially amounts to psychological manipulation and public indecency.

But embarrassment isn’t what I’m feeling.

What I’m feeling is powerful. Desired. Like I’m exactly where I belong.

“Shut up,” I pant, but there’s no real irritation in it. Just breathless acknowledgment that he’s right, that he always seems to be right about what my body wants before I even know it myself.

He chuckles—low and dark and infuriatingly smug—and circles my clit with one finger. Slow. Lazy. Like he has all the time in the world to unravel me piece by piece.

“You want more?”

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