“Why are you doing this? There’s no need for this.”
“I can’t interact with people and keep an eye on you at the same time. If I have to do another signing, I’ll have to make sure to bring a babysitter.”
“I didn’t even do anything wrong!” I spat, lashing out with my foot and kicking his leg with my sandaled toes.
He grabbed my jaw and shoved his face up close to mine. “You’re going to behave or you’re going back into the basement when we get home. I can’t have you disrupting my life like this.”
“I’m disrupting your life? All I ever wanted from you was an autograph. You’re the one who made me stay, you’re the one who took me here, and you’re the one who stuck his dick into me without a condom two minutes ago.”
His eyes, so black, burned with anger, and his grip on my face was none too gentle. He darted closer and for a second I thought he was going to kiss me, but instead he bit my bottom lip hard enough that I tasted metal when he let go and pulled back. Outraged and ridiculously horny, I pressed the back of my free hand against my mouth.
“You hate me, and yet you still want me to fuck you.” He patted the top of my head and turned around to walk out, but not before I saw he was still rock hard.
When he got to the door, I expected him to turn back and say something smug, but he walked right on through and closed the door behind him.
I couldn’t decide if I wanted him to come back so I could fuck him or kill him. Either way, I definitely wasn’t going to masturbate about him so I could relax for the next hour or two while he made nice with the public.
I sat there stewing, trying not to squirm in my seat as I replayed the feel of his bare cock pushing into me. We’d almost gotten caught.
Lowering my head to the table, I waited. Unfortunately, I also fantasized, since there was nothing else to do.
Chapter 12
By the time signing was over, and he came back to get me, I was still turned on and spitting mad. From the thunderous scowl he gave me, I wondered how on earth he’d managed to shake hands and kiss babies all the way through his signing.
“What are you doing?” he demanded almost as soon as he strode into the room. He eyed me suspiciously, and I stared at him, since I couldn’t possibly have been doing anything.
I clanked the handcuff against the table support to remind him of that.
“I’m daydreaming about hiring a hit man—preferably a hot sadist with a British accent,” I grumbled. “What do you think I’ve been doing, genius?” I rattled the handcuff again.
He growled something about me being a smartass, but I was in no mood. My butt was numb from the plastic chair he’d left me on. I’d always considered my butt sufficiently padded, but there had been no way to get comfortable while he was gone—not with my arm secured halfway under the table.
I stuck my nose in the air as he detached the other cuff from the table support.
“Are you going to behave, or do I need to cuff you to me to make sure you don’t start trying to make side deals with some other guy?”
“I wasn’t making a side deal with that guy,” I reminded him. “I was being polite—which, I may point out, you told me to do. If you didn’t want me talking to people you should have said so.”
As he unlocked the cuff around my wrist, he gave me a quelling look.
“I could call the police and have you arrested for cuffing me like this,” I pointed out—reasonably, I thought.
“You have a safeword and chose not to use it, so I’m assuming you liked it at least a little.” His nasty grin was infuriating.
I got up from the chair and rubbed my wrist. “You need to get more comfortable cuffs.”
“For you? Why would I bother?”
Sighing, I stretched, arching. “I’m not sure why you’re being so cranky with me.”
His eyes traveled over me, from top to bottom, lingering on my bare legs.
“I think you know.”
“That wasn’t my fault. Evelyn is the one who interrupted.”
“You’re the one who lured me into doing it in the first place,” he grumbled. “Here, of all places. Talk about inappropriate.”
“I lured you into that? You wish. It’s not my fault you’re aggressive and horny all the time.”
“It’s that damned dress.”
“This? The dress you made me wear?” I plucked at the hem, holding it out to the side before letting the fabric fall from my fingers.
He chewed at his bottom lip. “Maybe dressing you like that was a bad idea. Well, hindsight and all that.” Without another word, he grabbed his satchel and walked out, leaving his welcome basket on the table.
“Aren’t you taking this?” I called after him.
When he didn’t answer, I grabbed the handmade gifts people had made for him, as well as the box of chocolates he’d started force feeding me, and trotted after him. Just because he was an asshole didn’t mean his fans deserved to be disappointed that he hadn’t appreciated their thoughtfulness and hard work.
We got into the truck and he glanced over at me, eyeing the items I’d salvaged as I settled them in my lap.
“You like that crap?”
It was a weird statement, considering his house was filled with handmade things.
“People spent time making these for you. The least you can do is take them with you so they don’t know you’re an asshole. It’s good public relations.” That and I couldn’t bear to leave them behind. His gaze lingered on the items for longer than I would have expected, considering he hadn’t shown the slightest interest in them.
Oh. He wasn’t looking at the gifts, he was looking at my bare legs where my skirt had shifted higher when I’d sat down.
He reached a hand toward me and traced a fingertip over my bare knee. I shuddered. Why on earth was such a PG touch turning me on? It felt so…possessive.
His gaze burned the side of my face, but I refused to look over at him. I felt my shoulders rolling submissively inward. The hand on my knee went to my hair, pushing it back from my shoulder to expose my neck.
“You really are a submissive little thing, aren’t you?” he asked quietly, almost more to himself than to me.
He pulled out of the parking lot while my heart was still in my throat.
“Just because I’m submissive doesn’t mean I want to submit to you.”
He flashed me a crooked smile. “I know. You prefer Zero. He’s taken such a shine to you that he’s been trying to convince me we should play with you. You should know we’re a package deal, though. If you want to play with him, you get us both.”
“I figured that’s how things were.”
“How do you feel about that?”
“Considering what I let you do to me today, I think that’s pretty self-evident.”
“You didn’t look very happy about it, so I thought maybe I should ask instead of assuming.”
“I have a safeword,” I said with a bravado I wasn’t actually feeling.
There was a coldness in him that scared me. Because I’d read all his books multiple times, I felt like I already knew the inside of his head better than I would have with anyone else. I was familiar with the sorts of things that seemed to interest him most. Then again, some of those had to be things he added for shock value, and not things he actually wanted to do—otherwise, I doubted he’d still be a free man.