“Stop wasting our time,” he growled.
“When will…” She gave an almost inaudible gasp as he squeezed her breast in his hand. “When will he return?”
“When I’m finished. If I let him.” He ground his erection between her thighs. “No more talk. Take off your dress.”
She was stronger than he’d realized. Her resistance was a solid thing of bone and muscle, preventing him from relieving her of her bodice.
The resistance was what excited him. Making her admit she wanted him to take her was more exciting still.
“Release me,” she demanded.
“Lying to yourself, Doctor?” He bent his head and grazed her neck with his teeth, nipping just firmly enough to make her feel it. “You can’t wait to find out what it’s like to have me pounding my way inside you.”
“You have no access to my thoughts… Fenris. What you propose is simply rape, nothing more.”
The sheer coolness of her accusation filled him with rage. He twisted one of her arms behind her so that she couldn’t move without pain. “It’s Quentin, isn’t it? You’ve been lusting after him like a bitch in heat. You think you can have him and get rid of me. It isn’t going to work. Once I take you, he’ll be that much weaker.”
“Quentin’s honor is more potent than your violence.”
“Is it?” He laughed. “The honor that made him go to your room with only one thing in mind?”
“That wasn’t Quentin.”
“It was both of us. But I’m getting stronger all the time. And when I’m done, Quentin’ll never show his face again. First I’ll take his woman, and then the rest of his miserable life.” He jerked her arm, forcing her to cry out. “Open your legs for me, woman.”
“I will not.” She stared straight into his eyes. “Do you know everything Quentin knows?”
He laughed in contempt. “More. Much more.” He licked the underside of her jaw. “You pretend to be a tight little virgin, but I saw your body when you were with him, your tits all hard and your juices flowing. I smelled your lust. I smell it now.”
“Does he know about you?”
She was distracting him with all her questions. “Shut up.” He pushed her to the chaise and turned her so that she would fall on her back.
“You do intend to rape me, then,” she said. “Now I know you are not Quentin.”
“Quentin!” He flung her down and fell on top of her, holding himself just above with his braced arms. “Did he ever kiss you like this?”
He seized her mouth, hard, thrusting his tongue deep inside. She lay quiet under him, unresponsive. A howl of fury built up in his throat.
“Quentin would never kiss me like that,” she said, when she could speak again. “He is a gentleman. I do not know what you are.” Intermittent shivers rushed through her body, as if she were only half able to control them. “You have the strength to do what you like with me, but I doubt that you will find it entirely pleasant.”
He raised his fist to hit her, saw the glint of fear under the stalwart façade, and let his hand fall. For all her brave display of fortitude, she was weaker than he was. Weaker, and not to be abused. That was the rule.
Quentin. Quentin did this to him. Quentin’s rules still bound him. If he tried to break them, he would lose.
“Damn you,” he snarled. “I will make you beg for it.”
She touched him then, deliberately, spreading her fingers across his chest in a gesture that both invited and repelled.
“I have a better idea,” she said with that excruciating, deceptive calm. “I’ll strike a bargain with you. You want me—but not unwilling.”
Oh, yes, he wanted her—now, as he’d wanted her from the very beginning, willing or unwilling.
“I’ll give myself to you freely,” she said, “if you answer my questions.”
Questions, always questions. He leaned so close that her breath filled his mouth like wine. “Why should I bargain?”
“Because—” She paused, some calculation moving behind her eyes. “Because if you rape me, you’ll be no better than May’s father abusing that girl at the hotel.”