CHAPTER 8

Crushing his delight at her lush response, Jack promised himself there would be plenty of time later to fuck her, screw Brandon out of a bride, and enjoy every moment of her soft, shy responses. Later.

Ending the kiss with a nip of his teeth on her plush lower lip, Jack opened his eyes in time to see the slick in the suit talking to some of the regulars around him. Jack made sure he blocked Morgan from the view of guys who hung out here at least once a week. He hoped like hell none of them would remember that they’d never seen him kiss Alyssa like that.

Mr. Suit listened, then nodded his thanks. Disappointment shadowed his face. The guy in the jeans and sweater had disappeared.

“I think we’re good to go,” he murmured to Morgan. “Let’s get out of here.”

Again, he took her hand. He led her right out the front door. The crowd on the street swallowed them up quickly, and Jack smiled.

Once the danger had passed, once he knew they hadn’t been followed, he could concentrate on Morgan—and every delicious way he could think of to make her surrender. 

Within minutes, Jack led her to his truck, parked on a dark side street. Morgan hesitated. Brandon wouldn’t be happy that she’d left his car behind, but what were her other options? She couldn’t argue with Jack’s logic that her stalker would be looking for it on the roads since he’d followed her here.

That settled, Jack tucked her into the passenger’s seat of his sleek black truck. She’d have to be blind not to see his gaze lingering on the length of her exposed thigh and cleavage offered up by Alyssa’s purple leather slut garb. The miles of skin it exposed made her want to find the nearest tent and throw it on quickly. Another part of her, though, heated at his look. The arrow of need that shot straight to her still-aching clit, encouraging her to inch her skirt a bit more and flash Jack a come-hither glance. She resisted the dangerous temptation.

The familiar dark desire, coupled with the stress and uncertainty, crashed in on her. How had her life gone downhill so quickly? How had she found herself at the mercy of a stranger who made her ache with a longing that shamed her?

“Don’t leer,” she snapped.

Jack looked away in his own good time. “Why not? You look good.”

“I look like a whore.”

Faster than lightning, he leaned across the cab and crowded her personal space. He smelled like midnight and elemental male. Like danger.

“You look available and willing. You don’t look for sale.”

“It’s the same thing.”

“Non, it is not.”

Jack said nothing more for long moments. He eased away and started the truck, then pulled away from the tree-lined street and took off into the dusk. Then they headed southeast, toward the heart of the bayou.

With another hot glance at her, Jack finally explained, “When a woman looks for sale, a man checks his wallet before looking twice. Available and willing just makes a man hot. Available and willing for him alone makes a man boil with need. Right now, I’m hard as hell.”

The night began closing around them finally, dark and absolute. Morgan swallowed. The way Jack looked at her through the inky closeness of the truck’s cab gave her pause. And if she was honest, made her wet. Did he realize that she’d never dressed this provocatively for any man, for any reason, before?

“If you were my woman,” he went on, his voice a sandpaper whisper, “you’d appear elegant in public. But in private…” He smiled, a flash of white teeth, illuminated by the moonlight drifting into the shadowed truck; it was a smile that promised satisfaction. “In private, I’d dress you in less than you’re wearing now. Much less. Without those useless lace panties you’re wearing.”

Morgan could barely catch her next breath. She didn’t want to dress like this. It had to look cheap and easy.

Yet she could not deny it also made her feel aware of her body, of her feminine power. Sexy and wanted and desired. How was that possible?

“You’re awfully direct.”

“I’m honest,” he admitted. “What’s the point of lying?”

“Oh, I don’t know. To be polite.”

Jack simply snorted.

“And these panties aren’t useless. They cover the essentials.”

“Exactly. Why would I want those covered?”

She gaped. “I’m not about to flash everyone in the first good breeze that comes along.”

“But if you were mine, what’s under that skirt would be mine, not yours, to show or conceal as I saw fit.”

His words burned her with shock—and terrible, unmistakable desire. She gasped.

“Shocked, cher? That’s what submission is all about. Surrendering control utterly to someone else. Your privacy, your body, your pleasure.”

He said nothing for long minutes, and Morgan lost herself in imagining. Would a dominant man really insist his partner show any—or all—of her body to anyone of his choosing? Anywhere? At any time? She squirmed in her seat at the thought. It was disturbing and exploitative. But some little part of her found his words reluctantly provocative. Forbidden. God, she’d gone insane.

But curiosity followed close behind. That, she allowed free rein. She was interviewing him about this very subject, after all. Journalistic integrity and all that.

“What you’re saying…it sounds selfish and mean-spirited, to expose someone without regard for their feelings.”

“It might look that way on the surface.”

“What do you mean, on the surface?”

“Like I told you online, one of the jobs of a good dominant is to see inside the soul of his submissive and grant her every pleasure she desires. Many submissives aren’t aware of their most secret desires.” He turned to face her, his chocolate eyes piercing, direct. “Or find them shameful, so they refuse to admit to them.”

He was talking to her. About her. With a hot glance, he made that clear. Her breathing shallowed, her heart beat accelerated. She couldn’t ignore the fact that her stomach—and her nipples—went achy and tight.

“And you force a woman to engage in acts you believe she secretly desires, even though she may not want to acknowledge them.”

“She has to accept them to find true satisfaction. My role is to help her.”

“What’s in it for you? I mean, if you’re always trying to read her mind and persuade her to do new, unusual things…?”

“New things that make her so hot, she’s giving me total control and is begging me to fuck her however and wherever I want. I’m sure you see the obvious benefits.”

Yeah, hard to miss that point. Was it possible to be so aroused that she would beg in such a way? A mental picture of Jack tying her down, feeling her up, as she writhed under his hand exploded across her brain. A blast of heat sizzled her belly…and lower. God knew his aggressive touch earlier today had flooded her with arousal so fast, she’d nearly been dizzy with it. And his kiss had obliterated most thoughts of fear and hesitation, the crowd, and her stalker.