I gasped at the delicious decadence of my name on his lips. The sound echoed in his mouth, shooting straight to my core.

Shit.

Jethro advanced again, his body trembling with barely veiled lust. “You’re the one who created this problem.” His hand came up, fingers slinking through my tied-up hair, tightening around the back of my skull. “I can’t hear the name Weaver without getting fucking hard. I can’t even think of you without boiling with need.”

His nose brushed against mine, his lips so damn close to stealing all my scrambled plans and sending me headfirst into a life of debauchery.

“You should never have said those two words, Ms. Weaver. I told you. We’re both fucked now.”

My mind was blank, every synapse focusing on his fingers in my hair and his mouth only millimetres from mine. “What two words?”

He chuckled. The sound was self-deprecating and almost morbid with dark intensity. “Kiss me.”

I shivered in his hold. “You’re reminding me of what started this mess, or you’re asking me to kiss you?”

Ask me. And I will. God, how I will.

I’d kiss him until I’d stripped him of his arctic armor and destroyed it, I’d lick him until I tasted his truth, and I’d bite him until I’d eaten every morsel of his soul.

I’d do all that so he had nowhere left to hide.

We stood wrapped in foggy silence. The drawn out anticipation of a kiss turned my legs to jelly. If he pressed his mouth to mine, I wouldn’t be going for my run. I would climb his body and sink onto his cock.

Fakery be damned.

Kite’s messages and deceit be damned.

I just wanted a raw connection—with this man, who made my soul whimper for wrongness.

Jethro’s tongue slipped between his lips, hypnotising me. Then…he let me go. “No, I’m not asking you to kiss me. I won’t ever ask anything from you.”

I flinched as if he’d slapped me. “Why not?”

“Because I own you. Everything I want will be given, not requested.”

Double shit.

I should hate him. I should smite him. So, why did his every word seduce me, even while I knew his morals were chauvinistic and heartless?

Forcing my body to obey, I shoved the weakness I had for him as far away as possible. My eyes trailed down his front. He wore tan jodhpurs, black riding boots, and a tweed jacket. The bulge between his legs looked heavy and far too dangerous to be legal.

“You’ve been riding.”

A gentle gust of early morning air blew his scent directly into my nose. I inhaled, soaking my lungs in hay, horse, and all things Jethro.

He nodded, crossing his arms once again. “You run. I ride. Seems we have something else in common.”

Something other than being forced into this debt and finding each other irresistible, you mean?

“Oh, what’s that?”

Jethro stepped closer, seeming to bring shadows into the smoky light of dawn. “We both need time alone to hide from the things that chase us.” He stiffened, his eyes churning with things he refused to voice. A five o’ clock shadow decorated his strong jaw, his lips parted while his gaze was pure brimstone.

Swiftly, he cupped my cheek.

Oh, God.

Electricity instantly sparked beneath his fingertips.

Would I always suffer the rhapsody of his touch?

My skin smouldered; pinpricks of light, of fire, of hell, all burnished beneath his hold. I swayed, pressing my face harder into his palm.

He sucked in a breath, his fingers digging harder against my cheekbone.

The chemistry and need to devour each other thickened with every heartbeat.

One beat.

Two beat.

Three.

We stood there, frozen on the stoop of Hawksridge Hall just waiting for the other to move. The moment we did, our clothes would disintegrate and I would willingly let him drag me into a bush and fuck me.

Lust and tension swirled.

I had so many questions and doubts; so many reasons to hate and fear him. But when he touched me…poof.

I no longer remembered, nor cared.

We swayed closer, drawn against our will to close the aching distance.

I couldn’t breathe.

Kiss me. Please, kiss me.

The moment stretched until it hummed with overwhelming possibilities.

Then, it snapped.

Loudly.

Painfully.

Shattering around our feet.

“You’re too fucking dangerous,” Jethro muttered, removing his touch and stepping away. Dragging his hand through his hair, he commanded, “Wait here. Don’t go anywhere.” His hands went to his jacket buttons, undoing them with nimble fingers.

I blinked, struggling to shed myself of heavy need and focus on the true reason why I stood barely dressed in the freezing morning. “I’m not escaping. I’ll be back in forty minutes or so.”

He shook his head, slipping out of his tweed and revealing a black long-sleeved jumper.

My mouth went dry. Even in clothing, I could make out every ridge of muscle in his stomach, every ripple of energy as he breathed in and out. He was designed straight from my fantasies, and I hated him for being so splendid.

My core clenched, sending flutters of wetness between my legs.

I hadn’t seen him in two days, yet I’d panted after him as if he’d been missing my entire life.

If he suspected I knew that he was Kite, he hadn’t let on. After Kes had told me the truth, I’d waited for Jethro to barge into my room and swear me to secrecy.

But he hadn’t.