Chapter Twelve-Atlas
“What the hell are you doing?”
“You were gone too long.”
“I was swimming.”
“You were fucking naked.”
“Oh, fuck you for not being one of your goddamned supermodels!”
My jaw ticks.
“What?”
“I don’t care if I embarrassed you, Your Majesty, but it was hot and I wanted to swim!”
“You think I’m embarrassed of you?”
I can’t even comprehend what she’s saying.
Is she crazy? Delusional? What the actual fuck are her words?
“Embarrassed? You think I was embarrassed?”
“Weren’t you? I mean, I know the women you date don’t carry an extra forty-five pounds on their skinny asses,” she mutters angrily.
“There are several things wrong with that statement, kardhoúla. First, I don’t date women. Second, you look like a fucking goddess!” I bark.
“What?”
“You drive me out of my goddamn mind with that tempting body of yours,” I snap, lifting her higher as I take the first step up the stone pathway.
“You think I’ll let anyone else see you like that? Touch you with their eyes? Laugh about it while adjusting their dicks like you’re a fucking snack?”
That shuts her up.
Her cheeks flame. Her breath hitches. But her eyes narrow, too.
“You can’t control me,” she mutters.
Wrong. I already do.
She just doesn’t know it yet.
“I don’t want to control you,” I say as I reach the villa stairs. “But I will protect you. Even from your own recklessness.”
“That’s rich, coming from the man who kidnapped me with a prenup.”
“I’m marrying you, Cecilia. Something a lot of women would kill for, by the way,” I correct. “And it’s not kidnapping if you walk willingly onto the plane.”
“You hit that guard and left my sandals.”
“I’ll get you new sandals.”
She sputters a laugh—half outraged, half amused—and I finally glance down at her.
Her eyes are bright.
Her lips part.
Her hair clings wet to her cheeks and collarbone, and her scent—sun, salt, woman—is making me fucking ache.
I walk inside and head for the master bedroom.
The maid I scolded earlier ducks and runs for cover. I can’t blame her, but also, I don’t really care.
Cecilia doesn’t protest when I squeeze her soft, wet body to mine.
She doesn’t say a word when I slam the door closed with my foot.
Not even when I lay her down, dripping wet, on the bedspread where I have every intention of stripping her nude and making her pay for what she just put me through.
“Next time you want to swim, you ask me.”
The words come out low, harsh, territorial.
I know I’m being a prick.
A bullheaded prick with too much adrenaline and too many feelings I don’t understand.
But fuck if I can stop.
Her eyes narrow. Her spine straightens. Her chin lifts like she was born to defy kings. She was.
“No.”
Just that.
A single word, soft and lethal.
“No?”
She shakes her head once.
Defiant. Proud. Mine.
“Wrong answer, kardhoúla.”
I grip the flimsy straps of her bikini top—and tear.
The fabric snaps in my hands.
Her cry slices through the room.
“Atlas!”
But she doesn’t cover herself.
She doesn’t scramble for the towel.
She just breathes, chest rising and falling, bar-tipped nipples tight and begging to be tasted.
I don’t make her wait.
I lower my head and wrap my mouth around one perfect, pierced nipple.
Her scream turns into a broken moan.
Her hands fly to my hair, gripping, pulling—begging without words.
I suck deeper, tongue teasing the metal barbell, and her thighs fall open like she can’t help it.
My cock strains against my slacks, so hard it’s painful.
When I lift my head, her lips are parted, eyes glazed, wet curls spilling around her face as she pants.
“Fuck,” I murmur, shrugging off my shirt. “You should see yourself.”
Her gaze drags over every inch of me—my chest, my abs, the V cut disappearing into my pants—and her breath stutters.
Women have looked at me before.
Hungry, impressed, greedy.
But no one has ever looked at me like this.
Like maybe she wants my body and my soul in the same bite.
And somehow, that makes me even crazier.
“Fuck, Cece, those look uncomfortable,” I say, glancing at the tiny bikini bottoms barely clinging to her ass.
She swallows.
“Don’t you—”
I rip them off.
She gasps, legs snapping together, but there’s no hiding.
Not from me.
Her Viper tattoo curls around her hips, sliding lower across her thigh—the head of the serpent poised right above her pierced clit.
The ink is wet, gleaming, taunting.
Christ.
I want to lick every inch of it.
I slide two fingers through the slick heat between her thighs, groaning when I feel how wet she is.
“Say you’ll ask me next time,” I demand, tracing her clit slowly, barely there.
Her hips jerk.
Her breath catches.
Her eyes flutter.
And still—she shakes her head.
A soft, trembling, perfect little no.
Fuck, she is so perfect.
I pull my hand away, and she whimpers, actually fucking whimpers, chasing the contact.
But her attention snaps up when I reach for my belt and shove my pants down, letting my cock spring free.
She stares.
And stares.
Her lips part, her tongue flicking across them unconsciously, hunger written all over her face.
“Fuck,” she whispers. “That’s so hot.”
I wrap my fist around myself, stroking slow, long pulls.
Her gaze is glued to my hand.
Her chest rises and falls too fast.
Her thighs inch apart.
“You like what you see, kardhoúla?”
She nods, dazed. “Yes. Atlas, please.”
“Hands above your head.”
She freezes.
“What?”
“If you touch yourself, I stop.”
Her eyes widen.
Her breathing turns frantic.
She lifts her hands, wrists crossing above her head against the pillow.
“Good girl.”
I lean in, still stroking myself, the fat head glistening with pre-cum.
“You want to know what I came home to?” I growl. “An empty villa. Three idiots staring at you. Laughing. Adjusting their dicks like you’re a fucking show.”
Her cheeks turn pink—anger and desire twisted together.
“I don’t belong to you,” she whispers.
“You do,” I answer, voice sharp as a blade. “You will.”
I slide the tip of my cock along her slit—slow, dangerous, dirty.
She cries out, hips arching.
“This—” I murmur, pushing just an inch inside, “—is mine.”
Her breath shatters.
Her eyes flutter.
Her body trembles.
“And next time you want to swim?”
I thrust, deep and hard—burying myself inside her in one powerful stroke.
She screams my name like a prayer.
I lower my mouth to her ear, voice rough and full of deadly promise.
“You ask me.”
And then I fuck her like I intend to keep her.