Chapter Thirteen
The moment I hear her footsteps in the hall, I’m already moving.
Twenty-eight hours without her was too damn long. I spent it going over plans with the guys, making sure every detail was locked down, but now, all I can think about is her.
She steps into the doorway of the office and freezes.
I don’t smile, don’t even greet her; I just take two steps forward, rip the bag from her hand, toss it somewhere behind me, and grip her chin.
“You’re late,” I murmur. “I was two hours from torching your aunt’s fucking house just to smoke you out.”
“I—” she starts, but my mouth crashes onto hers before she can explain because I already know everything she did while at her aunt’s.
Her back hits the office door as I shove it closed and lock it.
My hand stays on her throat, claiming. She’s already panting when I back her toward the desk, scattering whatever Beau left there—papers, pens, a folder full of names we’ll kill later.
Right now, all I want is her spread across this table.
I grip her hips and lift her onto the edge, stepping between her legs, mouth trailing down her neck, biting hard enough to leave a mark.
“You were making me lose my fucking mind, hellcat,” I growl.
Her lips part, but I don’t give her a chance to answer. I shove her dress up, exposing those thighs I’ve been starving for.
“Eiden—” It’s a warning and a plea in one breath.
“Shut up and hold on.”
I hook her panties with two fingers, rip them aside, unzip with my free hand, and release my cock. I press into her without hesitation, without giving her body time to adjust.
The sound she makes—Christ—it’s half pain, half surrender, and it almost undoes me right there.
“Fuck,” I drag out as her walls clamp around me, heat wrapping me so tight I feel it in my spine.
“Too much?” I grind out, forehead pressed to hers.
She shakes her head, nails digging into my shoulders. “Don’t you dare stop.”
My hands are everywhere, on her throat, in her hair, gripping her ass to drag her closer with every thrust.
“You’re mine,” I growl against her mouth. “Every inch of you. No one else gets this. No one.”
“Say it.”
She moans.
I clamp my hand around her throat. “Say you’re fucking mine while I’m still inside you.”
Her moan breaks, “I’m yours.” Her body tightens around me like a fucking vise. My eyes squeeze shut, a curse ripped from my throat.
“Don’t… do… that,” I grit out as she clenches again, fluttering around me. “Tight enough already. Fuck.”
My grip on her knee turns bruising. My thighs burn with the force of each thrust, abs locking tight every time I drive to the hilt. Veins stand out along my forearms as I fight the urge to finish too soon.
The pressure builds low in my spine, heat crawling up my back, my breathing turns uneven.
She whimpers my name as she comes, and that’s it. The sound slices through my restraint, my cock swells inside her, every nerve set alight. I slam forward once, twice, harder than before, and the first hot pulse of release shoots into her.
A deep, guttural growl tears from my chest as I lock her hips to mine, holding her exactly where I want her, every throb claiming her from the inside. My stomach tightens with each spurt, sweat running down my back, my whole body wired on the high of owning her.
I don’t pull out. Not for a second.
I stay buried to the last twitch, breath ragged, my heart pounding so hard I feel it in my teeth. I keep her pinned to the desk, as if letting go might let her slip away with my soul still lodged inside her.
When I finally lift my head, my lips brush her ear.
“You’re never leaving again.”
It’s past nine when the mansion comes into view, gleaming under the floodlights. Massive, set back from the road, the front swallowed by thick trees and the rear guarded by the black stretch of river.
Felix is already inside. We made sure Caleb and Tamsin would arrive fashionably late.
His security’s heavier tonight, but half of them are ours.
Men who owe us and know exactly the type of shit Felix is.
We only have to deal with the loyal ones.
No cops on site, but they sniffed around earlier.
Detectives poking into the disappearances, asking questions nobody wants to answer.
Beau handled it with a few burner emails sent to Felix written like his three missing friends were alive and well, just laying low after the heat from “what they’d done”.
I don’t know if Felix buys it, but he’s smart enough to keep the cops from digging too deep into his little circle. He even told them his friends left the country to enjoy some “time off”. It keeps the police away from us, and it keeps Tamsin off their radar.
Beau’s already hacked the mansion’s cameras, and now I’m sitting on the boat with him, geared up and mask in place, while my girl is inside with Caleb.
“It’s time,” Beau says through the comms as they step into the garden. A guard comes inside and sweeps the room but doesn’t notice the hidden compartment where we’re crouched.
I watch the feed, she looks beautiful, she always does. Nothing beats her black hair, but that fake blonde and the tan? I’ll lick every inch of it off her if I have to.
“Breathe, hellcat,” I murmur through the mic, she nods, and I see the faint tension in her shoulders as they near the door.
“Mister Ashford, Miss Karsen,” the guard greets, opening it for them.
“Karsen?” I cover the mic. “You gave her my last name?”
Beau chuckles. “You’ll marry her, so…” He shrugs, like it’s a certainty, and he’s not wrong, but still…
They walk in and the place drips money: polished wood, marble floors, and vases spilling with fresh flowers.
The women are in painted-on dresses serving drinks, the men in suits trading dirty secrets between glasses of scotch.
Most of these fuckers deserve to be buried alive. Maybe they will—one day.
“Showtime,” Caleb whispers, pulling Tamsin closer. I trust him with my life and hers, but watching him put his hand on her and pretend she’s his makes my jaw lock.
The huge dark-wood door at the far end opens. Four men sit at a table, each with a woman at his side, except for Felix, which tells me he took the bait. He wants her, and when she smiles and says, “Good evening”, I see it, his legs shifting, spreading just slightly.
My vision tightens, turning the edges red.
They take their seats.
The dealer moves with the precision of habit, cards sliding across the felt in an unhurried rhythm. Every chip on that table could feed a family for a year, but none of it matters to me. My focus is locked on Felix; on the way he watches her.
She’s already his in his mind.
Tamsin plays it flawlessly, offering sweet smiles, polite nods, fingers brushing Caleb’s arm when she laughs, but each time Felix flirts, she lets the faintest curl of distaste touch her lips, just enough to tell him she’s not interested.
Beau called it perfectly. He’ll want to break that wall. He’ll want to force her to take him.
“You’re a lucky man,” Felix says to Caleb, his voice slick with the kind of arrogance that rots a man from the inside out.
Caleb leans back, smirking. “She’s trouble, but worth it.”
Felix’s gaze slides to Tamsin and lingers there, crawling over her body. “Some trouble’s worth the scars.”
My jaw flexes under the mask, fingers digging into my thigh. If I were in that room, the only scars he’d get would be the ones I carved into him, letter by letter.
The game drags on. Caleb loses a few hands on purpose, keeping Felix’s interest hooked. The bastard leans forward, his eyes on her more than his cards. Tamsin shifts in her chair, crossing her legs away from him, sipping her drink as if the smell of him turns her stomach.
“How about we make this more interesting?” Felix says, tossing a fat stack of chips into the center. “You win; I’ll double your pile. You lose…” His gaze cuts to Tamsin, slow and vile. “…She spends the night with me.”
The console creaks under my grip, the plastic protesting as I squeeze.
“Careful,” Beau mutters beside me.
I don’t answer, eyes locked on the screen, watching my girl keep her face still. Only the faint tightening of her hand on Caleb’s sleeve betrays her.
Caleb grins. “Deal.”
The cards are dealt. Every twitch, every tell, I track it all. Caleb loses by a hair, on purpose. Felix’s smirk blooms, rot in human form. The smug twist of his mouth says he already thinks she’s his.
He has no idea what’s waiting for him.
Tamsin’s voice rises, her body tensing, but Felix moves faster. His hand snaps out, fingers locking around her arm before he slaps her across the face. The sound detonates in my skull, and my vision narrows, my blood boiling, and I’m already halfway up before I realize it.
Beau’s arm slams across my chest, pinning me back. “Easy, Eiden. She can handle it.”
“The fuck she can! He touched her! He put his hands on her!” Every muscle in me strains to break free, to put my fist through his skull, my jaw clenches so hard the pop echoes in my ears.
Caleb’s timing is perfect when he grabs her, hauling her over his shoulder. “I’ll take her,” he says, voice cold as steel. “She’ll do as I tell her.”
Felix grins, hungry and ugly. “Don’t worry. The more she fights, the better it will be.”
He downs the last of his drink and follows Caleb, convinced he’s walking toward his own private birthday rape session.
Tamsin nails the act, yelling, twisting, her voice cracking in just the right places.
I know her too well to be fooled, but Felix is buying every second.
His eyes burn with the kind of sickness you can’t scrub clean.
They take the side path by the garden, away from the noise of the guests. Two of Felix’s guards step onto the boat for a final sweep, but they don’t notice the hidden compartment. Beau and I crouch in the dark, silent, every second stretching tight as barbed wire.
“All clear, boss,” one of the guards calls.