Chapter 17 Eva
EVA
Heat pulses behind my eyes as my fingers glide over the black, permanent letters sprawled on my dress. He branded me? Literally marked my dress with his name, as if I were his possession?
My teeth clamp together until my skull hurts, anger thrashing through me like a heatwave.
Who does he think he is? He fucks his way around Fort, then wants to play with me when it suits him?
“Problem?” Mason arches an eyebrow.
“You ruined my dress!”
“On the contrary, I think it’s a massive improvement.”
“How dare you?” I spit.
“If you walk out there, you’ll leave wearing my name.” He smirks, making my hands curl into fists.
A long, silent minute beats between us, as I stare at him, trying to swallow my anger, my chin trembling with rage, while he stands there grinning at me, unfazed. I pull my expression together and put on the sweetest smile I can summon.
“Or I can take the dress off and walk out in my underwear.” I take a step back. “That ought to be in line with the theme tonight, right?”
For a heartbeat, his smirk falters. A crack in his armor. Then it lifts again—taunting, teasing, daring me.
He waves a hand toward the door, then folds his arms at his chest, waiting. Calling my bluff.
This isn’t like me.
I shouldn’t do this.
But I won’t lose to him anymore.
He wants to see how an Etheridge plays?
I’m all in.
Once my mind’s made up, I don’t hesitate. My fingers clutch the hem of my dress, and in one smooth motion, I slide it off and throw it, along with his name, at his feet.
That wipes the sneer off his face.
His gaze turns dark as it lands on my naked skin, appraising me from head to toe, while I stand there in my red lace backless bra and panties that hardly cover my arse.
My knees weaken, bones turning rigid, as his feral eyes take their time devouring every inch of me, before they meet mine.
The hunger on his face turns wild. A swallow works down my throat.
Okay, in hindsight, this was a mistake.
Without a single breath to spare, I whirl around and reach for the doorknob. But I have no chance.
The door swings barely two centimeters before Mason’s hand lands on the door, stopping me dead in my tracks. With twice my strength, he shoves it closed, then pushes me into it, using my weight to keep it shut.
His finger knots at the back of my head, my face flattened against the hardwood.
“Big mistake, princess. You shouldn’t dare a man with no morals,” he snarls in my ear. “I will kill every man here with my bare hands before I let them lay their eyes on what’s mine,” he hisses.
The weight of his words slowly sinks into my chest, but I have too much anger in me to allow him to affect me this way.
“You caught me in one weak moment,” I murmur, suppressing the tremors coursing down my body. “That doesn’t give you a claim on me now.”
“Not a claim,” he growls, moving my hair away from my nape and slowly trailing his large hand down my back, electrifying me at the touch. “Every fucking claim, princess. You belong to me. Only me.”
Fuck.
What was I thinking? How could I be so stupid?
Of course, he wasn’t going to let me walk out. And now, here I am, caught in my underwear, held under his lethal gaze.
His callous fingers trail down my body, while I am gripped in his hold, breathing against the harsh oak, biting my lip. His hand pauses at my hip, lightly stroking my bruise, before he moves down to my arse.
“You are so fuckable, little dove.” He draws circles on my skin, making me twitch on my feet. The nervous movements only push me closer to him as he cages me in. “And now that you have presented yourself to me like this, maybe I will take the pleasure of fucking you tonight.”
“You won’t,” I say with unwavering confidence.
“Is that so?” He lets out a dark chuckle. “Are you mistaking me for one of those posh twats who worship the ground you walk on? I’m not your fucking prince charming, princess.”
“No—you’re the devil,” I spit. “But you won’t fuck me until I ask you to.”
I’m not going to pretend I understand why he wants me, what this toxic obsession is, or what his motivations are.
But I know this.
He has had plenty of opportunities to cross this line.
He’s in my bedroom every night while I lie unconscious, unable to defend myself.
But he doesn’t. Because it’s not about a fuck for him.
He can get that anytime with anyone. Girls melt into puddles, opening their legs for him as soon as he enters a room.
No—he doesn’t just want to fuck me. He wants more.
He wants my will. He wants me to surrender myself to him.
As if. He can keep dreaming.
“No?” He cocks an eyebrow and grabs my breast over the bra. I gasp as he strokes and squeezes the red lace until my nipple pops out. “Is that Etheridge pride or faith in your king?”
“I’m not one of your Fort girls,” I breathe out. “And you’re not my fucking king.”
An animalistic roar rips from his throat as his fingers dig inside my panties and begin circling my opening. I press my lips together, but my body reacts to his touch as a reflex. Before I can stop it, I grind into his hand.
“Not your fucking king, huh?” He grins. “Tell that to your dripping cunt that doesn’t give a fuck about my moral compass.”
He shoves two fingers inside my wet pussy. My knees buckle at the impact. My mouth opens, not for words, but in pleasure, as he slides his fingers in and out of me in excruciatingly slow motions, making deliberate, erotic pops with every thrust—the only sound in the room, proving his point.
“How does it feel, proud princess? How does it feel when your cunt clenches around my fingers?” he grunts, his fingers digging deeper inside me, while mine scrape the wooden door.
“Fuck. I forgot how fucking tight you are. Maybe I should wake you up at night and start stretching out your virgin pussy. Make you ready to take my cock.”
Damn it. I have literally had dreams about him doing that. As embarrassing as that is to admit, even to myself.
Why do all my ethics collapse at the feet of this maddening person?
With a yank at the back of my hair, he pulls my head to his hard chest. My eyes roll back. Moans I can no longer hold back pour out of me in a string of unrecognizable sounds as he continues to thrust in and out of me.
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you, princess?” he whispers in my ear and grabs my breast with his other hand, twisting my hard nipple. I purse my lips, suppressing another embarrassing sound as he digs deeper still. “I’ll take that as a yes.”
His fingers thrust all the way in. Until I can feel the graze of his knuckles, my legs squirming around him.
I gasp when he hits that secret spot I wish he hadn’t found so easily.
“Stop,” I plead, my hand flying to his thigh, clenching, begging. “It's too much.”
He doesn’t. He scissors his fingers inside me, relentlessly fucking me, fixated on bending me to his will. Every time I get close, he slows, then starts tormenting me again.
“Oh God,” I beg. “Please…”
“You want to come, princess?” he asks and hits my spot again and again. Pleasure pools inside my core—so intense— I can’t fight it.
“Yesss.”
“Let’s try this again, then, shall we?” he whispers. “Who do you belong to?”
“Fuck, pl-lease.”
“Who do you belong to?”
“Mason…” I groan. “St—”
“That’s right.” He grins as he pounds into me. “Me. And just in case your memory fails you again, here’s a reminder.”
His mouth wraps around my neck, sucking on my soft skin, as he drives into me even faster, making my toes curl, and stars appear behind my lids. My body slackens in his hold, his name spilling out my lips again and again as he brings me to my peak.
It’s like he knows every inch of my body and is playing me like a fiddle.
“Come, little dove,” he breathes against my neck. “Come for your king.”
And I do.
I fall apart, screaming his name, just like he commands.
My body quivers against him, while he holds me, then withdraws his fingers, covered in my arousal, and slides them into his mouth. I look away, hiding my face in the crook of his neck.
Then his passionate hands ghost all over the front of my body: One brushing up my chest, my neck, then gripping my hair, the other squeezing my breast, then caressing down my waist and grabbing me between the legs.
“Mine!” he grunts. “My fucking property.”
Twin headlights blink with the snap of the keys, like judgmental eyes flaring into the night, spraying us with harsh beams in the dark parking lot of 99.
With his hand on my lower back, Mason escorts me to a Range Rover parked in a VIP spot.
His shoulders square as if he were ready to go to war, while his eyes flash across the space, searching.
What’s he looking for? Could that be the cause of the wound on his head? I only noticed it when we stepped into the light, but it looks deep.
I hold the clutch against my dress. I did manage to scrub the ink in the ladies room afterward, splashing water on it until the words bled.
Now there is a big blotch of black at my front, large enough that you can’t read the words from a distance.
Still, I hide it the best I can as he leads me to the car.
Having spent the last hour being unraveled by Mason, I really don’t want to be in a closed box with him for the next twenty minutes. His proximity is unbearable.
“I can take an Uber,” I offer, deliberately making my voice polite.
“So I have to go barging into every abandoned farm until I find you tied to a pole somewhere? No, thanks. Get in the car.”
“I made it here just fine,” I argue.
“Congratulations, you found one person at Fort who didn’t recognize you.” He opens the passenger door. “Now, get in, or I will put you in the boot.”
My teeth clench, but I don’t fight him. He holds all my vulnerabilities in his fist, and I’ve got nothing. Either I pick my battles, or he’ll undo me completely. I exhale hard and sink into the black leather seat.