Chapter 26
NIKOLAI
Iwatch her through the tactical scope, tracking her movement through the forest like the apex predator I was conditioned to be.
Ninety minutes of pursuit, and she’s finally reached exactly where I wanted her—the hunting blind clearing, surrounded on three sides by dense timber with only one viable escape route.
Which I’m already blocking.
Her chest heaves as she spins in the center of the clearing, those eyes wild with exhaustion and need. A heat that makes my cock throb against my tactical pants as I watch her realize she’s trapped.
There’s my girl.
She ran well. Better than I expected, actually. Seven miles through difficult terrain, using natural cover and elevation changes to mask her movement. The underground fighting circuit taught her endurance, but this—this is pure survival instinct refined into beauty.
Something that belongs to me.
I emerge from the tree line, letting her see me coming. I watch her pupils dilate as she takes in the full picture—six-foot-four of controlled violence moving toward her.
“You ran well, beautiful.” My voice carries through the clearing, roughened by my own exertion during the chase. “But you knew how this would end.”
She backs toward the far tree line, but her movements lack conviction. Her body knows what mine knows, that the chase is over. The real game is just beginning.
“I could keep running.” Her words come out breathless, but there’s no desperation in them. Just a statement of fact.
“You could try.” I close the distance between us with measured steps, watching her retreat until her back hits the trunk of a massive oak. “But we both know you don’t want to.”
But she doesn’t stay there.
She pushes off the trunk and comes at me. Bare-handed, no weapon, all hundred and ten pounds of her against two hundred and thirty pounds of trained violence.
She aims for the soft places—eyes, throat, knees. Quick combinations she learned in the cage circuit. Strategy that works when you’re half a man’s size and need to drop him fast.
I let her land two strikes before I catch her. One glancing off my jaw. One into my ribs hard enough that I’ll feel it tomorrow. Then I sweep her leg and have her on her back in the pine needles, my weight pinning her hips, both her wrists trapped above her head in one of my hands.
She’s panting beneath me. Eyes wild. Cheek scraped from the forest floor. Magnificent.
“You let me hit you,” she rasps.
“I wanted to feel how hard you’d try.”
“Fuck you.”
“That’s the idea, beautiful. You wanted this to happen the entire time we were apart.”
Her chest rises and falls rapidly and she manages to shove me off her enough to jump to her feet.
“That’s not—” she starts, backing away right toward that oak tree again, then cuts herself off.
“Not what?” I’m close enough now to smell her—sweat and adrenaline and that particular musk that tells me her body is responding exactly as I planned. “Not true? Not why you stayed in Chicago for three months instead of disappearing?”
Her breath hitches.
“I was building a life—”
“You were waiting.” I plant one hand against the oak beside her head, caging her against the rough bark. “Waiting for me to find you. Waiting for this.”
My free hand traces the skin at her throat, and she shivers under the touch. Even through my tactical gloves, I can feel how her skin burns.
“You’re insane.” But the words lack bite. Her body sways toward mine despite her protest.
“Maybe.” I lean closer, letting her feel the heat radiating off my chest. “But I’m also right. You could have run anywhere in the world. Instead, you stayed in my territory, hunting my competition, making yourself visible to anyone who knew how to look.”
She opens her mouth to argue, but I grab her throat in warning.
“You wanted me to find you,” I continue. “Wanted me to hunt you down and drag you back where you belong.”
“Stop.” The word comes out as barely a whisper.
“Stop what? Stop telling you the truth?” My body presses closer, pinning her fully against the tree. “Your pulse is racing, your pupils are blown, and I can smell how wet you are from here.”
She makes a sound and tries to turn her head away. I catch her chin with my free hand, forcing her to meet my eyes through the mask.
“Look at me, Jenna. Look at me and tell me you don’t want this.”
Those gray-green eyes search mine, and I see the exact moment her last defense crumbles. The way her body goes soft against the tree, the way her breathing shifts from panicked to hungry.
“I hate you.” But there’s no conviction in it.
“I know.” I release her chin to palm her breast through the thin sports bra, feeling how her nipple hardens. “Doesn’t stop you from wanting me to fuck you against this tree.”
Her back arches, pressing her breast more firmly into my hand. “Nikolai—”
My name on her lips destroys what’s left of my control. The careful protocol I planned dissolves into simple need as I tear at her sports bra, ripping the fabric away from her perfect tits.
“Three months,” I growl ripping off my mask and dropping it to the floor, my teeth finding the sensitive skin. “Three months of dreaming about having you under me again.”
My mouth latches onto her nipple, sucking hard enough to make her cry out. She tastes like salt and desperation and everything I’ve been craving since she sneaked out of my bed.
“Please—” The word escapes her before she can stop it.
“Please what?” I bite down on the peaked flesh, making her hands fly to my shoulders for balance. “Tell me what you need, beautiful.”
Her nails dig into my skin as I work her breast with lips and teeth and tongue. The other breast gets the same treatment, until she’s gasping and writhing against the oak.
“I need—” She cuts herself off, shame warring with desire in her expression.
“You need me to fuck you.” I straighten to my full height, looking down at her flushed face and swollen lips. “Right here. Right now. Like the desperate little thing you’ve always been for me.”
Her thighs clench together, and I know I’ve hit the mark.
“Say it,” I command, dragging down her shorts. “Tell me what you really came here for.”
“I didn’t—” The protest dies as I slide the athletic shorts down her legs, taking her panties with them. “Oh god—”
“No god here, beautiful. Just me.” I hook her leg over my forearm, opening her to the cool forest air. “Just the man who’s going to breed you against this tree until you remember where you belong.”
She’s soaked. Absolutely fucking drenched, her pussy glistening in the dappled sunlight. The sight makes me growl like an animal as I open my pants with desperate hands.
“This is what you’ve been craving, isn’t it?” My cock springs free, thick and hard and already weeping. “Three months of waking up empty, wishing you were still in my bed.”
“Yes.” The admission tears out of her. “God, yes, I’ve missed—”
I slam into her before she can finish the sentence. Her scream echoes through the forest as I bury myself to the hilt, the piercing dragging against her inner walls in ways that make her whole body shake.
“Missed what?” I grunt, holding still while her pussy adjusts to my size. “Missed my cock splitting you open? Missed being owned?”
“All of it.” Her head falls back against the oak, exposing the column of her throat. “I missed all of it.”
I pull back and slam forward again, setting a rhythm that’s more punishment than pleasure. The oak bark scrapes her shoulders with each thrust, but she only moans louder.
“That’s right, take it all.” My hips snap forward with increasing violence. “Take every inch of what you’ve been missing.”
Her leg hooks around my waist, urging me deeper, and I can feel her internal muscles starting to flutter. She’s close already, wound tight from the chase and the rough claiming.
“You’re going to come on my cock,” I tell her, reaching between us to find her clit. “Going to soak me while I breed you against this tree like an animal.”
The pressure of my thumb makes her cry out, her back arching away from the rough bark. Her pussy clenches around me in waves, and I know she’s right on the edge.
“Come for me, beautiful. Show me how much you missed belonging to me.”
The scream that tears from her mouth sends birds exploding from the nearby trees. Her orgasm rips through her with such force that she nearly unbalances me, only my grip and the tree keeping us upright as she shudders around my driving cock.
“That’s it,” I snarl. “That’s my good girl, coming apart on my cock out in the open where anyone could witness it.”
The thought of being discovered, of someone witnessing her complete surrender—despite there being no one around for miles—makes her clench even tighter around me.
“You like that,” I observe. “Like the idea of being watched while I claim you.”
Her moan is answer enough.
I shift the angle, hitting that spot inside her that makes her back arch. She’s building toward another peak already, her body greedy for the release it’s been denied for months.
“Going to fill this pussy with my cum,” I tell her, feeling my own climax building at the base of my spine. “Going to breed you right here until it takes.”
“Yes,” she gasps, nails raking down my back. “Fill me up, please—”
“Please what?”
“Please breed me.” The words come out broken, desperate. “I need—I need you to put your baby in me.”
The hunger in her voice pushes me over the edge. I bury myself as deep as humanly possible and explode inside her, flooding her with months of pent-up need. Rope after rope of cum fills her as I grind against her cervix, making sure she feels every pulse.
“Mine,” I growl through gritted teeth. “Mine, mine, mine.”
When I finally stop, we’re both gasping for oxygen. She’s limp against the tree, held up only by my grip and the legs still wrapped around my waist.
I pull out slowly, watching my cum leak from her well-fucked pussy. The sight makes me want to take her again immediately, to keep her full of me until her body has no choice but to accept my seed.
“When you run from me again,” I murmur against her ear, still breathing hard, “and you will run, this is what’s waiting at the end. Me catching you. Me claiming you. Me putting another load inside you until you’re carrying my child.”
She shudders at the promise, and I see her pussy clench around nothing.
“Every time you run, I’ll catch you,” I continue, nipping at her earlobe. “Every time I catch you, I’ll breed you.”
I step back, tucking myself away and watching her struggle to stay upright without my support. Her legs are shaking, cum dripping down her inner thighs.
“We’re going back now.” I gather her torn clothing, leaving her naked in the forest clearing. “And tonight, you sleep in my bed where you belong.”
She doesn’t argue. Just follows me through the trees on unsteady legs, naked with my cum leaking from her pussy with each step.
By the time we reach the compound, the sun is setting behind the Wisconsin hills, painting everything gold and orange.
And Jenna is exactly where she’s always belonged.
With me.