Page 7 of Claimed Through Deception

For a split second, I see something flicker behind the obsidian wall of his gaze. It isn't anger. It isn't the blind, drunken rage I used to see in my father's eyes. It is a pause. A hesitation.

He looks at my shaking hands, still pressed flat against his chest. He looks at my pale face. He sees the raw, unadulterated terror I am trying so desperately to hide, and he simply stops.

He slowly stands up.

I have to crane my neck to keep looking at him. He is over six feet of pure, predatory dominance. The sheer mass of him blocks out the rest of the bar.

He doesn't back away. Instead, he takes a slow step into my space.

My instincts scream at me to retreat, but my spine hits the hard wooden edge of the booth behind me. I am trapped.

He takes another step, closing the distance completely. He is so close I can smell him. He doesn't smell like cheap cologne or sweat. He smells like bergamot, dark woods, and the cold, metallic tang of gunpowder.

He lifts his arms, planting a large, heavy hand on the wooden table on either side of my hips.

He cages me in.

I am completely engulfed by his shadow. The heat of his body wraps around me, suffocating and heavy. My breath hitches, my chest brushing against his expensive suit jacket with every frantic inhale.

He lowers his head, leaning down until his face is mere inches from mine.

"What do you think you are doing?" he asks.

His voice is a low, rough murmur meant only for me.

I swallow hard, my throat is sandpaper-dry. "Let him go."

"He stole something that belongs to me."

"I don't care," I whisper, my voice shaking despite my desperate attempt to keep it steady. "You are not doing this. You are not hurting him in front of me."

His jaw tightens. A muscle twitches in his cheek. He studies my face, his eyes tracking the frantic pulse beating wildly at the base of my throat. He is dissecting me. He is stripping away the cheap uniform, the tough exterior, and looking straight into the terrified, broken core of who I am.

He lifts his right hand from the table.

I flinch, a hard, involuntary jerk of my shoulders.

He doesn't hit me. His large, rough fingers wrap around my jaw.

His grip is firm, but it doesn't bruise. He holds my face in place, forcing me to look up into his soulless, black eyes. The callouses on his fingers scrape lightly against my skin. It is the most degrading, terrifying, and intensely intimate touch I have ever experienced.

My breath stalls completely in my lungs.

He tilts my head up just a fraction more. His thumb shifts, dragging across the fullness of my lower lip.

A violent, electric shock rips straight down my spine.

I gasp, my lips parting instinctively under the rough pad of his thumb.

His eyes darken, the pupils expanding until they nearly swallow the iris. He stares at my mouth, his chest rising with breath. For one terrifying second, I think he is going to kiss me. I think he is going to completely devour me right here in the middle of this filthy bar.

"Get him up," he orders, his voice dropping an octave deeper. He doesn't break eye contact with me.

Behind him, the younger man hauls the bleeding patron off the floor.

"We are leaving," the giant says.

His thumb drags across my lip one last time, a brand burned directly into my skin.