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I knew that good strategy won out each and every time. I especially loved coming out victorious when anyone was foolish enough to underestimate me.
Without any warning, he leaned close, gripped my chin, and forcefully yanked my face up to peer back at his. I opened my lips to protest, but his mouth was on mine before I could say a single word.
Without asking my permission, he just went andkissedme.
It wasn’t the sort of chaste kiss shared between lovers or even two people that had crushes on one another, but the sort of rough kiss that told me he wasn’t interested in simply making love to me. It was a conquering with nothing other than his mouth as his fingers gripped my chin hard enough to ache. I shouldn’t have reacted. I should have pushed him away, but the electric pull between us was like gravity, and I couldn’t turn away.
Without meaning to, I kissed him back.
I lost myself in his rough dominance, allowing him to take over for the briefest of moments. Heat burned through my veins, my nerves igniting like a molten, sputtering volcano. I only just kept myself silent, biting back a moan at the last possible second.
I didn’t want to reveal how much I was actually enjoying this, not to the likes of him, or anyone that might be watching.
When he finally pulled away, he let go of my chin, and I could feel the lasting presence of his fingertips aching along my jawline for a good long while. My chest rose and fell at his audacity, and I finally remembered that it should be making me very angry.
“I’ll see you tomorrow night, Ada,” he assumed, and the fury I was holding back exploded.
This was my bar and he’d kissed me without permission.
It didn’t matter that I’d enjoyed it. All that was beside the point.
In a fraction of a second, I had drawn my hand back and slapped him as hard as I could across his face. I watched with pleasure as the mark from my hand glowed white for a brief moment before it turned a pleasing pink and then a remarkably satisfying red. I saw his nostrils flare for the briefest of seconds, but he lifted his chin and leveled me with a steady, cool look.
“If you come back tomorrow, I’ll send you home with a bullet,” I snarled. The bastard was lucky he didn’t get my backhand too.
His lips curled up in a slow, confident smile. With an increasing air of arrogance, he cocked his head and grinned even wider, reacting like I hadn’t just smacked him across the face.
“You wouldn’t do that, little girl. Do you know why?”
I didn’t gratify that with a response. I just glared back at him with fiery vehemence.
“Because then you wouldn’t getyourfucking, would you?”
Immediately, I tensed, wrapping my fingers around my empty glass in an effort to keep my rage contained. I seethed as he turned to walk away, but I only let him get a few steps away from me before I reacted. Using all my strength, I hurled the glass directly at him. As if he had eyes in the back of his head, he turned and shot his hand up, catching it before it connected with his forehead. The dickhead met my eyes and lowered his hand, my glass safely encased within his fingers.
I glared, scowling as fiercely as I could manage at his foiling of my perfectly aimed assassination attempt. The whole thing might as well have been rehearsed, like he’d known I was going to throw it before I even thought to do it.
It was exceedingly frustrating.
He walked back over to the bar and set the empty glass back down before he slid close to me. I kept my chin held high, standing my ground as he leaned towards me.
I hated that he stood above me, but there was nothing I could do about it. Even if I pushed myself to my feet, I’d be forced to touch him. There wasn’t enough room to step aside without brushing my breasts against his chest. Like he could read my mind, he took another step closer and closed the distance between us.
The scent of his cologne along with the top shelf whiskey on his breath took me by surprise. As I stared into his eyes, I noticed copper flecks hidden among the gold and green of his irises. It was as if there were a ring of fire surrounding his pupils that was flickering with heat.
Just like the fire raging inside your veins.
“I’ll be here tomorrow night, little girl, but you’ve been such a naughty girl that you’re going to have to ask for something else before your fucking,” he purred, and I hated the way I enjoyed how the syllables rolled off his tongue. His voice was low enough that only I could hear, but that didn’t take away the fact that we were surrounded by people. Any one of them could turn the right way and overhear his words.
I took a deep breath, trying to figure him out before it was too late. His expression was full of supreme confidence, like he knew something I didn’t.
What kind of man was he? Did he just need to hear himself talk? Was he going to mansplain my own needs to me? What the fuck did he want?
Needing more intel, I decided to give him a chance to speak. The worst-case scenario was that I called Aidan in the morning and arranged for my own personal protection to drag him out of the pub and into the back ally so I could put a bullet directly between those arrogantly enticing eyes tomorrow night.
“And what’s that?”
He chuckled, the sound dark, and the sudden impression that I was soon going to regret asking in the first place washed over me.
