“I’m not sure that matters.”

“Jesus, that master of the universe never goes away, does he?”

“What the hell do you expect?” he said, his voice no longer mellow or casual or weary in his mildly contemptuous way, but suddenly razor sharp. “You think I’m going to change? You think that hot sex with you is going to alter my life? Burn away thirty-two fucking years of encoded distrust and the poisonous shadow of my parents? I’ve got news for you, baby. It ain’t gonna happen. So just get the fuck out. This is my room.”

“Your last defense you mean.”

His eyes were searing blue. “Yeah, it is and you’re not supposed to be here.”

She swung up out of bed, stood well away from him, faint color rising on her cheeks. “I need my clothes.”

He stared at her, at her redhead’s pale translucent skin, at her pulse-quickening beauty, at her extravagant tits and her soft, curvaceous body that fit his like a glove. “Later,” he said.

She straightened her spine at his words, drew herself up to her full height, which still fell short of his by a foot, forced herself to meet his implacable gaze. “I’m not going to let you walk all over me, Dominic. I’m not afraid of you. Jesus, will you stop? Don’t look at me like that. Like you’re doing a cost analysis and your dick has the final vote.”

“My dick always has the final vote with you, baby. And the first and tenth and hundredth.”

“It’s nice to know you care,” she said, her lips compressed, unfiltered animosity in her eyes. “This is a real Hallmark moment.”

“Don’t get all worked up,” he said, as if he weren’t standing there with a major hard-on behind his open zipper. “Maybe that’s how I show I care. Maybe that’s the only way. Maybe I don’t know any other way.”

“Jesus, you are so fucked.”

“Uh-uh—you are.” He moved in a blur, picked her up, tossed her back on the bed, kicked off his sandals, and, standing at the side of the bed, freed the metal button at the waistband of his jeans. Sliding his fingers into his open fly, he shoved his boxers down enough to draw out his heavy cock.

She glared at him. “You’re such a child.”

“I was never a child, Katherine,” he said with a small sigh. “Not within memory. Tell me you want this. That’s not too difficult, is it?” His mind fuck aside, there was no way he wasn’t going to screw her.

She tried not to look, but his massive erection was defying gravity, starkly upright, the swollen head reaching past his navel.

“He’s not insulted by bitchy women, baby.” The faintest of smiles flickered across Dominic’s face. “But we need you to get with the program. You know how it works: I give the orders. You follow them.”

“Go to hell,” Kate snapped.

Something tightened in his jaw; his smile disappeared. “I’m not playing this game anymore,” he said, cool and seamless, the billionaire CEO reinstated. “I’ve been kissing your ass since Singapore. I don’t kiss ass.” He gazed at her across endless years of hard living and taking what he wanted. “I’m done with this bullshit.”

“Excuse me? Is that what this is?”

“I don’t feel like excusing you right now.” His voice was grating, deadly, her second question dismissed. “Just do what you’re told.” He ran his closed fingers up the length of his pulsing dick, took a deep breath as the pleasure streaked up his spine. “Now tell me you want this deep inside you.”

She should tell him to fuck off. Better yet, she should get up and leave this infuriating man with his invisible world he was battling; she should turn her back on this impossible relationship that wasn’t a relationship at all, unless nonstop fucking qualified. Perhaps she might even have followed through if his eyes hadn’t been fixed knowingly on hers, if he hadn’t run his finger all the way up his monstrous dick so slowly she could see the fresh blood pouring into the network of distended veins feeding his arousal.

A sudden spike of shimmering desire raced through her body, recklessly vaulted over judicious thought, left her quivering. Instant recall of the consequences of Dominic’s brusque orders flooded her senses: the wild hysteria, the seething need, the soul-stirring ecstasy; how he could make the pleasure last.

“You’re pissing me off Katherine. Talk to me or fuck it; I’ll turn on some porn and take care of myself.” He circled his erection with his fingers, slid his hand down to the base of the thick shaft, tipped his towering dick in her direction, and arched his brows.

“Will you be starring in the porn?” Bile spilling from her tongue.

He gave a small shrug. “Not necessarily. Would it interest you if I were?”

She blushed furiously, and for what seemed an ice age she was under the gaze of a silent observer who had the power to overlook the ordinary constraints of life. Who had the power to make her ache for him.

“The porn can wait,” he said quietly, as if he could read her mind. “But I need you to answer me. Politely. You must, Katherine.”

She flinched at the steel edge in his voice, called herself every kind of fool for trembling at his free-of-apology demand. Had she learned nothing in the month past about personal freedom and choices? “Okay, then, yes,” she said, as though she had no will of her own, as though she were on some carnal autopilot.

“Okay?” he said silkily, because he’d been walking a bloody tightrope since Raffles trying to please a woman for the first time in his life and he needed some serious payback. “That doesn’t sound very enthusiastic. You can do better than that.”