Stephanie had gone on and on about how good looking he was while also reminding me to be very careful of all three men. They’d certainly seemed like kings, ruling over a kingdom that had made them into superstars.

  I closed my eyes, envisioning the dreams and fantasies I’d had about the masked man. All while thinking of Xander. I laughed bitterly, the sound hollow. Admitting the truth was more painful than I could ever have imagined.

  But I hungered for him.

  His rough touch.

  His heated kisses.

  The way he made me feel so alive, as if there was nothing I couldn’t do.

  Every single rush of fear pushed my adrenaline higher, creating the most incredible endorphins.

  His lips on my skin.

  And on my pussy, his tongue buried deep inside.

  Oh, my God. I longed to feel his cock buried deep inside, bringing me more rapture than I’d believed existed.

  Moaning, I dropped my head into my hands. My sinner, my saint.

  My nemesis.

  He returned only a few minutes later, striding into the room with items in his hands including a true icepack. I allowed myself a full look at his carved chest, the six-pack abs more like an eight-pack. There wasn’t an ounce of fat on the man. I sucked in my breath, still uncertain of my feelings at this point. While he had a powerful draw, I was still frightened about my reaction to him.

  I was also shocked at his level of tenderness. He crouched down as he’d done before, gently removing the shirt from my hand.

  “Your shirt might be ruined,” I told him.

  “Do you think I care about material things?”

  “By the look of this house, the art on your walls, my answer is an easy yes.”

  He tilted his gaze while opening a bottle of hydrogen peroxide. “I could easily go without any material things, Jessica. For most of my life I lived in squalor. You should continue with the ice on your eye.”

  The Blackwell brothers’ past had been kept very private. While there were whispers they’d grown up separately, I had no idea of the details. Neither did anyone else. I thought about what little Stephanie had told me, wondering if her father actually knew more than he’d been willing to tell.

  “But you must prefer living in such luxury.” I did as he asked, placing it tenderly against my aching eye. The pain was still there, my head throbbing, but the damage could have been so much worse had he not intervened.

  After tugging out a few cotton balls, he surveyed my wound again before pouring the peroxide onto the swabs. “This might sting a little and I’m sorry if it does.”

  I winced as soon as he pressed a swab against the cut. “It’s fine.”

  He chuckled. “A favorite word when around me. I enjoy nice things, I can’t lie to you that I do, but I respect those who can raise a family with little money. Especially the ones who keep the family together through thick and thin.”

  “Does that mean you didn’t experience that as a child?” For as much as I wanted to hate him, when I noticed the dark swell in his eyes, I felt another sense of sorrow.

  “My childhood is of no concern. Not to you or anyone else. What happened was the only thing that could have occurred.”

  “I’m sorry, Xander. I really am. We have our crosses to bear. However, that doesn’t give you an excuse or the right to take out what you’d suffered on anyone else.” As soon as I gripped his hand, the same flurry of butterflies swarmed my stomach and I was momentarily caught off guard by the electricity shooting through every cell and muscle.

  I instinctively pulled my hand away, curling my fingers just as he offered me a soulful look. It was entirely different than any expression I’d seen before.

  “There is no reason to be sorry and perhaps you’re right, but keep in mind not all stories are filled with one hundred percent truths. Suffering, anger, sadness, and hatred often jade everything. We’re all given things to endure in our lives that make us stronger. Sadly, if it doesn’t, then we succumb to the kind of darkness that can’t be controlled.”

  Was this a strange reasoning for why he’d gone into the gaming business?

  He concentrated on what he was doing for another two minutes before taking a deep breath. “I don’t think this will become infected.” He rose to his full height as he’d done before, standing over me for just a few seconds before taking the items away and toward the bar.

  I kept the compress on my eye as I watched him preparing fresh drinks. Even the muscles in his back were perfectly sculpted. How could a man so dangerously handsome be such a dick?

  That’s what I continued to tell myself as he returned with the tumblers in his hand. The stern look he offered while handing me a glass matched the one from before.

  In return, I handed him the ruined shirt. He smirked as he accepted the gesture, continuing to stare down at me.

  “I’m really okay. Just rattled,” I told him as if repeating what I’d said would change his mind and he’d take me home. I placed the icepack on the table between the two chairs and smiled, forcing myself not to wince. If the punch had been any harder, I wouldn’t be able to see out of one eye, but my vision was just fine.

  Other than that I was staring into the cold, hard eyes of a predator.

  Was Sinner really that dangerous or was this just an excuse to see how I’d handle being close to him as Xander? Well, I was an excellent opponent. He’d found out in his virtual death I was quite formidable. As if proving a point, I stood, no longer as shaky as I had been before.

  He was close, so close to me that I felt his incredible body heat resonating into mine. He never blinked, didn’t say a single word as I brushed against him. But the electricity was different, starting out as tiny prickles dancing across my skin before exploding into rockets of extreme power and heat.

  I was breathless, the butterflies remaining as I returned to the picture I’d looked at before. It was interesting how the artist had used bold colors for some aspects and muted ones that made the person gazing on the work of art look more closely.

  The masked man had his hand around her throat.

  Brilliant.

  I felt Xander’s presence behind me, yet he was keeping his distance, allowing me to explore on my own.

  But the pressure was building. I could feel it spiraling to the point of being out of control. I held my breath as I stood in front of another painting, colors in the masterpiece matching the gothic red painted on the wall.

  “The artist is incredible,” I finally said to break the silence and the nervousness that continued to build.

  “A reflection of one’s soul,” he said as he moved right behind me.

  It was almost impossible to concentrate, but the painting continued to draw me as the artist must have intended. The landscape was beautiful, a dark forest completely thick with lush foliage in deep greens with hints of moss. There were no flowers, no vibrant colors other than the mask the man was wearing. It held a neon reflection, just enough to linger over what he was doing.

  Tying his intended to a tree.

  My mouth and throat were suddenly dry, my mind spinning with images of the woman being me. Deep in a forest. Hunted and captured. Now she would be punished.

  I longed for it. A taste of pain before the utmost pleasure.

  It suddenly dawned on me why the paintings were here. “You painted these?”

  “Very good, Jessica. Yes, I did.”

  The way he said my name sent another shower of trickles skittering through me. Those pinpricks had turned into an erupting fire that would soon be uncontrollable.

  “Out of pain and guilt.” I said the words absently, but I knew them to be the truth.

  His sigh was deep and filled with darkness. “I didn’t kill Shanna. I loved her, but she was better off without me. That was the single thing your father was correct about.”

  “Then why did you leave her?”

  He brushed his hand through my hair before rubbing the pads of his fingers over my shoulder. “Because your father begged me to and I honored his request. It was the one thing he’d asked of me and the one promise I should never have kept.”

  I closed my eyes. I believed him.

  “You crave the darkness,” I said after a few seconds had passed and I wasn’t certain why. Wasn’t that obvious?

  “Just as you do. You have a need to let go of everything you fear, all the anguish you’ve experienced. The hatred. There’s only one way of doing so.”

  “How so?” I could barely breathe, my pulse racing.

  “By allowing someone to take full control of you. And your destiny. That is what you truly want. Isn’t it?”

  “I don’t know what I want, Xander. At least not any longer.”

  “Then I truly think you’re lying to yourself.” His voice was deep, not harsh, but holding a stern tone that both excited and frightened me. I was frozen in the moment, still staring at the painting yet the characters were no longer strangers, depictions of the shadows living in those hungering for a taste of something more extreme.

  The man in the mask holding a leather strap was Sinner and the woman was his little lamb.

  My breath skipping, the moment I felt his fingers brushing against the skin on my shoulders, I shuddered audibly.

  “I don’t know what this is,” I whispered.

  “I think you do.”

  I sensed for once and perhaps this time only, he was offering me a choice. With a merciless beast like Xander, there would be no others. From here on out, he would dictate every interaction.

  As I closed my eyes, I fell into the sweet peace of his fingers trailing down my arms, briefly interlocking our fingers together.

  “Surrender and I’ll set you free, my perfect Jessica.”

  This was wrong, so very wrong, but his touch and the beautiful release was everything I’d craved.

  And everything my body and soul needed.

  So I turned around to face him, tilting my head. His eyes were positively glowing and to think, the man I’d believed to be a monster didn’t need a mask to excite me.

  Everything about him did.

  CHAPTER 23

  Jessica

  “I’m supposed to hate you,” I told him as a rush of emotions pushed me to a steep precipice, a cliff I could easily drop off.

  “Do you?”

  “I don’t know what to think.”

  “Look me in the eyes and tell me you still believe I had anything to do with Shanna’s death.” Xander’s voice was imploring, yet even darker than before. The look in his eyes was filled with emotions, but I couldn’t read what they were.

  “Why would my father lie?”

  For the first time since I’d met him, his expression softened. “To protect you. I don’t blame him. I’m not a good man and he knows that. However, hurting Shanna was never my intention.”

  He was offering me a way out if that’s what I wanted. This had nothing to do with the game or with Sinner. I was standing in a room with Xander Blackwell, a tortured man.

  But he wasn’t the monster I’d made him out to be.

  Surrender.

  “Tell me what you want, Jessica.” He narrowed his eyes, his chest rising and falling.

  The spiral of emotions would be difficult to explain to anyone, but the desire that I couldn’t squelch would never be understood.

  And I honestly didn’t care. “This. I want this.”

  As Xander cupped both sides of my face, rubbing my jaw, the rough pads of his thumbs scintillated my core. The flash of heat was unlike what I’d experienced before with him during the hunt. Or during the feast after he’d broken the boundaries of my home.

  My pulse was still high and I darted my eyes back and forth across his. There was something about him that I couldn’t deny. The hatred still existed, but the desire was much stronger, the sensations driving out everything else.

  He crowded my space, adding more pressure to his firm hold. I was captured by him, his power and his dominant personality. As Xander slowly lowered his head, I was certain my heart had stopped beating altogether.

  “I will always protect you,” he muttered just before capturing my lips. There was no movement for a few seconds, no sound other than the rapid beating of my heart echoing in my ears.

  A small part of me knew I should push him away, but the larger part, the one that had taken over every rational thought wanted something else altogether. I gripped his wrists, digging my nails into his skin as he swept his tongue inside. His hold was commanding yet tender.

  Every move he made was slow and easy, allowing me to become used to what he was doing.

  But I knew in the back of my mind this was just the beginning. He wasn’t a gentle lover, not by any standards. There were no masks, no sense of the anonymity that had protected both of us from the truth of reality. This was hard, cold, and would soon be brutal.

  As if reading my mind, he rolled one arm around my waist, lifting me onto my toes. I slid my hands up along his muscular arms, marveling in the feel of them as the heat continued to build. His actions slowly became more controlling as he crawled his other hand around to the back of my neck.

  I was going nowhere until he was finished with me.

  Or until I was finished with him.

  The thought brought another wave of tingles as the kiss continued. His tongue dominated mine in a dance of superiority, but he would never allow anyone else to win.

  He jerked me as close to his body was possible and I ground my hips against his. His cock pressed against my stomach and I shivered from the realization of how large he was, his shaft throbbing just as my pulse was doing. Rapid and hard. Unforgiving.

  Xander’s actions became rougher and I slid my arms around his neck, clamping one hand around his thick strands of hair while raking my nails down his back.

  I felt his hand tugging at the zipper on my dress, slowly rolling it down. The cool air in the room couldn’t erase the explosive heat furrowing between us.

  Suddenly, he broke the kiss, backing away completely.

  I dragged my tongue across my bottom lip, uncertain what to expect.

  “Remove your dress for me.” His command was as dark as the man, so husky my legs were quaking.

  The way he was staring at me was as if the man would devour me whole. I’d never seen a man’s eyes glow the way his were doing.

  I couldn’t stop shaking, nor could I take my eyes off him as I tugged on one side of my dress and the other, shimmying until gravity allowed the silky dress to fall ever so slowly, finally pooling around my feet.

  He took a deep breath once my breasts were fully exposed, holding it for a few seconds before exhaling. The expression on his face was even darker, if that was possible.

  I took a step from the dress, offering a slight smile even though apprehension mixed with utter excitement. This was something I would never have imagined in a million years.

  “Come to me.” The command in his tone turned my legs into jelly. I was a crazy woman for doing this, but I was trembling from the desire to obey him.

  Yet I took a single step, almost chickening out. There was no hiding behind a game any longer. This was real. This was crazy. This was dangerous.

  But I refused to fall prey to my own fears or to the lies that had kept me imprisoned for so much of my life. I took another step and he dipped his head as he began to unfasten his belt.

  My eyes were drawn to his movements, my mind processing what it would feel like to have the strap snapped across my bottom. Maybe I did crave pain more than I’d ever admitted to anyone including myself.

  The corner of his lip lifted and I sensed he knew exactly what I was thinking.

  “Is this what you crave, Desdemona?” he asked as he began to tug the strap from his belt loops. It was the first time he’d used my screen name while still not admitting he was Sinner.

  Was he waiting for me to expose him or enjoying our game as much as I was?

  I allowed my gaze to fall from his face to the belt, swallowing hard before answering.

  “Yes,” I said without thinking.

  “Can you handle it?” he mused and cracked the strap against the floor.

  It was a challenge, another test of my will. But not my resolve. He had to know what I was capable of, yet here he was pushing me into discovering more about myself. That was the way of Xander, forcing someone to embrace their limits then pushing. That much was easy to tell about him.

  It was also something I remembered my sister telling me. It was interesting how much I’d thought of her lately, blanks filling like missing pieces of a puzzle. All because I’d finally committed my mind and actions to bringing down a single man, and watching his world crumble.

  But as I moved toward him, drawn by his magnetism, I wanted to laugh at myself for believing such mediocre bullshit. I wanted exactly what I suspected Shanna had had before her untimely death.

  When I was six inches away, he folded the belt, rolling it down between my breasts. He lowered his head, trailing his gaze behind his actions as he flicked the edge across my right nipple several times.

  Already taut, my breasts started to ache from the firestorm of sensations. I closed my eyes only briefly because I wanted to see everything he was doing.

  Everything he did to me.

  Xander shifted the belt between my barely open legs, inhaling as if gathering the whiff of my desire that I’d fought to keep from him. I’d never felt so exposed. Even during the hunt, I’d felt powerful, as if there was nothing I couldn’t do. Now I was extremely vulnerable with no headset to hide behind. No ability to stop the game if I felt uncomfortable.

  This wasn’t about winning or losing. This was about recapturing my soul. The only loss might be one of anger. We would see what the future would bring.

  He closed the distance, using his fingers instead of his hand to explore my torso, brushing his fingertips ever so slowly around one hardened bud then the other. I couldn’t stop quivering, the excitement building to a frenzy.

  The expression he wore was positively carnal. He didn’t need the mask to provide a hint of fear. He could do that all on his own. But there was also a tremendous amount of desire mixed in, enough so his nostrils were flared.