My pulse spikes at his words. He wants me alone for a reason.
It’s part of my job, though. If I do this… if I do what I’ve set out to do, vengeance will not only be mine, I’ll be paid amply for the information I send back to my boss. If we can do a full-on exposé of the McCarthy Clan, we can bring them down. I’ll be paid richly, and maybe I’ll even have enough to go to court and fight for my siblings.
I wonder if he’ll interrogate me. Perhaps there’s an even meaner side to him than I’ve yet seen. I know that although his record’s clean, he was accused of murder several years back, but he was acquitted. Naturally. Ballyhock thinks the McCarthys wear tilted halos.
I know better.
He unfastens the gag they put on me while he asks me a question.
“So tell me, doll. Why’d you try that?”
Doll. I hate it when he calls me that because a part of me likes it. A tender term that would make a girl feel wanted, I think, but since there’s no tenderness between us, it grates.
Nolan leans back in the seat and laces his fingers behind his head. Sandy blond hair falls on his forehead, his green eyes glint at me. When he leans back, his muscles bulge. He might be a bastard, but those arms, those hands. Strong arms like that could hold a woman close and make her feel safe.
But I’m not that woman.
He waits for an answer, his gaze so nonchalant he could be watching a rugby match.
“Do what?” I ask.
“Try to distract me by sucking me off.”
I swallow hard. The way he says it makes something like arousal stir low in my belly.
I had him. I had him, right there, on my knees.
I shake my head. I need to throw him off kilter as easily as he does me.
“If only you were patient. I’d have swallowed, you know.”
His nostrils flare and his eyes heat for one split second before he schools his features and gives me a slow, sadistic grin.
“Not so fast, doll. Don’t make assumptions.”
“Assumptions?”
He smiles, and it’s a chilling sort of smile. I shiver.
“Assumptions,” he repeats.
“What am I assuming?”
“That it’ll be the only time you’ll get on your knees for me. That your opportunity to swallow’s gone.”
I shiver, suddenly nervous. I prepared myself for many things, but somehow rape wasn’t one of them.
Would he? Have I managed to convince myself there is good in this man after all?
Am I wrong?
I grit my teeth and don’t respond at first. He wants to scare me. He wants to intimidate and threaten me. I won’t let him.
I give him a grin. “Is that right, sir? I’m eager for another chance.”
I have to admit, I feel a little smug. I hope it doesn’t show. But if I won’t cower with a spanking and I look forward to being used sexually, what else is there he can do to me?
His eyes darken as he stares at me.
“Why are you on our arses?”
Maybe playing stupid will help. It’s worth a shot. So I shake my head at him and roll my eyes. “Are you that dense? Do you really not know?”
But it was the wrong thing to say. He unclasps his hands, leans forward on his seat, and reaches for my hair. I gasp when he tightens his fingers and yanks my head back. Pain shoots along my scalp, even as a shiver slides down my body.
I love to be dominated. Mastered. Manipulated, and used. I don’t come to The Craic for the drinks.
“Mmm,” I say. “I did peg you as a hair-puller.”
A lesser man would cave, maybe lose his temper and hurt me. But he doesn’t even register surprise.
He leans his mouth to my ear and whispers, his hot breath tickling the sensitive skin. “I’ve wanted to tangle my fingers through your hair and pull it since the day I first saw you.”
Oh, Christ, his hand’s traveling down my body, slides under the top of my dress, and cups my bare breast.
“Oh, have you then?” I ask, trying to mask my arousal and give him a grin. “You fancy the red?”
He gives me a wicked grin. “Oh, I fancy the red, all over. Your hair, my bite marks on your neck, your freshly-spanked bottom. Now, lass. Answer my question.”
I want him to think he doesn’t affect me, because hell, I like his hands in my hair and on my body. “Or what? You’ll make me come to threaten me?”
He shakes his head. “You shouldn’t do that, doll.”
I swallow again when his green eyes narrow on me.
“Do what?”
“Lie. Manipulate. You’ve underestimated us.”
I don’t reply, because for one brief moment, I’m afraid he might be right. Have I gotten in over my head?
But no. Cast me to the furthest depths of the ocean. I always swim.