Page 69 of The Enforcer’s Pawn

“From every man who thinks love is just another place to put a knife.” I take the torn sheet and walk toward the waste bin.

His mouth tightens into a thin line. Good. Let him feel that one.

Dmitri moves in front of me, slow enough to give me the choice to step back, close enough to make the choice useless. “Give it to me.”

“No.” I crumple the paper into a ball.

“If Patrick knows, Morozov can know.”

“He doesn’t know everything.” I dare him to lose his stupid patience.

“You don’t know what he knows.”

“No, I know what he wants.” I grab his shirt front and crush it in my fist. “Patrick wants to be the man holding the string.”

“And you?”

His blue gaze holds me with so much force, it’s difficult to meet it for long.

I laugh, but it comes out thin. “I want my life left alone.”

“You were never left alone.” He removes my hand from his shirt without looking away.

“Because of men like you.” I push him once.

His face closes. A muscle jumps near his cheek, then vanishes under control. I see the wound beneath it, and some foolish part of me wants to touch it. Hate is cleaner. I hold on to that. His hand closes around my wrist, hard enough to remind me that he could take anything if he chose to. Heat flashes down my spine, unwanted and alive.

“Let go,” I say.

He does that immediately. That makes it worse.

“You think I want you easy?” he asks.

“I think you want me contained,” I persist.

“Yes.”

The answer is honest, and it stings.

Dmitri steps closer. “Contained isn’t owned. Learn the difference.”

“Funny. From this angle, they look related.” I sneer.

His hand lifts, then stops short of my face. Control, control, control. I see it in every inch of him, and suddenly, I want to break it so badly, my mouth goes dry.

“You aren’t property,” he says, then turns toward the door.

That’s it? He says the controlled thing, then walks away before I can make him bleed for it.

“No?” I close the last space between us. “Then stop deciding where I belong.”

His voice turns rough. “Right now, you belong where I can reach you.”

I shove his chest with both hands. The bastard lets me, then catches my wrist when I go to push him again, and the touch burns through every lie I have been using to survive him.

“Say it,” I snap. “Say you need me.”

Dmitri turns my wrist and pulls me in until I crash against his chest. His breath is hot on my face.