Stunned, embarrassed, Morgan backed away. “Oh.”

“Oh.” Jack shot back with an acid grin as he followed her deeper into the cottage. “Next to him, I look like a choir boy.”

Morgan nearly choked. “You’ve got to be kidding! You, a choir boy?”

“Hey, I was one until puberty. The choir director at Our Lady of Perpetual Hope told me I sang like an angel.”

“And you’ve got a mind like the devil.”

Jack merely smiled. “I’ve barely given you an introduction, cher. There’s so much more I could show you…”

She believed him. Utterly. The very thought of the sensations and feelings he could introduce her to made Morgan shiver and ache. And not just for the stunning release he could give her. In his arms, his bed, she’d felt so liberated and alive. It frightened her to think that the only place she could fell completely free to be herself was bound to Jack’s bed.

God, no. Please no.

“There won’t be any more of that,” she vowed. “You told me to give it a night. I did. I know enough now to do the show. That’s all I need.”

Jack sidled closer. “Are you going to tell me you didn’t like it?”

Wouldn’t it be nice if she could, and he’d believe it? Morgan knew better. “No. But that doesn’t mean we need an encore.”

“What’s holding you back, your fiancé?”

Morgan gritted her teeth. Damn it, she’d kept up the pretense of a relationship with Brandon to keep Jack at arm’s length, but her lie was doing a lousy job. In fact, his question seemed to taunt her for being every bit as naughty as he was.

“To some degree.” Maybe pretending remorse would turn him off. “Yes. I feel terrible.”

“You might, but it has nothing to do with cheating. Why weren’t you wearing your ring when you came to meet me and talk about sex?”

“I—I don’t have one yet. I want to pick it out myself.”

Jack studied her with a tilt of his head and knowing dark eyes. “I think you’re more afraid of your wants than cheating on your fiancé. Wanna prove me wrong?”

How could he know that? How could he just look at her and tell?

“Go to hell. I gave it a night, like I said I would. You’re not taunting me into giving you another. No more domination. No more sex. And no more conversation about this.”

With a determined shake of her head, Morgan turned away. She half expected Jack to grab her arm, stop her, growl something. She was nearly to the bedroom door when she started to wonder if she’d stunned him speechless. To feel both victory and crushing distress.

His voice stopped her cold…right before it made her blood boil.

“I can fulfill your fantasies, cher.”

“Stop.” Hand on the doorknob, Morgan paused. She drew in a ragged breath. “Damn you. Just…just stop.”

“Non.” He stepped closer, closer, until he curved his hands around her waist, pressed his erection against her ass, and whispered in her ear. “Every last one of your fantasies. Starting right now.”

CHAPTER NINE

Running into the bedroom seemed like a damn stupid idea for someone trying to avoid the torturous need to have sex with the man chasing her.

Holding in a wail of frustration, Morgan’s mind raced. Where the hell else could she go in this three-room shack? The swamp was no place for a city girl, especially at night. She didn’t much like alligators or crocs or whatever lurked out there with enormous teeth and a not-too-fussy palette.

The door, the one at the end of the hall. It had been locked earlier, but she didn’t recall him locking it back up after Deke’s visit. Maybe she could dart in and lock it behind her. Shut him out for a while and see how well that suited him. Make him find some way to cool down while staring at the bed they’d nearly combusted into flames with the blistering heat between them.

Spinning away, Morgan sprinted farther down the hall. God, she couldn’t believe she was running from him, and she’d berate herself for the stupidity of this tactic later. At the moment, she couldn’t think of any other way to escape the steamy seduction of his voice luring her to her sanity’s doom. He wanted her downfall, was playing hardball until she surrendered every ounce of her psyche and control to him.

No way in hell she was doing that.

With a crash of footsteps, she made it to the door with Jack in determined pursuit. Her hot, trembling fingers grasped the cold brass of the knob. He crowded in behind her, trapping her against the door. His hand clamped down around hers before she could twist the door knob.

“Are you sure you want to go in there?” He breathed hard against her neck.

Yes! The door has a lock. If she could just get inside, put the door between them…

But as she fought the shivers brought on by his hot breath, his very nearness, Morgan suddenly realized he had the keys to open the door. Damn it!

“I don’t think you do,” he answered for her.

“Is this where you keep the dead bodies?” she sneered, hoping to piss him off.

Instead, he laughed, and his easy rumble vibrated clear through her body. Even now, he was determined to defy her understanding of both men in general and him in particular. Damn, the man could both infuriate and intrigue her.

“You’d probably like that better than the truth,” he warned with a silky smile in his voice. “But keep going, and you’ll find out.”

He was yanking her chain. That’s all. Trying to scare her, and she wasn’t buying it for a minute.

Using all her body weight, Morgan lunged back, hoping to throw him off her so she could open the damn door and get on the other side of it.

With a rumble of laughter in his chest, Jack stepped back a mere fraction. “Go in. But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Morgan hesitated. What if he wasn’t just toying with her? What the hell could he be hiding here? And did she really want to dig herself in any deeper than she was?

Shaking her head, she decided it had to be a diversionary tactic. He’d run after her too hard and stopped her too quickly not to have any interest in keeping her out.

“Bite me,” she hissed. “And back off.”

Jack just smiled as if he didn’t have a care in the world and gestured for her to step inside.

Refusing to admit any apprehension to what she might find, Morgan yanked on the knob and shoved the door open.

And she frowned as she ambled in, somehow both relieved and totally disappointed at once. “This is it?”

Shrugging, Jack tried to pull off an innocent expression. Morgan knew better. Jack was about as innocent as Lucifer at his hedonistic worst.

“Just a little office space where I do paperwork and keep a computer.”

She rounded on him. “Then why keep the damn door locked? There are no dead bodies. Trying to keep me away from the precious porn on your computer?”

“Why would I waste time looking at pictures of other people fucking when I could be doing it myself?” He paced closer, sliding his finger along the slope of her jaw, then deviating course to rub the lightly calloused pad over her bottom lip. “With you.”

Morgan sucked in a breath, unable to look away from the scorching heat melting his dark chocolate eyes into something that epitomized sin. She didn’t tingle. His words didn’t tighten the knot of need growing in her belly by the second. Damn it, no! She didn’t respond to a man who wanted to subjugate her, to control her with orders and ropes and utter submission of her will.

She wasn’t depraved, as Andrew had hurled the slur at her. She had always been a “good girl,” as her mother had raised her to be.

“I’m not some blow-up doll here to do your bidding, oh arrogant one. You’re delusional.” Her voice shook as she said the words.

“I’m determined,” he corrected. “All that reluctant arousal and the tender flush that lights up your body—it’s nothing short of delicious. You fight it, cher, but when you give in…you’re like honey to sink into. Thick and hot and so damn sweet. Those catchy little moans at the back of your throat, the pretty way you finally ripple around my cock when you’re on the verge of orgasm… Even the thought of you like that is like fire licking through my balls.”

“You just don’t know when to shut up, do you?”

“Sure, I do. When you’re shoved full of my cock and are about to come so hard you scream the walls down.” He smiled, wicked, taunting—turning her legs to jelly.

Morgan drew in a steadying breath, determined to find someway—God, any way—to ignore him…and the wetness seeping out of her clenching vagina and drowning her thong.

“Dream on, sweetie. It’s not happening.”

“You mean, not again?” he clarified, crossing his arms over his chest.

It occurred to her then that Jack was blocking the exit. And his expression made it clear she wasn’t getting away until they’d hashed this out. Damn the man!

“Fine. You’ve shown that you’re an ass determined to get on my nerves and you have some little computer you like to lock up for reasons unknown. Now move so I can get out of here.”

“Actually, I think I’ve shown I’m a dominant determined to make a submissive in denial admit that she likes to be tied and fucked until she can’t see straight. As for what’s in here…”

He cast his hot gaze across the room. It wasn’t until then that Morgan noticed the door in the corner hidden in shadow.

“Ah, you see the door now. There’s more beyond this space.” He didn’t elaborate. On purpose, she knew. He was testing her. Tantalizing her with the truth. Trying to arouse her curiosity as easily as he did her body. He’d definitely succeeded on the former. Damn him! She refused to think for an instant about the latter.

“So the dead bodies are in there?” she asked tartly, with a bravado she didn’t really feel.

“Something more sinful.” Jack stalked closer, the intent in his eyes to have her, to fuck her, blistering his eyes.

She swallowed. “Stay where you are. Don’t come closer!”

In typical Jack fashion, he just kept coming toward her. He didn’t stop until he’d settled his hands on her hips, bent his knees, and pressed her wet, aching sex right against the ridge of his erection.

“Hmm. Your pussy is like summer in Louisiana, cher. Sultry. Intriguing. Inviting me to spend the day lazing inside.”

Morgan tried to struggle away—before the hunger gnawing at her gobbled up her good sense. Already the things he’d done to her in his bed haunted her. She didn’t dare give in again and make leaving him when the time came even more difficult. And she was no longer naive enough to believe that being with Jack in his way would cure her of the forbidden midnight desires that made her sweat. She knew now he’d only make her wants sharper, more explicit. More urgent.

“Let go and leave me alone.”

Jack took his sweet time responding, trailing the flat of his large palm over her ass, then lifting her thigh above his hip, and leaning in to give her an electric nudge of his cock against her aching clit. Then slowly, he released her and stepped away.

By then, her body was thrumming with need, the desire so loud inside her, the front row of a heavy metal concert would be more sedate. She clasped her hands to stop their trembling.

“You don’t give the orders, cher. I do, especially when I’ve got you all spread out across my bed.”

Digging into the pocket of his jeans, Jack pulled out a set of keys, strolled across the room, and unlocked the door. He flung the door wide and stepped inside long enough to flip a light switch.

Morgan tried to peer in discreetly, but the light inside was dim and red against black walls. She couldn’t see much, just low light and shadows. Her gut tightened with apprehension…and devastating curiosity.

“Through that door, you’ll find my playroom. In there, I have every means to restrain you, every tool to arouse, every toy to fuck you. You take a nice, long look around, cher, so you can describe it on your show. I’ll come back in fifteen minutes. If you’re still here…” He smiled and shifted his weight, clearly displaying the huge bulge pressing against straining denim. “Let’s say you’ll get an up close and personal tour.”

Jack turned to leave.

“And if I’m gone in fifteen minutes?” she blurted.

He stopped. The glance he cast her over his shoulder could have melted steel. “You’ll just be delaying the inevitable, cher. And it’ll cost you.”

Morgan stood still, trembling. The door to Jack’s most private room stood open not two feet away. She was curious about what he had in there. God knew she was.

Yet she hesitated.

Did she want to know those secrets? Really want to know? Having the knowledge would haunt her, change her. Would knowing exactly what he did in these four walls make him and the sexuality he could give her more objectionable?