Page 108 of Hunt for You

When I passed the trunks of the thick cedars, under the shelter of their branches, to the fence behind, I whipped her around and shoved her up against the fence so hard her head thunked back and she blinked a couple of times.

But I had both her wrists gripped in one fist, and used my body—one knee between her thighs and my hips against hers—to keep her pinned to that fence.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” I snarled, my heart pounding. “Fight!”

“I am!”

“No, you aren’t.”

“I’m just glad you’re here—”

Furious, I slammed that hand to her throat, gripping her hard enough that her words cut off in a strangled squeak.

And as she hung there from my fist, clawing at my forearm, her mouth opening and closing like a fish, I leaned into her ear.

“Whatthe fuckis going on with you?”

I loosened my grip on her throat just enough to let her wheeze a few words. Words that I expected to be pleas for me to change the rules, or garbled explanations for what the fuck was going on in her head. But instead…

“Keep going.”

I blinked and stared at her, so off-balance that I cut off her air again for a second, just so I could think.

But now it wasmyheart that wasn’t in it. I released her almost immediately because it suddenly felt like her skin burned my palm.

She dropped to her feet, wheezing, sucking at the air, while I stood in front of her, gaping behind my mask.

“What. The.Fuck?”

She’d leaned forward slightly and I would have sworn she rested her forehead on my chest for a second as she gathered her breath, but before I could flinch, her head snapped up and she looked up at me.

“We’re the same. You and me.”

I stared at her, every alarm in my head screaming.

She swallowed and continued, her voice hoarse. “The others scare me. But you don’t.”

“What the fuck are you doing, Bridget?” I was frozen. My feet nailed to the dirt and scraggly grass. The monster in me roaring that shewouldfear me, but the other side of me suddenly desperate to hold her and keep her close and put myself between her and the world that scared her so much and—fuck!

I tensed, about to run, when she caught my arm and shook her head. She was still panting and had to swallow before she could speak.

“I’m not… I’m not going to give you the safe word.Ever.”

“Then, what—”

“I just wantmore,”she whispered, then stood to her full height—which was still below my shoulder—and took the half-step to stand between my feet.

I couldn’t move as her pretty little hands slid up my chest to the top of the zipper on my hoodie and drew it down in one quick swipe—and then she was tugging my shirt out of my jeans, and reaching for my belt—

I caught both her hands with a snarl and pushed her back.

“No, Cain,please—”

I shoved her back up against that fence and she hissed like I’d hurt her, but her eyes never left my mask—I knew shecouldn’t see my face through it, but it still made adrenaline pulse through me like I’d been shot up.

Catching both her wrists in one hand and pulling them up above her head, I had her arched back and her nose only an inch from my mask.

“What are you doing, Bridget?”