He stomped over the broken remains of the djinn, irritating the many, many snakes that already didn’t like me in the process, and I jumped back with a squeal. Why was he intentionally aggravating them?
“Is this some kind of sick punishment?” I shouted at him, my fury rising. “Do you want me to get bit?”
No response. He bared his teeth and stalked forward, eyes set on something behind me. A new icicle formed in his hand, long and pointy. With hardly a second to aim and without even stopping, he hefted it over his shoulder and chucked it. His feet passed right through the mass of snakes. Like, rightthroughthem.
I blinked, a lot, but still couldn’t process what I just saw.Thatwas an illusion? But… it looked so real. I swore I felt the air move when that one snake got too close. Ezra’s glare was glacier cold as he looked over my shoulder. I spun and watched the last djinn choke and gurgle, the icicle sticking directly through his throat.
Looking away before the vomit in the back of my mouth decided to make an appearance, I was struck with a different view that, unfortunately, didn’t settle my stomach as much as set it aflame. That indifferent, domineering glare had morphed into something molten and still very angry.
Ezra stepped closer, hands twitching.
“Listen, you should be thanking me,” I started, and he cocked his head in a way that rang a little too predatory. “Y-you wouldn’t even know about that last guy if I hadn’t… if I… Why don’t you look at least slightly grateful?”
I crossed my arms and cocked a hip, aiming for defiant to hide the way my heart rattled inside me. I was sure he could hear it anyway. For every step he made toward me, I took one back. Not once had he taken his eyes off me, not since the last djinn took his final breath. Then I had his undivided attention.
“I told you to run,” he scolded, eyes narrowed. That furious gaze swept over me, taking in every detail from the scratch on my cheek to the leftover djinn blood on my chin. “What am I going to do with you?”
I didn’t like how he said that. It wasn’t rhetorical.
“Making me think I was about to suffer death by rattlesnake was punishment enough, thank you.”
His laugh was low and deep, the vibrations reaching out to me and sinking beneath my skin like a dark drug. A warning sign if I’d ever felt one.
“That wasn’t even the start of your punishment, babe.”
After seeing what he was capable of, you’d think I’d have been better prepared for how he moved. Quick and ruthless, he lunged at me, hooked his palms around my bare thighs, and threw me over his shoulder. Not this again! I knew from experience that squirming, pinching, or hitting was futile, but I tried them all again anyway. He was an immovable wall of ice.
A very tall, very warm wall of ice that chuckled evilly at all my failed attempts. My short skirt was now a belt, trapped between my stomach and his shoulder. I felt the night air ghost over my ass as Ezra took the path back to the beach house. I wasn’t embarrassed—okay, maybe a little—but I had a great ass. Ezra was a lucky son of a bitch to be witness to such greatness.
When the path began to incline, roughly right around where I decided to turn around, Ezra’s grip on my thigh tightened.
“I’d say about here, wouldn’t you?” I didn’t answer. No way that wasn’t a trick question. “You had enough time to get about this far beforedeliberately breaking a pinky promiseand turning around.”
“What did you do, count the seconds I was gone?” I jeered, trying once more to break free.
“Cute.” Ezra added a little skip to his step, effectively sending my heart on a boomerang trip at the unbalanced feeling it created. “But you’re going to be the one counting this time.”
“What does that me—”
His palm landed in a solid smack against my left cheek, and the sound that left my mouth was just shy of animalistic. He did not justspankme. Between my screeching and his infuriatingly calm arguments, I thought I heard him say something about a count of five. Over my fucking dead body. He gave my ass a pinch, and I yelped.
“Tell me why we’re doing this,” he demanded.
“Because you’re a controlling, chauvinistic, asshole—ah!”
His hand landed on the right cheek with just enough sting to piss me off even more. I could do four more of those, no problem, and it was somehow satisfying to know I would make it through with my anger intact. Then I could kill him.
“A punishment isn’t a punishment if you’re not repentant, my slippery starfish. I wanted to go easy on you, but I see youstilldon’t understand how serious this is.”
I had a lineup of insults ready to swing, but Ezra cut me off before I could set them free. He bounced me higher, until his arm behind my knees was the only thing anchoring me to him. A warm palm ran over my ass again, and this time a shiver rode on the waves of my anger.
“We’re going to start over until you give me an honest answer.”
My wiggling turned into an all-out fight as I tried to break free, but Ezra didn’t let up. Lost to a moment of panic, I sank my teeth into his side. His shirt was fisted in my hand, out of the way so I could be sure he felt every individual tooth. His grunt of pain brought me great satisfaction… until he forced a squeal out of me by returning the favor. The sting of his bite on my ass did some funny things to me, and I knew without a doubt that my little scrap of panties were soaked. Fucking Christ, I had a problem. His hand moved over me again, so close to my secret shame.
“Why are we doing this?”
I tried to bite my tongue, I really did. Despite the position he had me in, I wasn't one to bend over easily.
