Surrender to Me by Shayla Black

am and what I want. Can you?”
    Everything inside her clenched with desire. “I’m just here to scratch our mutual itch.”
    “And then what? We’ll just go our separate ways? That’s what you really want?”
    Kata opened her mouth to say yes . . . then realized that, despite everything, the idea of their paths never crossing again disturbed her—far more than it should. Why? He was urging her to surrender more than her passion, cross a line she’d refused to ever go near, no matter how tempting. And part of her fantasized about things she could never endure. If she admitted half so much aloud, Hunter would engulf her—and right now, she was too raw, too needy to stop him.
    But she’d offered to fuck him the simple way multiple times and he hadn’t taken her up on it yet. If she wanted him—and she did, desperately—she must pretend to play his game.
    As much as she hated to admit it, he intrigued her, sucked her into a drowning pool of desire. Walking away right now wasn’t an option.
    “How about this? For the next hour, I’ll be honest.” She gritted her teeth and forced the words out. “But if I say stop, you stop.”
    “An hour?” He didn’t sound pleased.
    Kata nodded. “That’s all you’re getting from me. Maybe, after that, we’ll both be done, and it won’t matter.”
    “I wouldn’t hang your hat on that, honey.”
    For a long moment, he said nothing, and she stared up into his unwavering blue stare. Earlier his eyes had been shutters that allowed fleeting glimpses of the real man to peek through, veneered by challenge and hunger. Now he’d opened up. The desire was still there, but she read something almost profound on his face. This was important to him. Why? A guy like Hunter would—and probably did—have anyone he wanted. Why would she matter when they’d just met?
    Whatever . . . He was a birthday fling she’d forget tomorrow. She hoped.
    “All right,” he agreed. “An hour, for starters. I want you to see me.” Hunter stood and reached for the button of his jeans, slid his zipper down, toed off his boots, then shoved everything off to the thick carpet in a pile. And Kata got her first look at him naked.
    “Oh, holy shit.” The words slipped from her mouth before she could stop them.
    Hunter was, in a word, gorgeous. Every inch of him solid, hard, imposing. Big . . . everywhere. She swallowed.
    He chuckled. “Glad you approve. I’m going to make this so good for you.”
    She didn’t doubt for an instant that he could.
    Hunter slid back onto the bed, over her body, balancing most of his weight on his knees and elbows. Then he settled right between her thighs, chest to chest, belly to belly, lips inches apart. As she’d suspected, he eclipsed the rest of the room, leaving her nowhere to look but at him. His stare melted into hers. He wasn’t yet inside her, but already Kata felt breathless, overwhelmed.
    With a dip of his head, he covered her mouth with his own, a firm press, a gentle demand. She opened to him, and Hunter sank in with a groan that lit her up and sizzled all the way to her toes. His tongue curled around hers, holding her a willing captive to his seduction.
    Just as she opened wider, he edged away, nipped at her lip, drizzled kisses down her neck so sweetly that she moaned and shuddered, clung to him and arched.
    Suddenly, Kata realized Hunter was far more dangerous than she’d believed. He would use his knowledge of her body and her pleasure to lure her deeper under his spell. Control her. Apprehension burned a hole in her belly.
    “Wait, Hunter, I—”
    “An hour.” The intensity in his gaze made her tremble. “I’m not wasting another minute of it arguing.”
    She couldn’t do a damn thing without breaking her word. As much as he alarmed her, she refused to show fear.
    Another part of her couldn’t stand for him to stop touching her. He rubbed the pad of his thumb over her lip. “You’re so fucking gorgeous, honey. It’s going to be my