Bitter Heat

She watched turbulent emotions play over his face and saw the flash of impatience before his fingers tightened around her throat.

No, he didn’t bribe me,” she said through clenched teeth.
“Then why?”
“I don’t want to talk about this!

That was before he learned of their affair. She thought she was going against the grain by marrying a man who hadn’t been born in her circles, but she was wrong. Roth was every bit as ruthless as her father

She hadn’t expected him to be angry as well. Roth was stone cold and always in control, but today, he had shown more emotion than she had ever seen other than the night she left him

You hit it big writing about our affair, the scandal, being disowned, about our sex life—”
She dropped her hands to declare, “It’s loosely based on us.”
“The virgin scene is position by position our first time.”
She wrapped her hands around her throat because she could feel it closing. “Y-you read…?”
He tapped his fingers on the back of the couch as his mouth curved into a mocking smile. “All four.”
Bile rose. “Some of the scenes are us but…”

“Do your sisters know about your pen name?”
“No.”
“Does anyone know?”
“Less than five people on the planet,” she said through clenched teeth.
“Now six.”
“I hate you

She wasn’t prepared for the hand that wrapped around her throat or the way he pulled up so she was forced to her tiptoes. Her heart careened into her throat as she gripped his massive wrist with both hands.

Still running from me, Jasmine?”

“If you hadn’t run to your father, you’d still be mine

Jamie, please.”
He went rigid against her and lifted his mouth from her skin. Uttering his nickname evoked memories she had buried long ago. No one was allowed to call him by his first name, so she gave him a ludicrous nickname and teased him unmercifully about it. That seemed like a lifetime ago.
“I want to go home,”