could to face off against the warlord.
‘I acted on my own!’ Ru Shan sputtered from behind her.
Li Tao towered over them both. The blade gleamed wickedly and she forced her gaze away from it to stare at his face. She couldn’t back down. She couldn’t bear any more bloodshed, another debt to weigh on her soul.
‘Your servants believed everything I told them,’ she taunted. ‘I am quite convincing.’
Li Tao’s mouth twisted grimly. She’d pushed him too far. Her breath caught as Li Tao raised his sword, but he jammed it back into the sheath. He snatched her wrist into an iron grip and dragged her through the interior hallway. Her feet stumbled against the floorboards and she tried to look back on the others, but he yanked her forwards cruelly.
He threw open the doors of the front parlour and shoved her inside. She stumbled before swinging around to face him. Her heart beat uncontrollably. She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. Her entire body trembled with fear, with anger. She could no longer tell.
‘You’re an animal!’
‘And you’re a sorceress.’
He slammed the doors shut and swung around. Survival instinct took over. She scrambled away from him as he came towards her. Her eyes circled the room for a weapon, anything to defend herself with. Her foot caught the edge of a divan. She fell to the floor, but he hauled her up against him.
‘What did you offer Ru Shan?’ he demanded through clenched teeth.
He brought her face close to his, forcing her to look at him. His hand gripped the back of her neck and she felt the first stinging threat of tears. But even now, shaking in his grasp, she refused to show him that surrender.
‘Did you offer him your body?’
She clawed at his hands, needing to free herself and get as far away from him as possible. He was dangerously strong, unpredictable in his wrath.
‘What man wouldn’t fall to you, honour be damned?’
The heat of his body surrounded her, overwhelming her. Suddenly his hold on her shifted. One arm captured her waist to drag her against his chest before his mouth descended on hers.
Heat and pleasure coursed through her at once, fierce and wild and uncompromising. She fell boneless against him, winding her arms around his neck dizzily, drinking in the salted taste of his mouth. His desire reached through to feed on the kiss, but the anger remained. His arms wrapped around her.
No. Not like this. Her mind fought even though her body surrendered. Not in this thoughtless, desolate hunger.
She sank her teeth into his lower lip and didn’t let go until she tasted blood. He tore away from her with a curse.
‘Fox demon.’
‘I am not a whore,’ she seethed.
She stumbled back on to the padded chaise, her legs weak with desire. Blindly, she fumbled for the vase on the end table and succeeded in knocking it over before grabbing on to it and launching it at him. He swatted it away, sending it crashing to the floor.
‘No, not a whore.’ He stalked towards her and all she could do was double up and press back against the seat. ‘A seductress and a liar.’
He braced one knee against the seat. She grabbed one of the embroidered pillows and held it in front of her like a shield.
‘Get away.’
‘I am not going to force you.’ His lip was swollen and a trickle of blood welled from it. He swiped it off with the back of his hand. ‘I have never forced a woman.’
They stayed at opposite ends of the chaise. She pushed herself as far away as she could, her shoulder blades coming up against the armrest. Desire still pulsed through her, hot and swimming in her blood, mixing with the fear. Her thighs grew weak, her sex damp with wanting. She would never understand how her body, how every inch of her skin, yearned for this man. It went against everything she ever knew.
‘Did you give yourself to Ru Shan?’ His voice ground against her shattered nerves. The sharpest edge of his anger had dulled, but the threat remained.
Only now did she fully understand what fueled his rage. It was jealousy. Raw, primal jealousy.
‘I gave him nothing.’
‘Nothing? A loyal man shuns his duty for the mere privilege of serving you?’
It was difficult to have him this close when she was still flushed from the onslaught of his mouth. She hated this weakness.
‘I’ll do anything in my power to escape.’
‘You have them all in your hands, bewitched and bent to your