Gift of Fire

going on all right, Verity. You’re starting to wonder if you made the right decision when you let me into your life, aren’t you? You’re starting to have second thoughts about us. But I’ve got news for you, little tyrant. It’s too late. You belong to me, and I’m going to see to it that you never forget it.” He stepped out of his boots and jeans and sat down heavily on the bed.
    Verity backed across the quilt away from him. He reached out and caught her hand, checking her retreat.
    “
Jonas.
Let me go.”
    He ignored her small cry of outrage as he rolled over to pin her beneath him. His eyes blazed. “I’m not going to let you get away from me, Verity. Don’t you understand? I can’t let you get away from me.”
    “Jonas, please, we have to talk.”
    “I’ve already told you, you talk too much.” He started to peel off her robe. “You’re always using your mouth to communicate when you should be using something else. Something that’s a lot more honest. Something I can understand.”
    Thoroughly annoyed, Verity started to struggle. “Dammit, Jonas, this is no way to communicate. Let me up! I want to talk to you. I mean it. Pay attention when I speak to you.”
    But Jonas paid no attention. He yanked the robe free and anchored her wrists above her head so that she lay there helpless and inviting. Then he reached down and grabbed the hem of her flannel nightgown, pulling it up above her waist.
    In spite of her determination to control the situation, Verity felt the excitement flaring in her. This was Jonas, who could set her on fire with just a touch. This was the man she loved with all her heart.
    But he had a disconcerting habit of resorting to sex when he lost his patience. The typical male approach to a problem, she thought resentfully. When the brain ceases to function, fall back on the brawn.
    Verity lost her temper. She twisted violently and kicked out at him with her good foot. “Let me go, you big oaf.”
    “Lie still, you loud-mouthed shrew.” When she responded by kicking him again, he pinned her legs down with one of his own. “Now I’m really getting irritated.” He used his weight to hold her still while he wrestled the nightgown up over her head.
    “Do you think I care if you’re irritated?” Her eyes sparkled with anger and hungry excitement.
    “You better
care.
” Once he had her nightgown off, he used his free hand to reach over the edge of the bed and grab his belt.
    Verity’s eyes widened in disbelief. “You wouldn’t dare.”
    “I’ve had it with your weird behavior lately,” Jonas told her as he quickly captured both her wrists and bound them with the leather. He looped the free end of the belt around one of the canopy posts and inserted it back through the loop that held her wrists. She was chained to the bed.
    “Jonas, you’re fired!” It was the only threat she still had left. Verity struggled uselessly against the binding leather.
    “You can’t fire me and you know it. You already tried it once, and it didn’t work.” He watched her as she lay glowering helplessly up at him. “Listen to me, Verity, and listen good. If you’re thinking of ending things between us, you’ve got a surprise coming. You can’t get rid of me that easily.”
    “I don’t have to work at getting rid of you. You take off all by yourself when the mood grabs you. Five days in Mexico without a phone call, Jonas. Five whole days.”
    “Christ, are you still holding that against me?” He scowled. “I thought we had that settled. I thought you understood.”
    “All I understand is that you feel free to take off whenever you want to, and you don’t even bother to call.”
    “I told you, I couldn’t get to a phone. And don’t start trying to blame me for your spaced-out attitude lately. It started before I went to Mexico.”
    “Can you blame me if I need to think things over?” she retorted furiously. “This is a damn strange relationship we have, Jonas Quarrel.” She tugged meaningfully on the leather belt. “Any woman in her right mind would want to think very seriously about what she was getting herself into by agreeing to live with you.”
    “I knew it. You
have
been thinking about us, haven’t you? Plotting and scheming, I’ll bet.”
    “So what if I have? That’s a perfectly normal reaction ,under the circumstances, I’d say.”
    “Thinking is never normal for you. I don’t trust the way your mind works,” he muttered.
    “Tough. It’s my