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  Bait the Hook

  Kat Crimson

  Spunky Publications LLC

  Copyright

  Copyright © 2016 by Kat Crimson

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Dedication

  For My Sanity

  Contents

  Exclusive FREE Offer

  BAIT THE HOOK

  Preview: Dot Matrix

  Dot Matrix: Chapter 1

  Dot Matrix: Chapter 2

  Dot Matrix: Chapter 3

  Also by Kat Crimson

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  BAIT THE HOOK

  I courted your disaster.

  They said you were a dangerous man. They said you always took what you wanted without asking anyone’s permission or caring what others thought. They said you were a hard man: hard mind, hard heart, hard body, and even harder cock.

  I was sure they didn’t even know the half of it. I was just as sure that I wanted to be that thing that you wanted. So I set out to make myself so.

  They said you liked innocent girls, to take their innocence and corrupt it: use it, taint it, and then spit it back out, leaving them damaged and craving. Well my body, at least, was mostly innocent, so I didn’t have to try too hard there. My mind, on the other hand, would have to remain hidden.

  They said you liked shy and sheltered girls, that you got off on the challenge. I could pretend to be that, but really I’m just a lone wolf in sheep’s clothing. I prefer my own company - not because I’m shy, but because I find the company of most others to be a nuisance, distracting me from my own doings.

  They said you were trouble. I’ll show you trouble…

  But first I’ll show you exactly what you want to see, where you want to see it, and when.

  Your reverse stalker.

  You won’t even know what hit you. I’ll have you pursuing me in no time, and the best part will be that you will think that it was your idea, that you are the hunter and not the hunted.

  But you will be wrong…

  I walked home from the library, timing it so that I’d be sure to be seen by you as you enjoyed a beer outside Flannery’s. Dusk is settling in and I am alone, so I make sure to look a bit timid. I clutch an over-sized art book to my chest, wrapping both arms around it like I’m using it as a shield, hugging it to my fragile body. I hold my head down, but keep stealing furtive glances at my surroundings as I briskly make my way down the street. My clothes are priceless. They are so innocent, wholesome and feminine that they are almost indecently alluring.

  I can feel your eyes glued to me as I make my way past, and I can tell that you want me to know you’re watching. I can tell that you want to make me nervous, so I stumble a little on the sidewalk then quicken my pace. I’m sure I look anxious, but on the inside I am exhilarated. Soon you will be chasing me and I will pretend to run from you.

  You must have asked someone about me, because on Saturday you showed up where I work and made a point of seeking me out. I had to hide my triumphant smile, turning it into a doe eyed, nervous guise, complete with trembling hands, as you approached and asked for my assistance with the kitchen knives. I work in a specialty store for chefs and cooking enthusiasts.

  You walked boldly up to me, invading my personal space, and using your ridiculous good looks and your lean, powerful body to physically intimidate me. And damn it if it didn’t sort of work. You caught and held my eyes for an uncomfortable amount of time before speaking, all the while backing me into the wall mounted display case, and trapping me there. Not touching, just in my space.

  I can’t lie, there was a part of me that felt that flight reflex - the defense mechanism of the prey - kick in, even though I had planned for this, even though it’s exactly what I’d hoped for.

  “Excuse me,” you said, then paused for a beat as you looked at my name tag, “Gemma,” you read with a wolfish grin, some very direct eye contact and a glimmer of triumph.

  Hearing my name on your lips felt way too familiar and too intimate.

  “Wha-what c-can I help you with, sir?” I asked. The stammer, much to my horror, was only partially faked. You definitely make me nervous. I suppose that is part of the allure.

  “I’d like to take a look at this one, here,” you said to me while leaning in further and placing your pointer finger right beside my face, on the locked plexi case. You held my gaze the entire time, never once even glancing at the display.

  A shivery tremble coursed through my body, not faked at all, and I glanced down for a second, breaking our locked stare. I tried in vain to regain the cool composure I pride myself on my ability to maintain. Shoving my shaking hand into my pocket, I reached for the key to the display as I turned to face it. Mistake. Never give your back to the enemy.

  I felt you step in right behind me, so close that the heat from your body radiated into mine, and your intoxicating scent permeated the air we shared. Your hand was still on the display. I felt caged, and slightly panicked, which pissed me off.

  I am the hunter. I am the hunter...

  I repeated this litany in my head, and took a deep, calming breath, which only served to fill me with more of your manly scent, and tried to regain control.

  “I’d really love to see how it feels in my hand,” you said, your mouth practically touching my ear, your breath tickling my neck, driving an instant shot of pure lust directly into my core. An utterly shameful, soft moan escaped my lips, unbidden, as my body resumed trembling.

  “I’d like to use it and see if it will respond to my touch the way I desire...”

  As nervous as you were making me I realized a comment like that required a good come back.

  “Oh no, you don’t use a knife like this,” I said, opening the display and reaching for the finely contoured handle of a beautiful, Japanese steel chef’s knife. “You wrap your hand around it and it becomes an extension of you; if you try to use it, you’ll never realize its full potential.” I turned then, meeting your intense gaze, and handed you the knife, hilt first.

  Your hand came down on top of mine, slowly travelled the strip of soft, sensitive flesh on my wrist, above my tendons and veins, then made its way down to rest over the handle of the knife. I couldn’t help the shiver this contact caused, or the goose bumps that betrayed my discomfort. I know you noticed every single detail of my body’s betrayal, right down to the hardness of my nipples, as you continued to stare me down.

  The butterflies in my stomach picked up speed, my body temperature rose, and I could feel dampness spreading to my hands, as well as to other places in my body.

  Control, control, control, I told myself, using the internal mantra to focus me, to calm my racing heart, to slow my breathing, and to shake this ridiculous tension.

  I am the hunter. I am the hunter and you are my prey.

  Finally, you plucked the knife out of my hand, hefting it, testing it, feeling the edge, and assessing the balance. It was a mesmerizing display. I couldn’t help but imagine those long, artistic fingers traveling over my body and finding ways to get inside of it and draw out my pleasure.

  I coughed, shaking my head slightly to clear my fuzzy, lust addled brain.

  Time to abort mission, I thought. This round definitely goes to the prey. I need to regroup.

  “I hate to do this, but we are getting ready to close very soon.” I was sure you had timed it that way on purpose. “What are your thoughts on the knife? S
hall I ring it up for you?” I asked, wanting to end this first contact while I still maintained at least the barest semblance of my composure.

  You reached for the backside of my forearm with your empty hand, positioning my arm to receive the blade back from your other It was like a two handed grasp between longtime friends who have love and history between them. Way too intimate, way too much for my overloaded senses. I felt an itchy tremor flow through my leg muscles as I refused to give in to my desire to flee, and I wished for my spine to reassert itself with all haste. I could not speak to save my life. That was how incredibly affected I was by your mental gaming and our intense physical chemistry.

  I prayed, to a god I don’t believe in, to put me out of my misery, to get you gone.

  “I don’t think I’ve spent quite enough time with it to make the judgment on whether or not it can be used. I’ll have to come back and handle it some more, to be sure,” you said, letting my arm go with a slow caress.

  You smirked at me like a predator that was very certain of its next meal, before turning to go.

  I watched your entire journey through the store and out the front door, wanting nothing more than the feel of your skin, and the pressure of your gaze back on me. I felt you leave. I felt it. In my bones.

  After you exited the Shoppe, I glanced down at my trembling hands. Pathetic, I thought, lowering them to my sides, and closing my eyes. I took a few moments to just breathe in and out deeply, calming my frayed nerves. I could still feel the electricity of our meeting coursing through my veins, feel it pulsing between my legs, and sparking between my hardened nipples.

  I need to be an unaffected iceberg. I need complete detachment the next time we meet. I cannot let you affect me like this, or the game is lost.

  I resumed my close-up duties, going through the repetitive activities on autopilot as I went over and over every wrong turn I had made, every small victory I awarded to the enemy, and every maneuver I was completely outplayed at.

  I could feel my cheeks growing warmer and my anger rising, so that by the end of my shift I was ready to sachet out the door like a drunken rocker chick on a ball-busting jag. Take no fucking prisoners!

  Then I remembered I would be walking by the bar where you were bound to be having a drink.

  FUCK! I would have to resume my timid mouse act, though it felt at least a light year away from where my head and heart were, at this very moment.

  I was often alone in the Shoppe at closing time, entrusted with the last few hours of duties: closing out the register, performing the small bit of cleaning required, shutting off lights, setting the alarm, and locking the door. I did all of this still very much in my blackened mood. No sense donning the act until the absolute last second.

  I slammed the front door of the store and locked it with a forceful air, swearing and grumbling the whole while. I was so mad at myself for today’s utter failure I was so mad that I failed to notice the man standing in the shadows, watching me from not so very far away.

  The Shoppe has a vestibule entrance way. It’s an old-time, tiled, and v-shaped channel, which leads from the door to the sidewalk. It is glassed, so the window display can be viewed from the sides while entering into the Shoppe.

  As I turned around, I felt myself shoved roughly into the glass, my back pressed into it firmly, my biceps gripped with force. I was completely stunned and frozen in shock and fear, my heart rate skyrocketed as the shadowed form of a man leaned in to whisper into my ear, “I don’t think you’re exactly everything you’ve appeared to be.”

  That’s when your familiar scent penetrated my senses. Instead of lessening, my fear intensified. My entire body tensed up in panic, ready to spring. But I was thoroughly trapped. Your entire length moved in to press against mine, pinning me in place even more effectively than your hands on my biceps had.

  I let out a frightened moan, just before your mouth descended over mine, stifling my noise in the most gentle, sensual and erotic kiss I’d ever tasted in my life. It knocked the wind right out of me, instantly fogging my brain with lust. All of that adrenaline fueled panic and terror of moments before, instantly converted to the pulsing, molten hot desire to be taken over, completely, by the sensations coursing through my system.

  Your body was the only thing holding me up, my legs rendered unable to support my own weight. I dimly noted, as I felt the flesh of my breasts being skillfully kneaded, and my nipples being teased, that you had released your strong grip from my arms. I felt the long hard length of you being ground into my abdomen, and then your thigh wedging its way between my legs, rubbing against my throbbing clit. Your mouth nibbled at my lips and I was utterly lost.

  Jesus. I can’t remember the last time anything felt this good, I thought, as one of your hands crept around back to palm and knead the flesh of my ass, and you continued to caress the insides of my mouth with the most sinfully erotic movements of your tongue.

  I was moaning my sweet pleasure into your hot kiss. I was perilously close to cumming, even though my mind rebelled. It didn’t help that both my hips and your hand seemed so eager to help me grind and ride myself to orgasm.

  I felt you bunching the material of my skirt up with the hand that had once been kneading my ass. The hand that had been at my breast was now wedged between us and I heard the unmistakable sound of a zipper being lowered, but it may as well have been a needle gouging into a record.

  No fucking way! There was no fucking way I was going to have sex with you: my captor. My prey, I reminded my fuzzy brain, in the darkened entrance of the Shoppe where I work. Not right on the fucking street like some two-dollar whore! Who honestly thinks they are gifted enough to hustle a complete stranger into having public sex with them five minutes after meeting?

  Fucker! I accused in my head. You haven’t even told me your name yet. The fact that I knew it was Jackson, notwithstanding.

  We were SO. NOT. FUCKING!

  And just as that thought solidified, I felt your finger slide into my wet pussy. I broke the kiss by turning my mouth away, forcefully, and then I brought my hands up to your chest, pushing you hard. Your fingers slid out of me, your grip on my clothing vanished as you stumbled back in a daze of lust and confusion. I looked into your face very briefly, you were blinking rapidly, breathing hard, and your confusion was quickly giving way to determination, and anger. You were getting ready to pounce. I had no doubt.

  I did something then that fills me with unimaginable, incomprehensible amounts of shame, embarrassment, and anger. I turned tail and ran. Like a frightened fucking rabbit. A scared little bunny. A coward.

  The entire time I ran back to my home, choking down sobs, I repeated to myself:

  I am the prey, I am the prey, I am the prey, I am the prey, I am the prey…

  Finally making it home, my hair in wild disarray, my clothes a crumpled mess, and my face a red, tear stained, puffy disaster, I flung the door of my dark and deserted house open. I made my way to the couch, not even bothering with the lights, and flung myself onto it, face down and just gave into the temptation to sob myself into comatose exhaustion.

  I was the prey, I was the prey, I was the prey...

  This was the endless thought loop playing in my mind as I gave in to my darkness. Self-loathing, self-pity, self-recrimination, disappointment, fear, and self-doubt were all waging a war within me as I analyzed the night’s disaster, and how I had lost complete control of the game. My foundation of strength, controlled calm, and cold calculation began to crumble away as if it had never existed, shaking me to my very core.

  At some point my exhaustion overtook me, giving way to fretful dreams of being chased, hunted down, and captured. My body twitched in sleep, fear and anxiety coursed through my system, while my utterly spent and emotionally drained body refused to awaken.

  I never even heard the door open, or the footsteps as he made his way to my prone form, and barely felt it as he placed his hands on my hips and slid them all the way up my sides, to my armpits, then along
my arms, grabbing them at the wrists and pinning them down, above my head, on the couch.

  That is how I awoke: face down on the couch, with my hands pinned, and a man straddling my hips.

  I was completely confused upon waking to find that I was still wearing all of my clothes and not in bed, and, as soon as I realized it, I became utterly panicked to feel the weight of a strong male body pressing me down into the couch. I was even more terrified to find that I was without the use of my hands.

  Just as I gathered a huge lungful of air, in preparation for an adrenaline fueled shriek, I felt his other hand cover my mouth securely, preventing me from uttering a sound.

  Every one of my muscles tensed under him and I prepared to fight, to buck him off, but he was sitting with his full weight across my hips, pinning them in place, and I was unable to budge him even one inch. My entire body was shaking with terror, and the adrenaline coursing through my veins, making my stomach buzz, and my mind spin frantically.

  I felt him lean down over my body and place his mouth next to my ear, that’s when his scent washed over me. Of course it was him I thought, as the recognition hit my senses all at once.

  Something I can’t explain happened then. My chest started to ease, my breathing calmed down, my nipples hardened, and my pussy began to throb as the very first hum of sound rose from his throat and escaped through his lips, which were pressed so closely against my ear.

  “Don’t fight it,” he whispered in a soothing, seductive, and commanding voice, “this is going to happen,” he continued so confidently and with such certainty, in his tone, that I found it mesmerizing and brainwashing. It just floated into my mind as fact, bypassing every single red flag, brushing over every single argument, and inserting itself into my psyche.