Burned

For years. Years she had fought him and what he wanted from her. Because she had known how much he wanted from her. The sexual excesses he enjoyed. She pressed her fists to her stomach, fighting the driving, insidious images that pounded at her brain. She could have tolerated it, she told herself. She could have allowed herself to let go if she hadn’t known the man who would eventually arrive.

Jase was nothing if not honest. He had never lied to her when his sexuality had begun emerging. They had been in their early twenties, and his need to dominate, to control her sexual responses had at first seemed merely harmless play. He hated her controlled sexuality. Her fear of letting go, of giving him the responsibility of pleasing her.

Ella had hated his need for it. She had married him because she was pregnant. She had cared for him, had felt a warmth and gentle desire for him, but what he needed she had never wanted. Until she met James. Until she saw in his wicked, knowing eyes, the tru