He shook his head. “As much as I’d like to fuck you, you’re not healed enough. And I’ve no condoms in the kitchen.”

“I understand.” She bit her lip, then looked up at him through the dark fringe of her lashes with coquettish eyes. “I wasn’t asking if you would fuck me.” She licked her lips.

All the blood rushed from his brain to his cock.

“Yes, lass. I’ve been dying to feel your mouth around me.”

He’d never been harder in his life, nor more miserable with wanting. The need to have Raine in every way tormented him. Just the sight of her shiny pink tongue sliding over her plump lips made his heavy balls draw up and his thick crest leak. He fell into her blue eyes and gritted his teeth, fighting for control as her wee hands drew the zipper downward. She was giving this to him of her own free will. The significance of it not lost on him for even an instant.

As she pulled his cock free, his breathing grew harsh. And when she wrapped her hot, sweet mouth over the throbbing crown and sucked him deep, he sighed out a long groan of toe-curling pleasure. His nipples drew up tight as pebbles as she worked him in and out of her heavenly mouth with a slow worship that set him on fire and burned him to his soul.

The unrelenting pull and release of her mouth on his cock threatened to unravel him. Liam clutched his thighs, terrified that he’d succumb to the urge to grab her without restraint and force himself down her throat. He gasped, fighting to hold back. He tensed, but the overwhelming pleasure was about to drown him.

Liam was dying to make every second of it last, yet desperate to fill her throat with his seed. He had to see it, had to see her swallow him, needed to see the submissive glow on her face. “Raine… Oh god, Raine! Look at me. Take it all. I’m coming!”

She raised her stare to him. Their eyes locked as he uncurled his grip on his thighs, fisted his hands in her hair, and drowned in her stare as he released every drop in his balls on her tongue. Her joy as she drank him deep transfixed him until he felt his heart become hers, and Liam let out a long sigh. This hard road he’d been down to reach here with Raine… He no longer had a shred of doubt that he’d done the right thing.

Hammer paced. Though Raine and that bastard, Liam, had only been gone twelve hours, it felt like twelve fucking months. In that time, he’d exhausted every avenue he could think of to locate them. Mutual friends hadn’t heard from either. He’d talked to a private investigator, but even his mad skills hadn’t turned up a clue as to Raine or Liam’s whereabouts in that short timeframe. The fucking Irish prick was no doubt using cash and an alias to keep her sequestered far from big bad Hammer’s reach. Son of a bitch. Liam had to know that he’d leave no stone unturned until he found Raine, but the man was still ignoring his phone calls and texts. So was Raine. The woman-thieving son of a bitch Hammer could understand. But his Raine?

Unless… Racing to Raine’s room, he saw her purse sitting on her nightstand. Fuck me! Liam hadn’t even let her grab it before he’d kidnapped her and disappeared.

Diving into the bag confirmed his worst suspicions. His hand squeezed around her cell phone as his stomach tightly knotted. Raine was lost to him unless Liam allowed her to call. And what were the odds of that? Sure, she might leave the bastard…someday. But would she ever come back here?

“Motherfucker!” He resisted the urge to throw her phone across the room.

Hammer set the little colorful bag back on her nightstand, staring sightlessly at the wall. He grabbed her pillow, drawing it up to his nose to inhale the intoxicating fragrance still clinging to the linen. Closing his eyes, he breathed in the remnants of her scent. Remorse clogged his throat, but the lump was so damn big, Hammer felt as if it might choke him.

The sound of someone shuffling near the doorway snagged his attention. He set the pillow in his lap and found Beck staring at him, shaking his head. No way Hammer could miss the concern in the big man’s eyes.

“What?” Macen barked.

“You need to get it together, man.” Beck frowned and walked away.

As much as Hammer hated to admit it, the guy was right. Moping and mooning wasn’t going to accomplish a damn thing. Problem was, he’d never mastered the art of not thinking about Raine even when she was here. Now that she was gone, her ghost lingered everywhere, haunting him.

“Fuck!” Hammer threw Raine’s pillow back on the bed and stormed from the room. He might feel like a pathetic bastard, but he wasn’t going to act like one.

Striding into the dungeon, he was determined to focus on work. Raine wasn’t here to complete some of her tasks, and he needed to find a willing slave to take care of those duties until she returned.

Hammer wouldn’t let himself think that he’d never see her again.

He found a pair of lounging subs only too happy to do his bidding. He knew their names and vaguely remembered playing with them in the past. Neither had made a huge impression on him, but he was grateful for them now. Since Raine’s disappearance, no one had bothered to wash the coffeepot or organize the dungeon. Neither should have been a big deal, but because she always took care of those tasks, they stabbed him with her absence again—and made the hole in his chest bleed more.

As they ran to do his bidding, he looked about, watching others scene. He hadn’t done that since that fateful night with Marlie. Shit, he didn’t really want to, and Hammer felt a bit guilty about shirking his responsibilities to the others here today. But he couldn’t bring himself to voluntarily take the hand of another sub and…

“Sir?”

Someone tapped his back, and a soft, sensual voice broke into his thoughts. He turned to find Crystal. She sent him an inviting glance. The single sub had few reservations about the Doms she chose to give her power to and even fewer boundaries. He usually strapped her up and pushed her to the edge about once a week. Often, he fucked her afterward. But he hadn’t been interested enough to even look her way lately. She wasn’t Raine. No one was. And the last thing he felt like doing now was Crystal.

“What is it, girl?” If he was lucky, maybe she had a complaint he could fix or trouble with another Dom whose head he could bash in.

Instead, she reached for his hand, prodding his fingers open with something cool and leathery. He looked down to find her giving him a single tail, then sliding to her knees. “Please, Sir. I need to feel the kiss of the whip.”

Fuck. Guilt pressed down on him. He’d neglected her, and it wasn’t her fault.

Since the blowup with Liam and Raine’s departure, he wondered if the grapevine was working and members would start talking, whisper that he’d lost control. Would they wonder if they should play elsewhere? Speculate that he might not be able to run a safe place?

It would be better for everyone if he put the possible rumors to rest. He never wanted to use a sub in anger…but he wasn’t mad at the nubile woman. In fact, anger had fallen far down on his list of emotions. Panic and desolation seemed to be vying for the top spot.

Confident that he wouldn’t take Crystal past a place she could handle, Hammer nodded and gestured across the room. An eager smile spread across her lips as she headed to a suspension frame near the back wall.

Hammer untied the little bow holding her sheer, nude baby-doll together and flung it away. Compliantly, she raised her arms to the dangling cuffs, and he secured her in. Then he grabbed her little thong in his fist and gave a mighty yank. It tore from her body, and Hammer tossed it aside. The actions were familiar. He’d done this a thousand times. But nothing felt the same. None of it excited him.

Against his will, his eyes traveled across the dungeon to the infamous spanking bench Raine had perched on for her punishment with Beck…and where she’d given herself to Liam. God, he could still see her there, angry and frightened and determined, at least until Beck had fucked it all up. He didn’t have the first clue where she’d gotten those Fuck You Very Much panties. At the time, he’d been furious. Now, he smiled a bit fondly. Only Raine…

How the fuck was he going to heal this gaping wound in his chest? How long was he going to miss her and need her and regret every second of the way he’d so fucked up.

“Sir?” Crystal stared at him over her shoulder.

Hammer could give this woman what she craved, and it didn’t cost him a thing. Why couldn’t Raine be as easy? Why did she want his heart and soul? Love he didn’t have to give?

Gripping Crystal’s long auburn curls in his fist, he jerked her head back as his lips whispered over her ear. “Your safeword is ‘power,’ girl.”

“Yes, Sir. Thank you. But you know I won’t need one.” She sent him a dreamy smile.

“You might,” he warned.

He smoothed a broad hand over her creamy flesh. Immediately, thoughts of Raine filled his head. His blood surged, boiled. Closing his eyes for a brief moment, he allowed himself to remember how her soft ivory flesh yielded beneath his hands.

Tightly, he gripped the leather-plaited handle of the whip and got ready to inflict pain.

But he was good at that, wasn’t he? He’d brought so much pain down on Raine with his actions. His gut seized at the thought of inflicting more, even on a pain slut who craved it. Visions of the marks he’d left marring Raine’s sensual body flooded his mind, and he liked the idea that those were the last marks he’d left on a woman. The memories of her slick, swollen pussy and how fucking epic she felt wrapped around his cock consumed him.

Shit, he had to focus.

Opening his eyes, he stepped back, arching the whip high above his head, and with a flick of his wrist, a deafening crack filled the air. Sweat broke out along his brow and trickled down his back. The room spun and a sickening taste filled his mouth. Staring at Crystal’s unmarred ass, the canvas he was expected to paint with wicked red welts, he clutched the handle of the whip with both hands. His body trembled as he fought for control.

Raine had left him. His uncompromising needs and his goddamn fears had driven her away, leaving him with no way to harness the overwhelming panic.

He shook his head and closed his eyes.

Suddenly, a strong hand gripped his forearm. Snapping around, he growled at Beck, who stood next to him looking deeply concerned.

“I’ll take care of her, Macen,” he whispered in a voice that only Hammer could hear.

“I got it,” he assured Beck.

“You don’t. Pull your head out of your ass,” Beck murmured for his ears alone, obviously trying to save Hammer the embarrassment.

He shrugged Beck off. “What the fuck are you still doing here? You’ve been banned.”

Beck snorted. “Banned. Yeah, right. Sorry, chief, I’m still here because I’m the only one who will risk standing up to you. You’re dealing with too much. Go unwind in your room. I’ll see to Crystal’s session.”

The asshole was treating him like a BDSM invalid. “Go the fuck away.”

“No. Look at yourself. You’re white as a fucking ghost. If the members truly knew how much you were falling apart, the ramifications would be disastrous. I can’t let you scene with Crystal, not while you’re half out of your mind over her.”

Hammer didn’t have to guess which her Beck meant.

“I don’t want to talk about it. Get your shit and get out.”

“I’m not leaving until I know you’re stable enough to be let loose among the subs. Now give me the whip and go unwind in your room.”

Who did Beck think he was talking to? He clenched his fists and narrowed his eyes, ready to knock the fucker’s head off.

“Ah-ahh, don’t start swinging here. It’ll ruin your fine, upstanding reputation as the bad ass Dom in charge now, won’t it?” Beck taunted with an arch of his brow.

Hammer looked up. All eyes were on him. Even Crystal had turned to see the reason he hadn’t started working her over yet. Hell, the sadist was right. “Shit.”

“I got this,” Beck assured. “I’ll give Crystal whatever she needs.”

With a sigh of defeat, he clapped Beck on the back. “Her safeword is ‘power.’ Don’t forget it.”

“No sweat. You worry about figuring out if you’re going to get yourself together or self-destruct. Now that Raine is gone, man, those are your only two options.”

With a disgusted sigh, Hammer slapped the handle of the whip into Beck’s hand, then clenched his jaw and walked away. The club members’ nervous looks did not escape him. Inwardly cursing for being such an idiot, he headed down the hall, to his room, picking up a bottle of Patrón on the way.

As he stripped off his clothes, Hammer stared at the wild tangle of his bed, the sheets still strewn from his night with Raine. If he closed his eyes, he could picture her naked and willing, legs spread, offering him every part of her without an ounce of reservation. God, she’d been all his wildest fantasies come true.

After all he’d put her through, Hammer couldn’t blame Raine for taking Liam up on his offer. If Liam’s ploy unraveled and she returned broken, he’d be there to pick up the pieces…like he always did. But for now, he was stuck here, alone.