Chapter 29

Twenty-Nine

M alcolm Hale sat with calculated calm in the lobby of the Waverly County Hospital, his legs crossed casually at the ankles, a worn magazine spread open on his lap. To anyone who glanced his way, he appeared to be just another family member awaiting news from the surgeons—no different from the rest of the people whose loved ones hovered somewhere between life and death. But beneath his composed exterior, Malcolm’s heart raced, not with fear or worry, but with a perverse thrill. His prey was there.

The sterile smell of antiseptic and the hushed conversations filled the air around him, but Malcolm barely registered it. His mind was far from the grief and uncertainty that consumed the other families in the room. Instead, he was focused on the woman, her face pale with anguish, her steps unsteady as she waited to see if her sister survived some horrific medical condition.

Brad Killian, her ever-competent, ever-vigilant protector, was not nearby. He and that annoying LAPD detective were busy trying to find him. The young submissive bartender at Hot Shots called him when they arrived. And even if Isobel’s Dom left the second she called, dear wonderful Mother Nature would slow him down, making traffic impassable. The important thing was that Brad was not an obstacle for the moment.

Isobel Everhart was here, broken and desperate. And she would be his.

Malcolm forced himself to breathe slowly, to keep his face neutral as he flipped a page of the magazine. He had practiced for years how to appear like everyone else—how to blend in, to become invisible when he needed to. He could smile softly when needed, feign concern, even offer a comforting nod to those who glanced his way. But inside, the anticipation built in him, a dark hunger that made his fingers twitch.

He drifted into the sweet memory. Malcolm Hale adjusted the lapel of his tailored jacket as he entered the grand auditorium of the psychology symposium. The room was a sea of ambitious scholars, eager to impress and network, their chatter echoing against the vaulted ceiling. But his focus wasn’t on the crowd. It was on the panel discussion. Specifically, on the young woman sitting confidently at the center table, poised and radiant.

There she was. Isobel Everhart.

He’d read about her before—her name had appeared in an academic journal when Professor Murdoch had dissected his research. Isobel’s statistical analysis was pivotal in unraveling his conclusions, the one note of credit that made her name stick in his memory like a thorn. But in the flesh, she was so much more than the name on the page.

Her auburn braid gleamed under the stage lights, perfectly woven down her back in a statement of precision and control. Her hazel eyes sparkled with intelligence as she answered questions with wit and authority, her voice smooth but firm. She was articulate, charming, and infuriatingly bright.

Hale felt the first stirrings of a dark fascination. How could someone so submissive in nature—he could sense it in her posture, in the way her lips quirked slightly downward when she didn’t agree with the panelists—possess such audacity to challenge his work?

Her smile was professional but warm, her laughter ringing softly over a pointed but kind clarification to another speaker’s question. He watched her hands, the way they moved deliberately with her words, occasionally brushing her braid back over her shoulder. He pictured those same hands gripping the edge of a desk, trembling with anticipation.

“ A scholarship for the most promising candidate of the year.” The words of the moderator snapped Hale’s attention back to the present. Isobel’s name was called, and she stood to accept the honor, her cheeks flushed with a mix of pride and humility. The applause roared, but for Hale, the sound faded into nothingness. His gaze followed her every move as she made her way across the stage to accept her award.

The smile on her lips, that natural grace, made him clench his fists. She was perfect. Too perfect. She was everything he despised and everything he desired—submission wrapped in strength, defiance disguised as charm. She would need to be broken. Corrected. Punished for her insolence.

Back at his hotel room that evening, Hale poured himself a glass of scotch and sat by the window, watching the rain streak across the glass. Isobel’s image was seared into his mind. He could still hear her voice as she’d spoken about the importance of rigorous statistical analysis, the smugness in her tone when she indirectly referenced her work debunking his conclusions.

He threw back the scotch, the burn in his throat igniting his thoughts further. She had dared to challenge him, publicly undermine him, and yet… she had no idea of the storm she had stirred. He imagined her face, those intelligent eyes wide with confusion, with fear, as she realized just how far he was willing to go to claim her.

The braid. That long, elegant braid. He could picture it wrapped around his wrist, pulling her closer as she knelt before him. Her lips, so soft and full, would part obediently as he guided her into submission. Her sharp mind would falter, reduced to nothing but his will. Her curves, her body—he envisioned her bent over his knee, her bottom flushed from the impact of his hand, her cries echoing with the perfect mix of pain and pleasure.

She would learn discipline. She would learn respect.

And then there was her submission. It radiated from her, even as she tried to hide it behind her professional facade. He saw it in the way her shoulders relaxed slightly when someone praised her, the faint blush that colored her cheeks under scrutiny. She was natural prey, though she probably didn’t even realize it. He’d have to show her. Teach her what it meant to truly give in, to truly surrender.

But first, she had to pay for what she’d done.

The statistical analysis. That damned paper gave Dr. Murdoch the ammunition to dismantle his career. She thought it was just numbers, just data. But it wasn’t. It was his life’s work. And she had ripped it apart with her spreadsheets and her smug little formulas. She had humiliated him, taken what was his, and presented it to the world as flawed, as wrong .

Hale set down his empty glass with deliberate precision, his pulse quickening. She would be his. Not just for revenge, but because he needed her. Because she was the perfect canvas for his control, the ultimate conquest.

Weeks later, he returned to South Dakota and watched her again from afar at the clinic she volunteered at. He’d begun studying her movements, her routines. She was an open book to him now, predictable in her habits. He wasn’t sure yet how he’d make his move, but he didn’t need to rush. For now, the hunt was enough to sustain him.

But, he promised himself, that braid would be in his hand. And her defiance, her brilliance, her submission—they would all belong to him.

Once he had her, he would whisk her away, disappear into the shadows he knew so well, and she would be completely at his mercy. His fantasies had played out every possible scenario in his mind. The thought of her bound before him, her spirit crushed, her body yielding to his darker desires made his pulse quicken.

Malcolm’s smile twisted into something ugly, something vile. He had every intention of showing her the most extreme sides of D/s, the parts Brad had likely shielded her from. She thought she knew Dominance, submission. She thought she had been trained. But what Brad had taught her was nothing compared to what he planned to do. He would break her in ways she couldn’t even imagine, push her past the point of no return.

And when she begged for mercy, her voice trembling and hoarse from crying out, he would only push harder. More pain, more control, more degradation. Isobel Everhart would be his masterpiece of destruction.

His mouth curled in a perverse smile as the images flickered through his mind. He could almost hear her screams, feel the tremors in her body as she yielded to him out of sheer desperation. He would take his time, stretch it out for days, until there was nothing left of the proud woman Brad Killian had fallen in love with. She would exist only to serve his darkest whims.

Malcolm’s fingers traced the edge of the magazine as he settled back into his seat. The anticipation was intoxicating, but he had been patient. It was all about timing. He had waited this long, but now it was time.

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