Chapter 52 Ribbons and Bows （Undo Me）
RIBBONS AND BOWS (UNDO ME)
BASTIAN
Bastian knew Luella was alone. That was why he chose now to sweep inside her room.
She jolted, hands stilling on the fabric of a gown hanging in the armoire before her, her head lifting to stare at him.
"Bastian?" Her voice was soft.
He closed the curtains to the lounge, leaving the warm breeze, rustling leaves, and distant waves flowing in through the other set of open curtains.
Luella’s eyes were wide. He felt her curiosity; greater than that, he felt her interest.
He was already dressed for the ball later this evening—fitted dark trousers, billowing black blouse, laced with blue stitching. He wore many silver hoops in his ears, felt them against his cheeks as he canted his head and prowled closer to her.
Bastian stopped when he was right before her. Her scent enveloped him, teased him. He’d been holding back for too long, and now, faced with her, he wanted nothing more than to eat her up.
He let his lips tip into a smile. If possible, her eyes grew wider at the sight. He knew it was not a comforting look.
Her knuckles grew white as she fisted her hands in the fabric of the gown she held. It was delicate and frothy in appearance, a mix of soft blue, with darker blue at the bottom like the shift of the sea from spring to winter.
"What are you doing?" she whispered, staring up at him.
Bastian crowded her against the armoire. The wood rattled faintly as her back and wings hit it.
Luella’s sweet, painted berry pink lips parted. "Where are the others?"
He grazed a hand over the side of her face. Her skin was warm from the breeze and flushed from his presence. Want pressed against him, building him up.
"They’re busy," Bastian murmured against the side of her face, loving the way she shivered faintly as his breath skittered across her flesh. "You’re mine right now, pet." He moved until his lips were right before hers, grazing. "Remember what you promised me?"
Her eyes crossed adorably as she tried to hold his gaze, dipping to his mouth. He’d fed yesterday, yet nothing compared to the memory of her taste—crafted solely for him.
"Now?" she asked.
"Yes, now." Bastian let his lips drift over hers in promise of what was to come, then pulled away quickly.
Luella’s hands shook against the gown, making the skirts flutter. She wore a plain dressing gown, a sash around her waist. Her bare feet poked from the long hem. The sharp neckline dipped between the small swell of her breasts.
Was she nude beneath?
Bastian’s hungry eyes fell to her feet, then lazily tracked up to her face, stilling on the dip of her waist where the ribbon of her dressing gown was tied snugly, accentuating it.
The curve of her hips and the rise and fall of her chest with her sweet little rapid breaths. He wanted to utterly ruin her.
"Get on the bed."
Luella dropped the gown.
"W-what?"
"Don’t make me repeat myself, pet," he warned sensually.
Her breath hitched. He heard the roar of her blood through her veins, thrumming in his ears.
She still didn’t move.
Bastian relished the power he held over her. He’d meant every word he’d ever said to her. He was hers. He… cared greatly, deeply for her. He wanted to make her feel good. Wanted to replace her pain and worry with pleasure.
And he was a creature of sensuality. He always had been. Who could blame him if his two greatest obsessions fit so wonderfully together? Luella and pleasure. Silken wonders, soft touches, and her blushing innocence.
Her heavy emotions weighed on them all. They’d grown thicker after Emarelia had left earlier that day, when she’d tried to bring up Luella’s true parents.
Bastian wanted her to be happy. Through tears and misery and heartache, she’d earned it.
His tone dropped. "Get on the bed."
She blew out a low breath, then turned, and he eyed her curves with appreciation.
The ends of the silk ribbon around her waist fluttered as she placed her knees on the side of the bed and crawled across it.
Bastian hummed. Would she like what he imagined doing to her?
She sat amid the sheets, staring at him with nervousness.
He walked to her, stopping when the edge of the bed hit his knees. Hunger stirred within him.
Her legs were splayed on either side of her, hands tucked in the space between her thighs. She fisted the material of her dressing gown where it bunched between her legs, making it pull taut across her hips and waist.
She was innocence, begging to be corrupted.
"If you knew how you appeared to me right now…" Bastian shook his head, placing his knees on the bed just as she’d done, as he knelt by her legs.
She licked her lips, and he couldn’t help himself.
He surged forward, gripping the back of her head to bring her to his mouth. He kissed her sensually as soft wet sounds and her hitched breaths filled the room.
Rising on his knees, he loomed over her. His grip on her head forced her to meet him. He didn’t yield, even when one of her hands rested on his chest, fingers curling in the neckline. He knew her touch would wrinkle the fabric. There would be no mistaking what he’d done to her.
He forced her to her back and followed her down. Her legs were splayed indecently, the hem of her long dressing gown bunched around her mid-thighs, while the ribbon sash was undone, hanging precariously by a loose bow.
Bastian tugged the end of it. The bow slid free easily.
"What are you doing?" Her voice was whisper-thin.
He curled the ribbon in his fist, then tugged it free from around her waist. It caught under her back, and he wrapped his hand around it, forcing it to slide from beneath her.
When it was fully undone and away from her body, the front of her dressing gown fell open down the middle, baring her soft, small breasts and pink, peaked nipples.
She gasped, then bundled the fabric closer, covering her stomach and the space between her thighs.
Luella’s flesh was pebbled with chill and awareness, chest rising and falling rapidly, the longer he stared.
He let his Mind magic drift against her thoughts. She didn’t shove him away—so he dove inside her.
He was assaulted with a barrage of desire—a lust so consuming it made his own swell. Her thoughts were an amalgamation of intense emotions, drifting by.
Is this okay? Does he like this? Does he like me? Am I… worthy? Why does he watch, without speaking? His touches are so different from the rest.
Bastian dove deeper.
Maybe if I give in, it’ll all be better. Do I even deserve it?
Deeper.
Everyone would be better off if I weren’t here. What if I disappeared—what if I had let the sea carry me away that day?
Like the mist enveloping the Isles, her worries turned his desire into anguish.
Her thoughts were swift, hard to catch, and harder to hold onto.
Some thoughts weren’t even fully formed, but a whisper of an idea. He knew she loved his touch, yet was ashamed by her own wants; he knew she had been intimate with the others; he knew a part of her grieved her innocence; and he knew what she searched for in truth was distraction—not pleasure.
But her deepest, darkest thoughts made his heart twinge.
Bastian let his forehead fall against hers. He breathed her in. Strawberries and cream-tipped roses.
"If you had let the sea carry you away, I would have followed.
" Bastian reached up and curled a tendril of her hair around his finger, letting the strands sift through his palms. "We are fated, pet—the sun and the moon, our witnesses.
You were given to us, to me. I have been your advocate for centuries, yet nothing could have prepared me for who you truly are.
Perhaps the Fates decided even a wretched, corrupt vampire like me deserved a bit of goodness. "
She stared up at him, blinking quickly. Bastian saw a shimmer in her blue eyes, betraying her.
"Just when I think I’m starting to know you, you undo me," she whispered, her small hand brushing his cheek; he leaned into her. "Never stop, Bastian."
As she shifted beneath him, her body pressed against his.
He kissed her again. Soft and slow and heart-achingly gentle. Those vile thoughts in her head were dashed upon the hard foundation of his words, his touch.
He kissed her until he no longer sensed her worries or fears, until the sweetness was replaced with rapacity.
He felt the slip of silk in his fist and realized he still held the sash. He let his fangs tease her bottom lip, then pulled back from her. Her lips were swollen and wet, eyes half-lidded.
Bastian drifted the end of the sash over her chest. She trembled beneath him.
The top of her dressing gown had already parted during the heat of their kisses, and he guided the sash down, teasing over her breasts, then down further, letting the fabric fall away slowly.
Her stomach twitched as the sash fluttered past her navel. Then lower.
Until her bare flesh was revealed to him.
He groaned lowly at the sight of her.
It was torture to drag his eyes back up to her face, but he wanted to see her face.
Her pupils were blown wide with desire, cheeks flushed, hair mussed.
His fingers curled around the sash, and her attention diverted to it.
Bastian grinned, feeling his fangs poke his lower lip. "Now would be a very good time to tell me to stop if you don’t want this." He waited.
She said nothing.
His grin turned wider. "Very well, pet."
He let the end of the sash flutter over Luella’s face, and she gasped as it tickled her cheeks and lashes, forcing her lids to close. He put his mouth to her ear.
"You remember being sightless? I know you enjoyed it.
A part of you liked giving up everything to someone else.
Keep your eyes closed," he warned, voice low, then placed the sash over her eyes.
He carefully lifted her head, and she was boneless, letting him.
He tied it under her skull, then placed her head back down on the mattress.
Bastian stared at her. "You are sinfully decadent."
He leaned down to take her lip between his own, letting his fang prick her giving flesh. Her blood filled his mouth—just a taste. She softened further.
He kissed down the line of her body, loving every hitch in her breath. He didn’t speak on purpose, wanting her to always guess where his lips would touch next.
When he shifted to lie between her legs, his shoulders between her inner thighs, he whispered, "All you have to do is tell me to stop and I will. Otherwise, I will keep going, and I will take what I want and make you love it, pet. When I’m done with you here, you’ll put your gown on and walk outside—you will enter the midst of the Fallen, all while you feel me between your thighs with every step.
When you breathe, I want it to be in memory of how you gasped as I touched you"—his lips hovered over the soft spot under her navel—"and how you trembled as I tasted you. "
Then, he descended upon her. He tasted her like she was the last living thing to ever grace the earth, and he was starving—dying.
Luella gasped and trembled. He knew she’d done this before, with the demon. He was slightly grateful, if jealous. For now, he did not have to ease her into it. He wanted her to leave wrecked, taken apart, and put back together again.
The taste of her arousal filled his mouth.
Her first climax was swift and shattering. Her thighs clenched around his head, and he kept kissing her, tasting her; he didn’t let up.
She clenched and trembled as he forced her from one peak, hurtling toward the next. When she teetered right at the precipice, he let his fangs drag over her flesh. Her gasp was loud. He moved until his lips were at her thigh, giving her time to tell him to stop.
Bastian bit down. Hard.
His fangs sank into her inner thigh, and she came undone from that alone. A wash of her blood filled his mouth, dripping from his lips too quickly for him to gulp down fully. He drank greedily and stopped when she shuddered lowly in exhaustion.
When Bastian pulled away from her and sat up, small droplets of blood fell from his lips.
The sash was still firmly around her eyes, and her legs were splayed. The dressing gown was parted wholly down the middle, baring every inch of her to him.
He touched the tip of her nose. She leaned into his touch like a flower seeking the sun’s warmth.
He kissed her, and she moaned. He knew she tasted herself on his lips.
"Do you now know how much I like you?" Bastian whispered, with a breath of space between them.
He let the words echo through her mind, chasing away the last bit of her worries.
Bastian tugged the sash down her face, until it rested around her neck like a loose, silken collar.
She blinked a few times as if to clear her vision. "Yes. I know." Her tone sounded dazed.
"Good. Then get dressed, or we’ll be late."
He stood, moving to the gown she’d dropped on the floor by the wardrobe. He sensed her utter confusion through their bond—he didn’t even need to go into her mind.
Bastian let her lie there for a few moments, then helped her dress gently, as if nothing had happened. They did have to hurry, after all.