10. The Waiting
TEN
The Waiting
The light changes.
The light shifts. Afternoon gold to amber, then to the long purple shadows of evening. I'm still on my back in the center of his bed, arms above my head where he put them, naked and aching and forbidden to move.
The arousal doesn't fade.
That's the cruelest part. I expected it to ebb, to gradually release me from its grip the way normal arousal does when ignored. But the Protocol won't let me escape. It keeps me at a simmer. Not building, but not releasing. A constant hum of want that pulses between my legs with every heartbeat.
I think about touching myself.
The thought comes unbidden, intrusive, impossible to ignore. My hands are right there, above my head. All I'd have to do is lower them. Slide one between my thighs. Give myself what he denied me.
He'd know. He said he'd know.
But would he? Is that even possible? Or is it a bluff, a manipulation, another way to control me through fear rather than force?
My right hand twitches. Starts to lower.
I stop it.
Not because I'm afraid. Not because I believe he has some mystical connection to my body that would alert him to my disobedience.
Because he expects me to break.
The realization crystallizes like ice. He left me here deliberately, aroused, desperate, forbidden to touch, because he expects me to fail. He expects me to give in to the need, to prove that I'm weak, to hand him another victory on a silver platter.
He can rot in hell.
I force my hand back above my head. Clench my fists. Focus on the rage instead of the want.
I won't give him the satisfaction. If he wants to know whether I can resist temptation, I'll show him resistance he never imagined. Not because he told me to. Because I choose to. Because defiance is the only power I have left.
The first time he comes back, I've been waiting an hour.
The bedroom door opens without warning. I tense, my whole body going rigid, and then he's there. Standing at the foot of the bed, looking down at me with those frozen eyes.
"Comfortable?"
"No."
"Good." He moves to the side of the bed. Sits on the edge, close enough to touch but not touching. "Show me your hands."
I uncurl my fists. Hold them up where he can see.
"Good girl. You didn't touch."
The praise lands where it always lands. Somewhere deep and shameful. I hate the way my body responds to those two words. Hate the way the arousal spikes, the Protocol amplifying his approval into something physical.
"I wasn't tempted."
"Liar." He reaches out. His hand lands on my stomach, just resting there, warm and heavy. "Your pupils are dilated. Your breathing is elevated. You're flushed from your chest to your hairline." His hand slides lower. Lower. "And you're absolutely soaked."
His fingers brush my folds. I jerk, gasping, the touch electric after an hour of nothing.
"You were tempted." He strokes through my arousal, spreading it, his movements maddeningly slow. "You just didn't give in. That's different."
"Does it matter?"
"It matters." His thumb finds my clit. Presses. I arch off the bed. "It matters because obedience from fear is worthless. But obedience from choice—" He circles, slow and relentless. "—that's valuable."
He's building me again. The pleasure coils, tightens, the orgasm approaching like a freight train.
"Please—" The word escapes before I can stop it. "Please, I need?—"
He stops.
"Not yet."
And then he's gone. The door closes behind him. I'm left gasping, trembling, closer to the edge than I was before and somehow further from relief.
I hate him.
I hate him more than I've ever hated anyone in my life.
The second time, I've lost track of how long it's been.
The light has shifted again. The purple shadows darker now, night creeping in. I've been lying here for hours. My arms ache from holding them above my head. My throat is dry. The arousal has become a kind of pain, a constant throbbing that won't let me think about anything else.
I've been trying anyway.
Bennett. I think about Bennett. About the phone call in the break room, the panic in his voice, the way he told me York's people had approached him.
About the fact that he was going to sell me to Carlo Moreno first. That Sebastian York swooping in wasn't salvation, it was just a different kind of predator.
My brother tried to sell me to pay his gambling debts.
I've known this for over twenty-four hours now, but the reality of it keeps hitting me in waves.
Bennett, who I raised after our parents died.
Bennett, who I covered for and bailed out and sacrificed everything to protect.
He was going to trade me to a monster. And the only reason I'm here instead is because a bigger monster got there first.
I should hate Bennett. I should rage at him, scream at him, refuse to ever speak to him again.
But I can't. Because hating Bennett means hating the last eight years of my life. It means admitting that everything I sacrificed was worthless, that the brother I thought I was protecting was never worth protecting.
So I think about Sebastian instead.
The last woman I showed mercy to?—
He didn't finish the sentence. But the words have been echoing in my head for hours, turning over and over like stones in a tumbler.
Someone hurt him. Someone he showed mercy to. Someone who took that mercy and used it against him.
That's why he's like this. That's why control matters more than anything. He let his guard down once, showed kindness to someone who didn't deserve it, and they—what? Betrayed him? Destroyed something he cared about? Left him bleeding, literally or figuratively?
It doesn't excuse what he's doing to me. Nothing excuses this.
But it explains it.
The door opens.
He crosses to the bed without speaking. This time he doesn't sit. Just stands over me, looking down, his expression unreadable in the dim light.
"Still haven't touched."
"No."
"Why not?"
I meet his eyes. Hold them. "Because you expected me to."
Something flickers across his face. Surprise? Respect? Gone too fast to identify.
"Most people break." His voice is thoughtful. "By now, most people would have given in. The need becomes too much. They convince themselves I won't really know, or that the punishment is worth the relief."
"I'm not most people."
"No." He sits on the bed. His hand finds my hip, grips firmly. "You're not."
And then he's on me.
His mouth covers mine. The first time he's kissed me, the realization registers distantly, through the haze of sensation. His tongue slides against mine, demanding, possessive. His body presses me into the mattress, his weight pinning me down, his hand sliding between my thighs.
"You've been so good." The words are spoken against my lips. "So patient. Let me reward you."
His fingers slip inside me.
I cry out into his mouth. The penetration is overwhelming. Two fingers, then three, stretching me, filling me. His palm grinds against my clit as he fucks me with his hand, and I'm already so close, so desperate?—
He pulls back. Withdraws his fingers. Leaves me empty and aching and screaming with frustration.
"Not yet."
The door closes.
I scream into the pillow.
The third time, I'm crying.
I don't know when it started. Somewhere between his second visit and now, the tears began. Silent, sliding down my temples into my hair. Not from sadness. From rage. From frustration. From the unbearable pressure of being kept on the edge for so long that my entire body feels like a wound.
He finds me like that. Tear-stained and trembling, my hands still above my head, my thighs sticky with arousal I can't satisfy.
"Chloe." His voice is different now. Rougher. Strained.
I don't answer. Don't look at him. Just lie there, destroyed, waiting for him to wind me up and walk away again.
He doesn't.
Instead, he sits on the bed and pulls me into his arms.
The gentleness is almost worse than the cruelty. He cradles me against his chest, his hand stroking my hair, and I'm too exhausted to fight it. Too broken to do anything but lean into him and shake.
"You didn't touch yourself." He says it like a revelation. Like he can't quite believe it. "I gave you hours. I pushed you to the edge three times. And you didn't break."
"I told you." My voice is hoarse. "I won't give you the satisfaction."
"You think this is about my satisfaction?"
"Isn't everything?"
He pulls back. Looks at me. His eyes are darker than I've seen them. The ice melted into something liquid, something hungry.
"I've been thinking about you," he says. "Every minute I was away from this room. Thinking about you lying here, wet and wanting, fighting yourself to spite me."
"Good."
"It's not good." His hand fists in my hair, tilts my head back. "It's driving me insane. I walked away three times when all I wanted was to bury myself inside you and make you scream."
The admission lands like a blow. The denial hasn't just been working on me. It's been working on him too.
"Then why didn't you?"
"Because I had to prove I could." His grip tightens. "Because control is everything. Because if I can't control myself, how can I control you?"
But he didn't control himself. Not really. He kept coming back. Kept touching me. Kept pushing both of us closer to breaking.
"You want me." I say it wonderingly. Like I'm just now understanding. "You actually want me."
"I've wanted you since I first saw you dealing cards at two in the morning with circles under your eyes.
" His voice is a growl. "I've wanted you every second since you walked into my office and told me one night was your limit.
I want you so badly it's affecting my judgment, and that hasn't happened in years. "
The last woman I showed mercy to?—
Is that what happened? He wanted someone? Showed mercy because of it? And she used it against him?
"Sebastian—"
"On your knees."
The command snaps through the air. His hand releases my hair. He stands, starts unfastening his belt.
"You've earned your reward." His voice is cold again. Controlled. Whatever crack I glimpsed is sealed over. "But you'll work for it first."