Chapter 64I’ll Ruin You Gently #2
“And after I let you go…” My grip on her waist tightens slightly, remembering. “I thought it would be over. That whatever sickness I had for you would fade once you weren’t under my roof. Under my hand. But it didn’t.”
I lean in closer. Her nose brushes mine, breath warm against my lips. I don’t kiss her yet. I want her to feel this.
“You investigated me,” I whisper, my tone turning sharp with something between admiration and amusement. “I knew it immediately. Dug into my name. Traced my blood. Looked for every bone in my closet. Like you couldn’t help yourself.”
Her jaw tenses again, like I caught her in the act yet again.
I smile, slow and vicious. “You couldn’t let me go, either.”
She swallows hard. My thumb moves from her cheek to her throat, settling just beneath her jaw.
“And I loved it,” I say, voice darker now. “I loved that you were intrigued. That you couldn’t stop poking at the edges of the monster who caged you. Like some part of you liked the way I burned . ”
Her eyes flicker with heat, and shame.
“You wanted to understand me,” I murmur. “But what you don’t realize is I understood you first. Every scream. Every silence. Every time you cried and then wiped your face like you didn’t want the tears to exist. I knew that rage. That ache.”
My hand slides up, fingers threading into her hair.
“I loved you then,” I say. “Not gently. Not sweetly. I loved you like a man starving. Like something feral. It was obsession long before it was affection. Before I ever knew what softness tasted like on your lips.”
She’s breathing faster now, chest rising against mine, eyes dark as pitch.
“I didn’t want to own you like a thing,” I hiss. “I wanted to unravel you. Bit by bit. Thought by thought. I wanted to know what it would take to make you say my name without hate in it.”
Her lips part. I grip her jaw tighter, not cruel, but firm. Controlling. Possessive.
“I dreamed of it,” I growl. “Of hearing you moan it. Cry it. Breathe it like it was the only word you remembered. I still do.”
A soft sound escapes her throat. She’s shaking, and not from cold.
“You think I’m dangerous?” I whisper against her lips. “You’re right. I am. But not to you. For you.”
She flushes, heat blooming across her cheeks, her neck, down to where my hand still grips her jaw. It paints her in something vulnerable and carnal all at once. Her breath stutters, lashes fluttering as her thighs shift slightly over mine.
I feel it.
The tension in her body. The ache she’s trying to swallow. The desire curling low and shameful beneath her skin. She hates herself for it, but not enough to stop.
I smile, slow and wicked.
“You like it,” I whisper. “Don’t you?”
Her lips part like she might deny it, but no sound comes out. Her silence is the truth.
“You like that I’m dangerous,” I say, dragging my thumb across the corner of her mouth. “That I could ruin you if I wanted to. That I have . ”
She trembles.
“And it turns you on.”
Her eyes widen, throat working around a choked breath, and I laugh; a low, hoarse sound from deep in my chest, rough with hunger and something cruelly intimate.
“God, you hate it,” I murmur, brushing my lips across hers without taking her fully. “You hate that your body lights up for the man who kept you in a cage. Who made you scream. Who made you fight.”
Her fingers tighten in my shirt, nails digging into my chest. A warning. A plea. She’s shaking with need and fury and that exquisite shame only we could make holy.
I grip her hip with my free hand, pulling her tighter against the ache in my lap. Her breath hitches, and I feel her fight herself.
“Say it,” I whisper. “Say it turns you on.”
“No—” she gasps, breathless, almost frantic.
But her body betrays her. It leans in. It grinds .
I growl, teeth grazing the shell of her ear. “Say it.”
She shudders, jaw clenched so tight I know she’s at war with herself.
“Fine,” I murmur darkly. “I’ll say it for you.”
I kiss her throat. Slowly. Possessively. My tongue traces the thrum of her pulse.
“You want me,” I whisper. “Because I’m dangerous. Because I could snap your spine and instead—I’m holding you like this. Because there’s something inside you just as fucked as what lives in me.”
She lets out a sound, half moan, half sob.
And I bite her neck.
Not to hurt.
To mark .
She gasps, hips rolling forward, chasing friction.
Her breath stutters. Her nails still grip my chest, trembling. Her lips are parted, glossy with the kiss she’s still too ashamed to beg for.
But she does it anyway.
“I—” Her voice is broken. Quiet. Her pride twisting against her ribs like barbed wire.
“Say it,” I murmur again, lips brushing hers. “Don’t make me take it from you.”
She closes her eyes, exhales hard, then looks up at me. Burning. Desperate. Real.
“It turns me on,” she breathes. “God—you turn me on.”
My chest tightens at the sound of her voice, the ache in it, the shame-licked hunger.
Her next words come out in a whisper so vulnerable it tastes like surrender.
“Touch me.”
I still.
Not from hesitation. From reverence.
She swallows hard, voice trembling as she repeats it.
“Please. Touch me.”
I groan, low and guttural, dragging my mouth to her neck again, biting down harder this time, just shy of a bruise.
“Fuck,” I rasp against her throat. “You don’t even know what you’re asking for.”
She whimpers. Writhes in my lap. Her fingers claw at the back of my neck, pulling me closer like she wants to be devoured.
And I can’t help the next words that come out, dark and twisted and absolutely true.
“I bet,” I whisper, “if I dragged you down into that cell right now... it would turn you on.”
She shudders violently in my arms.
“You’d hate every second of it. The fear. The chains. The lack of control . But your body?” I bite her ear gently. “Your body would fucking sing for it.”
A sound tears out of her throat, somewhere between a sob and a gasp.
And I keep going.
“Because it’s not about being hurt, solnyshko, ” I growl. “It’s about being helpless. It’s about trusting the monster and not knowing if he’ll give you pleasure or pain.”
Her nails sink into my shoulders, and I let her dig deep. I want the pain. I want the proof.
“And you trust me now,” I whisper. “Don’t you?”
She nods, frantic.
“Say it.”
“I trust you,” she breathes, voice breaking.
I grip her jaw again, tighter this time. A possessive, dominant hold that tells her exactly where she is, beneath me, inside my grasp, safe only because I say so.
And I rise, her in my arms, the blanket falling away, forgotten. My bruised body is equally forgotten.
The porch creaks beneath our weight, and the cold wind howls around us like it knows exactly what’s coming.
I carry her inside. Through the hall. Down the steps.
Straight to the cell.
But this time, the lock doesn’t matter.
This time, she’s walking into the dark with open eyes.
Because this time—it’s hers .
Because this time—so am I.