Chapter 10 #2
I’m not sure how we’ve fallen back into this dynamic so quickly, but it’s what I need right now. So I text him back a simple yes, no frills or excuses.
My phone rings, and when I see his name, I freeze.
He’s never called me before. But if he’s going to tell me what to do, I’d rather it be like this.
“Hello?” I answer softly.
“Turn on your camera. I want to see you.”
That deep, demanding voice is rougher than I remember, but God help me, it sends a shiver right through me.
I grab the pillow beside me and reposition it so I can prop my phone up, angling it so it shows everything but my face. Then I turn on the camera.
A low, guttural sound of approval vibrates through the speaker, reigniting a long-repressed ache.
“There’s my little thief.”
“Little thief?”
“You took something from me. Now I want to punish you for it.”
Electricity sparks through my veins as his words trigger a flood of ideas.
In our past interactions, we never made it to the actual intercourse stage. But it didn’t stop me from imagining all the things I knew he’d do so well.
Bending me over, collaring my throat as he buries himself deep. Smacking my ass. Pulling my hair. Rough commands and whispered praise.
Biting. Kissing. Claiming.
Fucking me until he owns me.
I knew if I ever let him inside me, he would possess me. Right now, I’d lay myself bare at his feet if it meant I could have just one more night with him.
“Pull down the straps of your nightgown,” he rumbles. “Show me what I’ve been missing.”
I do as he instructs, slowly slipping each delicate piece of black silk off my shoulders until my breasts are bared.
Silence stretches as he takes me in from behind the privacy of his blacked-out screen. I don’t have to see him to feel his eyes on me. His attention is a physical caress, burning with an intensity that has always felt addictive.
There isn’t a detail that could escape him, and selfishly, I want him to remember everything.
I want to haunt his fantasies the way he’s haunted mine.
“Perditio mea.”
His gruffly spoken words are barely audible, but they feel like a confession.
My comprehension of Latin is limited to what I learned at Sanctum. I don’t know the meaning behind what he said, but I understand that there are some revelations better left secret and uncomplicated.
“Are you wet for me, little thief?” he murmurs.
“Yes.” I breathe.
“Show me.” His voice takes on a familiar edge.
My body responds to his quiet authority as if not a day has passed since I last saw him.
When he tells me what to do, it doesn’t just free me from the constant war inside my head.
It permits me to be vulnerable without overthinking it.
It’s the only time I can allow myself to let go of control and trust that I’m safe.
I follow his command, hitching up my nightgown so he can watch as I slide my fingers inside me and pull them back out. There isn’t an ounce of modesty left in me when I show him the evidence of what he does to me, and I don’t care.
“Look how bad you’re aching for it,” he rasps. “I never got to wreck that pussy. Now I’m not sure you deserve to come.”
A soft protest escapes me as my fingers move of their own accord, sliding back inside me without his approval. The dark sound of amusement that pulls from his chest ripples through me, both a threat and a reward.
“I’d beat your ass red for that if I were there right now,” he admonishes. “But you’d like that too.”
A quiet acknowledgment hums in my throat, and when I close my eyes, the image burns itself into my brain.
“Have you been thinking about what my cock would feel like inside you?”
“Yes.” I groan.
“Is that how you got yourself off when he fucked you?”
My fingers stall as I register the question—and the bite in his words. Bran has always been controlled to a fault, whereas I felt like I was flying too close to the sun whenever I was near him. But now I know he wasn’t as unaffected as I’d tried to convince myself.
“Did he make you come like I did?” he asks.
“No,” I confess on an unsteady exhalation. “Nobody has ever made me come like you do.”
“That’s because your pussy is mine.”
His possession consumes me, feeding the flames of my desire as my fingers start to move again. A sense of urgency overtakes me, and I chase that high with a desperation that leaves me dizzy and frantic.
“Say it,” he demands.
In the moment, I convince myself it’s a game. But when the words slip free, and I tell him that my body is his, nothing has ever felt so real.
He lets out a shuddering breath, and I realize that he must be stroking himself too.
“I want to see you,” I beg.
“Only good girls get to watch me come.”
White-hot jealousy surges through me, and I know it’s irrational, but it doesn’t make it sting any less.
Of course he’s been with other women. I walked away, and he has every right to do what he wants.
But the idea that he could have that dynamic with someone else fractures something inside me, dislodging emotions I don’t want to acknowledge.
I swallow hard, choking down whatever awful feeling this is as the momentum of my orgasm dies a swift death.
“You don’t like that very much, do you?” he concludes.
“No.” My throat tightens. “I don’t.”
“You gave it up,” he reminds me.
That observation blisters under my skin, resurfacing the memory of our last night together.
He was the first person I truly felt like I could trust after what happened.
Losing that connection carved out a hollow in my chest that time and distance have never repaired. But I know I only have myself to blame.
I did give this up, and regardless of the reasons, he doesn’t owe me anything.
“This was a mistake.” I reach for the phone with the intention of ending this conversation.
“Don’t run away, Chantel.”
I freeze for a breath.
“How do you know that name?”
His hesitation to respond makes me think that slip wasn’t intentional, which leaves me to wonder exactly how long he’s known.
“How do you know who I am?” I force out. “Have you seen me in public?”
“Yes,” he answers with a sigh.
I recall the photo he sent me the other day, and though it seems improbable he’d recognize me at the club, I ask anyway.
“Was it at Black Velvet?”
“Not initially, no.”
“But you’ve seen me there?”
“Yes.”
I think that over for a moment, and given what’s been happening with the notes at the club, I have to consider it.
“Are you stalking me?”
“You ended our arrangement,” he answers. “I gave you the space you asked for, even when it tested the limits of my restraint.”
I sit with that for a minute before I respond.
“But you came to Black Velvet?”
“Once.”
“To watch me…or the show in general?”
“You.”
That admission feels significant, but I’m not sure what to do with it.
Realistically, if he came to the club, he could be anyone from The Society. The fact that he mentioned testing his restraint makes me think he’s someone I’ve been around more than once.