Chapter 13
YELENA
My first instinct is to run.
To put as much distance between us as possible.
The immediate response to that, of course, is how could I get away right now? He’s got me caged and pinned halfway up a ladder in a sub-basement with no one else remotely within earshot to come help me.
But it’s the next thought that bleeds through my psyche that scares me more.
I don’t know if I want anyone to come help me.
I also don’t know if I'd run from him, even if I could.
I stand there four rungs up the ladder, my back still turned to him, my head turned over my shoulder, my body frozen, my wide eyes captivated by his.
I’m not frozen with fear. This isn’t terror.
It’s darker.
It's need.
I’m not running, or even thinking about running, because I don’t want to.
It’s not just that Achilles makes me feel like I’m standing on the edge of a cliff feeling the wind whip across my face as I teeter on the very edge.
He also makes me want to look over that edge and see how far down it goes.
Morbid fascination.
Toxic curiosity.
Self-destructive intrigue.
He’s not just the inexorable pull of gravity beyond the edge of the cliff.
He’s the black, intrusive thought that makes me take that last step.
I want to label him the villain for that, but only because I’m not sure I’m capable of looking in the mirror long enough to ask what all that makes me.
Because I’m the one still standing here.
Looking over the edge.
Letting those intrusive thoughts in.
“And again, little prey…” he murmurs darkly behind me.
His teasing breath traces sensually over the backs of my bare knees, making my thighs tighten as a shiver chases up my spine.
“I have to wonder if you’re down here in the shadows all alone because you hoped that I’d find you here.”
“H-how…” I swallow, my breath heavy in my throat. “How did you know I—”
“You don’t honestly think there’s anywhere you could go that I wouldn’t find you, do you?”
My breath drags in and out of my lungs, rattling over my slightly parted lips.
“Why?” I whisper.
“I’ve already told you.”
I flinch but remain silent and still when his hands move from the handrails of the ladder to the sides of my calves. Heat blooms under the cotton of my knee socks as his strong fingers splay over my leg.
“You caught my attention, little prey.”
His hands begin to slide up the sides of my legs. Every instinct I have screams to run, or tell him NO, or kick him, or do anything I can to stop him.
But there’s a darker, more insidious instinct buried deep inside me, and that’s what takes over when the rest of me freezes, caught between fight or flight.
That’s what has me closing my eyes as I turn my head forward, my breath ghosting over my lips and my hands tightly gripping the handrails as Achilles’ fingers slowly trace up my calves. Then my knees.
Then under the hem of my skirt.
My eyes squeeze tight as the world around me grows warmer and darker. He doesn’t lift my skirt, but my entire focus is on the hot, deliberate slide of his strong fingertips up the outsides of my thighs.
I wait for the acidic flashback to this summer, to hands pushing where they didn’t belong, without permission. For the claw of fingernails against my skin.
Taking.
Breaking.
Hurting.
And yet, none of the terror or nausea I’d imagined I’d feel in a situation like this materializes. All I feel is a heated, tingling sensation deep in my core.
Slithering.
Coiling.
Tightening, until my insides liquify and my breath catches with a quiet rasp in the back of my throat.
Achilles’ steady, strong fingers curl into the waist of my panties. Slowly, he starts to peel them down my hips.
My face flames with heat, my brow furrowing and my core clenching. Shame floods my system as I feel him pull my panties down my thighs to my knees.
But underneath the shame, it feels like letting go. Exhaling a held breath.
Dropping the poised, controlled, perfect image of who I am to the world.
The white lace slides down my calves, and I raise one foot and then the other, eyes still squeezed shut as I let him—let him—take my panties all the way off.
“Turn around.”
My pulse skips. My throat bobs. And slowly, very slowly, my feet turn me around until it’s my heels, not my toes, that are perched on the ladder.
Until I’m facing him looking down into his piercing dark gaze, his gorgeous jaw tight, that dark lock of hair across his forehead. A throb of heat zips through me as I watch him calmly tuck my panties into his jacket pocket.
“Sit.”
The single word drops quietly but commandingly from his perfect lips. I swallow, my lower lip catching in my teeth as I smooth the sides of my skirt and slowly lower my butt to the ladder step.
Achilles is eye level with my knees as I press them together. My hands drop to my thighs, my fingers splaying across the blue and gray plaid of my skirt and then nervously tightening on the fabric as I force myself to look him in the eye.
“Now,” he murmurs, his dark eyes glinting. “Spread your legs, baby.”
The rippling sensation that coils through my body isn’t fear, nor the sensation of being forced, or pushed, or cornered, even though I am.
It’s a ripple of desire, tangled up with an utter inability to move right now.
Achilles’ lips curl dangerously. My breath teases over my lips again as he sets his big hands on my exposed knees, gripping them just hard enough to send a tingle of electricity zipping over my skin.
“Shall I show you how?” he growls with a hint of dark amusement.
I can’t speak. Can’t move. Can’t look away.
All I can do is slowly, silently…
…Nod.
Achilles slowly pries my knees apart, opening my legs to his gaze. But his eyes stay completely locked on mine, like he’s gauging my reaction.
Looking not just at me, but into me.
Into my soul.
Effortlessly stepping over my walls. Breaking the chains I keep around that secret place inside me and yanking it right open.
I tremble when I feel warm air tease up my bare thighs and over my naked pussy. Time seems to stop, the whole world going still except for the needy throb between my thighs and the twisted, aching desire coiling in my core.
I wait for his gaze to drop and capture the prize he’s just unlocked.
But he keeps looking right at me as his thumbs lazily trace slow circles over my knees.
“Now, doesn’t that feel better?” he murmurs.
My face is so hot that it’s stinging my eyes as I finally manage to create words.
“W-what?” I blurt in a shaky, croaked whisper.
“Dropping the fucking mask,” Achilles growls, still looking straight at me. “Not having to pretend anymore.”
My gaze drops to his hands on my knees, my skirt barely covering my pussy.
“W-why are you doing this?” I choke in a raspy tone.
Achilles smiles darkly, his eyes cutting into mine. “That’s simple, little prey.” His tongue drags slowly and sensually over his bottom lip. He dips his head down, finally pulling his gaze from my wide eyes and letting it stab between my lewdly spread thighs. “So I can devour your pretty pussy.”
He swiftly pushes up my skirt, lowers his head between my thighs, and drags his tongue through my lips.
Oh my fucking God…
It feels like plunging headfirst into liquid fire. My jaw drops open, my eyes rolling back and an achy, needy, desperate sound rattling from my chest as pure pleasure melts through my core.
Oh shit…
I may be a virgin, but it’s not my first time doing this. That said, it might as well be. Because whatever this slow, sensual, consuming sensation is from his tongue playing over my pussy, it is like nothing I’ve ever felt before.
Like nothing I knew I could feel.
A low growl rumbles from his throat, and I whimper as his big hands grip my thighs, shoving them wider apart.
His wet tongue snakes up and down my lips, making me shudder before he curls it around my throbbing clit.
The tip of his tongue bats across the sensitive nub before he wraps his lips around it and sucks.
Sweet fucking GOD…
It’s beyond “good”. Beyond "amazing". The feel of his tongue swirling over my clit as he sucks it between his lips, his growls vibrating through my core and his big hands firmly on my trembling thighs, is like pure pleasure being injected into my veins.
I realize I don’t care that I wore basic panties and not sexy lingerie today. Don’t care that I haven’t shaved recently. Don’t care that he followed me here, don’t even care that I'm so nakedly exposed to a man when I’m still not sure if I’m scared of him or not.
His tongue plunges into me and I cry out, gasping as my back arches and my ass jolts off the step. Achilles growls into my pussy, tonguing me harder and deeper. His big hands grip my upper thighs and hips, pinning me to his mouth as he sucks on my clit.
My entire body begins to tremble. My brow caves, and my mouth falls open as my hands keep a white-knuckle grip on the brass handrails of the ladder. I stare at him between my legs, devouring me, and my toes curl as the dark, needy thing inside me slithers and coils and squeezes.
Drop the fucking mask. Pretend for one second that you don’t have to pretend anymore.
That’s exactly what I’m doing. That’s the sensation that builds in my core, sparking and igniting, letting the swirling fire engulf me.
I’m not pretending anymore. I’m not keeping a careful mask in place.
Right now, I’m not “a De Luca”. I’m not keeping it together, telling everyone and myself that it’s all fine. That I’m fine.
I'm letting go, taking that last step over the edge without fear or shame.
I'm being set free.
Achilles’ tongue drags through my lips as his fingers dig into my skin, marking me. His low, hungry groans vibrate through my clenching, coiling core.
His dark eyes lift, locking with mine as something shifts inside me.
Breaks.
Gives way.
Oh my fucking God…
For the first time in my life, someone other than me is making me come.
And it’s the biggest, wildest, most explosive sensation I’ve ever felt.