CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
TESSA
In a flash that only consists of a feather boa and the mirrored exit, Maddox rushes me to the tunnel, drops me to my feet, laces his fingers with mine, and guides me in the direction of the penthouse while he calls Jax and tells him to clear the laundry-room entrance.
I’m immediately in my head, wondering if this will morph the predicament of my lifetime employment into an awkward power dynamic I can’t escape.
But it feels like someone ripped my heart out, and all I want is to annihilate the ache with another orgasm bestowed by the six-five Noire, with his cock instead of his Karambit knife. Although that was phenomenal.
He makes me feel alive like no one has in … maybe ever.
He ends his call and decides to lug me around like a rag doll. In a suave swing-dancing move, one arm grips my shoulders while the other glides down behind my knees, scooping me into a bridal carry.
His teeth graze my lower lip before nipping hard enough to sting, his tongue peeking out to soothe it. I really love that he bites. He’s not taken aback by a little aggression. He leans into it. With me.
Dammit. My head—or my heart—is getting entangled here. If I’m not careful, this day will go from disastrous to cataclysmic.
Our mouths collide in another torturous tethering, and he cradles my head as his commanding tongue dominates stroke after stroke. It’s a dance that ripples through me, sparking an inferno in my veins and bones, nipples and core. Curling my toes and beckoning me to match his every move.
So, I do. Threading my fingers into his hair, I wrench his neck to the angle that suits me, and he growls his approval into my mouth. Giving me more. Of him. Of things I shouldn’t want, but can’t get enough of.
Every step of the forbidden path to his residence fades into us.
He tastes like the Twelve Mile Limit—grenadine and top-shelf whiskey. Cherry and cognac and a tart lemon twist. A line that should never be crossed and a wall I yearn to catapult over.
How does he kiss like this, like he’s branding my soul with music? The burn and the balm of a victory ballad.
It’s exhilarating, but it hurts because …
He breaks our fusion to scan his iris before what I’m assuming is a door hidden within the wall. “Where’d you go?”
That’s so unsettling—the way he already knows me so well, accurately reading the smallest signals from me.
“I was thinking about things that make me angry,” I lie, though it is what I should focus on if I have any chance at staying grounded.
He chuckles and pecks my nose. “Hold that thought for me then.”
Once he pushes open a false front to a stacked washer and dryer, his strides are so brisk that I can barely absorb the penthouse. I’ve been here before though. High ceilings. Art Deco charm. Grandeur and sentimentality. Snapshots of a family that shouldn’t work, but clearly does.
A cozy castle.
He sprints up the staircase, enters his room, shuts us inside, and drops me on the king-size bed, immediately crawling over me.
God, he’s all-consuming. Even with him fully clothed, I know what lies in store. Long, tatted limbs. Rigid, chiseled chest and torso. Wintry eyes that see more than I want them to.
He lifts my legs one at a time, shucking my boots and socks with a tender peck on each of my ankles before hovering above me and ripping off my wig and mask. “There she is. What makes you angry, Tess?”
He ogles me with so much adoration that it burrows into my depths, coaxing me to let him soothe the jagged edges of loneliness I try so hard to ignore.
“Fake pockets, having so many damn passwords, filling out endless medical forms that doctors don’t even read, Uber drivers who sing, and driving behind busses.” My voice wanes in strength on the last one because I fear he spots my fragility, so I tack on, “To name a few.”
A smile blasts across his tragically gorgeous face as he slants his head, studying me in the apricot glow of the late afternoon sunlight.
“That’s what you were thinking about when I was kissing you?
” He meets that challenge by sailing his mouth up the column of my throat to my jaw and that sensitive spot behind my ear. “How fake pockets piss you off?”
Honestly, they should be labeled as a crime. It’s a subtle slight from the patriarchy. Half of what they claim they’re granting women is a goddamn illusion. Those sewn flaps are a sadistic form of heckling.
I’m not sure we should deep-dive into that right now though, so I settle on, “Yeah,” bobbing my head emphatically to sell it before I graduate to something that really will piss me off. I need the fury fueling me. “And you. Give me the name of the guy I …”
“Okay.” His face sobers with a sigh. “Niko Makarov.”
My stomach churns. Why did I ask? I had a hunch that might be the case. I’d put the pieces together after that fucked-up blow-job call, but hearing it confirmed is sickening. The Makarovs will kill me and my whole family. Slowly.
How the hell is this my life? I’m not only a murderer; I unwittingly elevated myself to being public enemy number one for one of the most ruthless Mafias in the world. I’m going to vomit.
My eyes close on a craggy breath, one that nearly emits a whimper.
Maddox skims his knuckles down my cheek, so tender that goose bumps sprout all the way down to my toes. “Don’t do that. I told you I was taking care of it.”
When my eyelids pop open, I’ve harnessed the ire required to survive this—the knowledge of who I crossed and the man who is sending me signals that turn everything upside down. “When did you find out it was him?”
“I knew that night.” He states it so plainly, which makes sense.
He already admitted to hiding it because he didn’t want me to be scared. And I would’ve been terrified. He gifted me more than two years of semi-peaceful ignorance and worked behind the scenes to keep me safe, all while I hated him.
But if I grab ahold of that altruistic gesture, I’ll crumble. I can’t bear for him to see me break.
“You knew, and you hid it.” There’s not nearly as much bite to that as I’d like because a part of me is desperate to curl into him.
My head is so messed up.
“Hit me,” he demands with a demented grin.
“What?”
“Fucking hit me.” He lifts his palm in demonstration. “Open hand. No fist. I have a pretty face. But you need to unload. You’ll feel better if you rage, and I fucked up a lot today.”
How does he understand me so well? That in itself is irksome. All day, he’s been turning this into something it can’t be.
“Remember when I was half naked in your parents’ backyard today, tossing water bal—”
Crack.
My flat palm smacks into his scruffy cheek without my mind’s full consent, though I’m not mad about it. His head sways from the force, the thwack resonates throughout his room, and a comforting burn eats into my hand. That small slice of power shoots through me.
I’m sick.
“That’s my sexy Nightmare,” he pants as he rubs the spot, lust pouring off him with the accolade.
We stay suspended here—him massaging his face, me studying the depths of those mysterious gray pools. Our hushed breaths pant in unison. Whispers of the volcanic energy zipping between us.
“You’re turned on,” I accuse, “by me hitting you.”
“Yeah.” His voice is satin and sandpaper, and he presses the softest of kisses to my nose. “I am. And so are you, baby girl.”
He’s right. I am.
But then in a move I never see coming, he flips me over so I land on my stomach, rucks up my dress, and swiftly spanks my bare ass.
The clap of skin-to-skin ricochets off the floor-to-ceiling glass windows.
The tingling slap sears into my flesh with a hint of always-denied cravings raring to be unleashed.
I hiss in surprise, heat swarming me, thighs instantly sticky, fight coursing through my bloodstream.
He gathers my wrists, secures them with one of his large hands at my lower back, and hovers above me while thrusting two fingers inside me.
His lips tickle my earlobe, his words cascading over my molten skin.
“Your strength captivates me, but I told you last week that I wanted to break you, and I plan to do just that. Do I need to cuff you, or are you going to keep your luscious ass in the air like a good girl while I devour your sweet pussy?”
Every cell of my being is shouting, All the above, but the prospect of his mouth on me feels too intimate.
Instead of a verbal answer, I drive my hips backward, taking his fingers deeper while also severing the hold he has on my wrists.
He raises himself off me and rains a spank down on the opposite cheek. A noise between a gasp and a purr flees from me, harmonizing with the slap, as my inner walls clench around his fingers.
And I am undone. Shaking with a desperation I’ve never experienced.
“Fuck, baby.” The sonorous bass of that exasperation reveals how undone he is too. “There has never been a more enticing vision. I want my handprints branded on your fine ass for all time.”
Yeah, okay. Mark me. Everywhere. What is he doing to me?
Those long limbs of his snap into action.
He straightens and hauls me upright so we’re both still on our knees, my back flush with his chest. The loss of him extricating his fingers from inside me is nothing short of devastating, but there’s no time to process it.
He whips my dress over my head, my arms instinctively cooperating.
My bra goes next—so hastily that, for all I know, he cut it off, like my panties.
“Christ, you’re a goddamn masterpiece,” he breathes.
Then his hands and lips and teeth and tongue are everywhere. Roving, pinching, kneading, nipping. Exploring me in ways that are the divine balance of obscene and intuitive.
It’s a transient spell of reverence, preceding another addictive dose of his unhinged dominance. Even the scene he’s setting suggests his upper hand. I’m stripped of my clothes and my defenses while he remains in his dress pants and button-up, wielding all the power.
I should hate it, but it’s so damn hot.