10. Chapter 10
Rylen
I'm not supposed to be here, I'm supposed to be on a date. So naturally, the second Maddox called I turned right around and came running straight to him like a well trained pup.
I enter Maddox’s office and immediately have the aching dread of walking into an intervention. Maddox and Felicia are standing together by his desk, both of them fixed on me with the kind of knowing looks that say they’re in on something I’m not. It makes my jaw tense.
“What’s going on?” My hardened gaze flicks back and forth between them.
Felicia grins, cautiously approaching me to trail a hand along the back of my shoulders.
“You've been such a good boy tonight. What if I said, as thank you for your bravery, that I wanted to get railed by both of you? At once.” Her voice is buttery smooth, the kind of charm that rivals even Maddox’s.
I blink, scoffing in disbelief. “You’re joking, right?” I ask, and yet, her expression is unwavering."Nah. Surely fucking not... This is some kind of sick joke."
Maddox doesn’t even try to hide the smugness as he leans back in his chair, looking real fucking pleased with himself.
“Told her you’d chicken out. Towel boys are one thing, but you Lecia?
Rylen wouldn’t survive five minutes with a blood domme.
Doesn’t have the stamina, or the stomach,” he laughs, as his eyes trail up and down my body, bottom lip caught between his teeth like a challenge.
I breathe out a humourless laugh. “I just prefer my dick attached, thanks. Pretty sure your pussy has teeth.” I shoot a wink at Felicia.
She laughs, low and wicked, like I’ve just handed her a loaded weapon, then steps in close enough that her breath hits my ear.
The feeling is so clammy and uninvited that it has me trying not to wince.
I don’t want her in my proximity. Why can’t she crawl back into the depths of hell and out of my life?
“Oh, come on, Ry. You really expect me to believe the idea of bleeding for me doesn’t have your balls in a chokehold?
” Her lips graze my jaw and her fingers drag slowly over the line of my zipper, where I’m starting to grow hard under Maddox’s stare.
Almost losing control. He’s been looking at me this way a lot tonight.
I don’t know what to make of it, or the way it makes my skin pebble.
“Think a lot about my balls, do you Flea?” I quip, not even looking at her. My breathing hitches uncomfortably when she palms my cock through my jeans and purrs against my skin, her mouth set into a lopsided grin.
“Mmm. That’s what I thought,”she purrs.
I recoil from her touch. "That's not your doing, ice queen," I scoff. Behind her, Maddox laughs again, and there’s more teeth in it this time. “Fuck, I should’ve brought popcorn. Look at him, about to bust just from a little blood talk. You gonna blush next, Ry? Or beg? ”
My brows knit together in a scowl. "Get so far fucked and then fuck off some more," I snark.
“Oh?” He laughs at my reaction, teeth gleaming in that carefree way of his. “Prove me wrong then, big boy.”
"Fine." The prick wants a show, I’ll give him one. I hold his gaze while my hand tangles in Felicia’s hair, yanking her into a kiss that’s burning with heat and defiance. Her moan punches straight into my chest and I have to fight my internal war at kissing someone I hate.
She melts against me, fingers clutching my shirt like she’s scared I’ll stop. But I don’t stop. And I don’t take my eyes off him, either. Maddox isn’t laughing anymore, and that shouldn’t make me feel as giddy as it does.
He straightens from his chair and rounds it to sit on the edge of his desk, jaw tight as he drags a hand back through his hair. The smirk’s still there, but it’s hollow now. “Okay,” he grits out through clenched teeth, voice low and icy. “Fine. Point made, Ry.”
I hold my ground, slowly breaking away from Felicia’s lips.
Fuck I love getting a rise out of him like this.
Heat builds low in my stomach, and my dick gives an involuntary pulse under his seering stare.
My breath is steady, mouth still parted from the kiss.
And even though I want to, I don’t pull away when she grinds her body against mine and nips at my throat.
“Just doing what my boss asked, Mads,” I counter. He lets out a short, dry laugh. There’s no humor in it anymore. Maddox hates when he’s not winning the game he started. It’s so easy to rile him up and so fun for me when I get to.
His gaze cuts to Felicia, then back to me seemingly re-weighing the shift between us. “Is that so?” he hums, his head tilts to the side as he absentmindedly drags a thumb across his bottom lip. My eyes zero in on the movement and I have to remember how to breathe.
Felicia doesn’t say a word. She’s still clutching the front of my shirt like she’s forgotten how to let go—knuckles tight in the fabric, breath coming slow and shallow.
Her pupils are blown wide, not just with lust or victory, but with something else.
.. Something closer to confusion; like maybe she didn’t expect that kiss to feel the way it did.
Or maybe she felt the shift too. That the heat in the room isn’t about her anymore—it’s between me and Maddox, laced through the silence, coiled tight in the stare he doesn’t drop and I refuse to blink away from.
We’re both stupidly stubborn when it comes to a challenge, something that seems to be amplified between us more than with anyone else. I suppose that’s what happens when you build your entire life around the only person in the world you can trust.
Maddox tilts his head slightly, voice smooth but edged. “Careful, Ry. Keep looking at me like that, I’ll start thinking you want to fuck me.”
I roll my eyes, such a fucking twat. But the heat begins to spread throughout my body at his words.
“Not even on your birthday,” I rasp, but it’s weaker than I want it to be.
He grins, though it doesn’t quite land. This isn’t our usual banter anymore.
And for the first time since meeting Maddox, I realize what it feels like to be in his sights without the protection of humor, or the buffer of rank or roles.
Just two men, standing eye to eye, watching for the first flinch.
Then he taps the desk, just once. A clean, sharp thud of his index finger. Before my brows even have time to pinch together in confusion, Felicia has released my shirt and is crouching on her knees, head lowered, at Maddox’s feet. Like the floor was where she belonged all along.
What the actual fuck is going on?
There’s a glint in his eye as he sneers at me, showing me that I don’t actually know what goes on behind these doors. The smug fucker doesn’t rush as he loops a collar around her neck like he’s done it a hundred times; like it was waiting for her, and she was made to wear it.
His thumb grazes her cheek, and it isn’t cruel, it’s intimate and possessive.
It twists something inside my gut to see them this way.
I feel like I’m intruding on a private moment between lovers.
It pisses me the fuck off. My jaw ticks and the muscles in my neck threaten to cramp from how tightly wound they are.
He’s giving her the kind of touch that says mine louder than words ever could. So of course the prick says it anyway, to really drive things home. “That’s my pretty Lecia,” he coos as her head rests against his palm.
I don’t move. I can’t. She’s kneeling for him.
.. The Blood Woman . The one every man in this goddamn building fears and fantasizes about.
And not only does he have Flea on her knees, but she’s…
soft. For the first time since she walked through Velvet’s doors, there’s no trace of the smart ass, headstrong hellion that is Felicia Evans.
My chest tightens, my lungs struggling to suck in air properly.
What I'm feeling isn’t jealousy, not exactly.
It’s more like disorientation—like watching a predator lie down at someone’s feet and realizing you never knew what kind of animal you were dealing with.
Besides, why would I be jealous? I’m not into Felicia.
I’ll never understand the obsession everyone has with her.
Maddox looks back at me, his features twisted into something I don’t recognise. “You still think you have what it takes to satisfy a blood domme?”
I don’t even like Felicia, let alone want to stick my dick anywhere near her.
So why am I still here entertaining this?
My throat is dry but I force it to swallow anyway.
I’m not sure who the fuck I’m fighting anymore.
I’m even more confused what kind of game Felicia was playing with me.
Because if this is who she kneels for… If this is the man she gives her submission to, then I’m not sure whether she ever meant for me to win.
I think I was just bait to sharpen his teeth with.
Maddox keeps his hand on her face like he owns it, holding her there like a painter stepping back from his finest piece, admiring every stroke that led to this moment. Then his thumb drags slowly across her bottom lip.
“Open," he commands in a tone that has my heart hammering. She obeys instantly. “Good girl,” he breathes, and then without taking his eyes off me he adds, “Now show Ry what that pretty mouth can do.”
His belt comes loose with a whisper of leather and the clang of metal, his zipper rasping down like it’s been waiting all damn night to be heard. Her hands brace against his thighs, and then she’s on him, mouth open wide, throat already taking him in like she’s starving for it.