Chapter 11 Raphael #2
“Partially. Put on your dress. Leave the undergarments.” I turned away from her. “Then follow me.”
I heard the rustle of fabric as she obeyed. Didn’t look. Didn’t trust myself to look at her body again without touching, and I wasn’t ready for that yet. Not until I’d found a way past her walls.
The library was at the end of the hallway, through a door I rarely opened. Floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, leather chairs by a cold fireplace, thousands of volumes I’d never read. Alice kept it dusted and maintained, though I never asked her to.
The piano sat in the corner by the tall windows. A Steinway grand, rosewood case, ivory keys. I’d bought it on impulse years ago, drawn to it for reasons I refused to examine. It had never been played. Not once.
But I remembered music. Somewhere deep in the fragments of memory I still carried from before, my mother had played. Chopin. Debussy. The sounds drifting through a different house, a different life, finding me wherever I hid.
I hadn’t heard those sounds in thirty years.
Lena stopped in the doorway behind me. I heard her breath catch.
“You play.” It wasn’t a question. I knew from the surveillance reports, the notes on her background, the details I’d collected and catalogued and memorized.
“Yes.” Her voice was different now. Softer. The defenses slipping. “How did you know?”
“Your mother was a concert pianist.” I moved to the window, keeping my back to her. Outside, the last light was fading from the sky. “Before she died. You would have learned from her.”
“I was four when she died.” Lena stepped into the room. I heard her footsteps approach the piano, soft on the old Persian carpet. “I barely remember her teaching me. Just her hands over mine. The way she smelled like gardenias. The sound of her voice counting time.”
Something clenched in my chest. I ignored it.
“But Maya, one of the long-term guests at the hotel, she helped me keep learning. She was an opera singer. She said my mother would have wanted me to play.”
Maya Pavlova. I knew the name from my surveillance. Another connection to Lena. Another pressure point I could exploit if I chose.
I didn’t turn around.
“Play something.”
Silence. Then the soft creak of the piano bench. The whisper of fabric as she sat. I imagined her there, dress fallen open, bare skin beneath, her fingers hovering over the keys.
A single note. Testing. The piano was in tune. Alice saw to that, though I’d never asked her to.
Then she began.
I recognized the piece immediately. Chopin. Ballade No. 1 in G minor. My mother’s favorite. She had played it almost every night in those final months, when the fighting with my father had grown worse and music was her only escape.
The first notes were tentative. Careful. Lena was warming up, testing her fingers on unfamiliar keys, learning the touch and weight of the instrument. But then her playing transformed. The music swelled. Her touch became more confident, more assured.
And the vault I’d built around my memories began to crack.
I remembered my mother at a different piano, in a different life.
The way her dark hair fell across her face when she played.
The way her fingers danced across the keys like living things, coaxing beauty from wood and wire.
The way she would look up and smile at me when she finished, reaching out her arms for me to climb into her lap.
The way the music had stopped forever on the night she died.
I gripped the windowsill until my knuckles went white. The wolf was silent inside me, suspended in an ache I couldn’t name. Not grief, exactly. I’d burned that out of myself years ago. This was older. Deeper. A wound I’d thought long scarred over, now bleeding fresh.
She reached the midpoint of the piece. The section where the tempo shifts, where the melody becomes more urgent, more passionate.
The part my mother used to play with her eyes closed, swaying slightly on the bench.
Lena’s playing changed with it. Became less technical and more raw.
She wasn’t just performing the notes anymore. She was living inside them.
I turned.
She was transformed. The cool composure had evaporated entirely. Her eyes were closed, her body swaying slightly with the rhythm. Her lips were parted, her breath coming quick and shallow. The dress had slipped off one shoulder, exposing the curve of her neck, the delicate line of her collarbone.
This was the real her. Unguarded. Not the frightened girl of the first night or the composed woman of tonight, but something else entirely. Someone who felt the music in her bones, who poured herself into the melody like water into a vessel until there was nothing left but sound.
The wolf stirred. Not with hunger this time. Something softer. Something that made my chest ache in unfamiliar ways.
She has my mother’s gift. The same soul. The same fire.
I didn’t want to hear that. Didn’t want to think about connections and meanings and the way her music had dragged my mother’s ghost out of the grave I’d buried her in.
The piece ended. The last notes faded into silence, lingering in the air like the memory of something beautiful. She sat motionless, hands resting on the keys, eyes still closed. I watched her come back to herself slowly. The slight flutter of her lashes. The small sigh that escaped her lips.
When she finally opened her eyes and looked at me, there were no defenses left. Just vulnerability. Just truth.
“Who taught you that piece?” My voice came out rougher than I intended.
“Maya.” She was still catching her breath. “She said it suited me. Something about longing and loss. About wanting something you can never have.”
Longing and loss. Yes. That was what Chopin had captured in those notes. What my mother had played, night after night, in that other life. What Lena played now without knowing the memories she was summoning.
“Your mother played too.” She was looking at me with those clear blue eyes. Seeing too much. “Didn’t she?”
I didn’t answer. Couldn’t. My throat had closed around the words. How did she know? What had she seen in my face while she played?
The wolf was silent inside me. Not howling, not demanding. Just watching. Waiting. As if he understood something I didn’t.
“Come.” I turned away from the piano. Away from the ghost of my mother and the girl who had somehow summoned her. “We’re not finished.”
I led her back to my quarters. My hands were shaking. I clasped them behind my back so she wouldn’t see.
The plan had been simple. Strip her. Touch her. Teach her body to respond to me. Stay cold, stay controlled, stay in command.
The piano had complicated things.
“On the bed.” My voice was steadier now. The predator reasserting itself, pushing down the rawness the music had exposed. “Face up.”
She climbed onto the mattress. Lay back against the dark silk pillows. Her dress had ridden up, exposing the length of her thighs. No undergarments beneath. Just bare skin and soft curves and that damnable scent filling the room, stronger now, layered with the unmistakable musk of arousal.
I shrugged off my jacket. Rolled up my sleeves. Watched her eyes track my movements with wary anticipation.
“Tonight I’m going to touch you.” I approached the bed. “Not between your legs. Not yet. But I’m going to learn what makes you respond. What makes you gasp. What makes you beg.”
Her breath quickened. The pulse in her throat fluttered.
“And you’re going to let me.” I sat on the edge of the bed. Reached out and traced the neckline of her dress. “Because that’s what you agreed to. That’s what you signed.”
She nodded. A tiny movement. Her defenses were entirely gone now, stripped away by the music and the intimacy of this strange evening. In its place was the same woman who’d played Chopin with her eyes closed, pouring her soul into the melody.
I wanted to devour her.
I undid the buttons of her dress slowly. One by one. Revealing her body inch by inch. Her collarbone, delicate as a bird’s wing. The swell of her breasts, rising and falling with each quickening breath. The soft skin of her stomach, trembling slightly under my gaze.
When the dress fell open, I pushed it aside and looked at her.
Perfection. Nipples already hard, tight little nubs that begged for my mouth.
Skin flushed with desire, painted in shades of rose and cream.
Breathing quick and shallow, her ribs visible with each inhale.
And that scent. That intoxicating, maddening scent that was stronger now than ever, wrapping around me like a physical caress.
I cupped her breast in my palm. She gasped. Her back arched slightly, pushing into my touch.
“Sensitive.” I squeezed gently, feeling the weight of her, the softness. “Good.”
My thumb found her nipple. Circled it. Pressed.
She made a sound. Something between a whimper and a moan. The noise went straight to my cock, which had been half-hard since she started playing and was now straining against my trousers.
The wolf purred. More. Give her more. Make her feel good. Show her what we can do.
I bent my head and took her nipple in my mouth.
Her reaction was immediate. A sharp cry. Her hands flying up to grip my shoulders, fingers digging into the fabric of my shirt. Her body writhing beneath me as I sucked, licked, teased.
I took my time. Learned the difference between a gentle lick that made her sigh and a firm suck that made her gasp. Between teeth grazing her sensitive skin and a sharp nip that made her cry out. She was responsive in ways I hadn’t anticipated. Every touch a revelation. Every sound she made a gift.
The taste of her skin was clean, slightly salty with the faint residue of sweat. The scent of her arousal was growing stronger, filling my nostrils, making the wolf howl with want.
I moved to her other breast. Gave it the same attention. Her fingers tangled in my hair now, pulling me closer. Her hips were moving, rocking against nothing, seeking friction she wouldn’t find.
“Please.” The word escaped her before she could stop it.
I lifted my head. Looked at her. Her face was flushed, her eyes glazed with desire, her lips swollen from biting them. Beautiful. Desperate. Mine.
“Please what?”
She shook her head. Didn’t answer. Her guard was down but the stubbornness remained. She wouldn’t beg. Not yet.
But she would. Eventually, she would.
My hand slid down her stomach. Stopped just above the curls between her thighs. Close. So close. I could feel the warmth emanating from her core. Could smell how wet she was for me.
“I could touch you here.” I let my fingers trace the crease where thigh met hip. “I could slide my fingers into your cunt and feel how wet you are for me. I could make you come so hard you’d forget your own name.”
Her breath caught. Her hips tilted toward my hand.
“But not tonight.”
I pulled my hand away. Sat back. Watched the frustration bloom across her face.
“Why?” The word came out strangled.
“Because I want you to remember this.” I stood.
Looked down at her sprawled on my bed, dress open, body flushed with unsatisfied need.
The image would stay with me for days. Weeks.
“Tomorrow night, you’ll think about this.
You’ll lie in your bed and remember the way my mouth felt on your breasts.
The way my hands felt on your skin. The way you wanted more and I didn’t give it to you. ”
She pushed herself up on her elbows. Her eyes were bright with anger now, cutting through the haze of desire.
“You’re a bastard.”
“Yes.” I smiled. “I am.”
I crossed to my closet and pulled out one of my robes. Charcoal silk, heavy and expensive. I tossed it onto the bed beside her.
“Put that on. I’ll have Alice escort you to your room.”
She stared at the robe, then at me. “I have a dress.”
“Your dress stays here.” I kept my voice flat. Final. “You’ll walk through my house in my clothes. Sleep in my clothes. Wake up smelling like me.”
Her jaw tightened, but she was smart enough to recognize a battle she couldn’t win.
She sat up fully, pulled the robe around her shoulders with shaking hands, and belted it tight.
When she looked at me, there was something new in her expression.
Not fear. Not composure. Something hotter. More dangerous.
“This isn’t going to work.” Her voice was quiet but steady. “Whatever game you’re playing. You can’t break me.”
“We’ll see.”
She left without another word. I heard her footsteps in the hallway, quick and angry. Then Alice’s murmured greeting. Then the sound of doors opening and closing as she was led to her quarters in the east wing.
I stood at the window. Watched my own reflection in the dark glass. My face was composed. Calm. The mask firmly in place.
Inside, the wolf was raging.
Why did you send her away? She was ours. She was ready. She wanted us.
She had wanted me. That was true. Her body had responded to my touch in ways that made my cock ache with need. I could have had her tonight. Could have spread her thighs and buried myself inside her and claimed what the contract entitled me to.
But something had stopped me. Something I didn’t want to examine too closely.
The piano. The way she’d played my mother’s favorite piece with her eyes closed and her soul wide open. The way she’d looked at me afterward with those knowing eyes and asked about my mother, as if she’d somehow seen straight through me.
You’re just lonely.
I pressed my palm against the cold glass. Let the chill seep into my skin, anchoring me in the present.
She was getting under my defenses. Finding cracks I hadn’t known existed. And the worst part, the part that made me want to howl with frustration, was that the wolf wasn’t fighting her anymore.
He wanted to let her in.
I turned away from the window. Poured myself a glass of whisky. Held it up to the light and watched the amber liquid catch the fire. Then I set it down without drinking.
I would be colder next time. Harder. I would take what I wanted without hesitation, without the confusing mess of emotions that had plagued me tonight. I would be the monster she expected.
But even as I made the promise, I knew it was a lie. Something had shifted between us. Something I couldn’t take back.
And despite everything, despite the revenge I’d planned and the distance I’d sworn to keep and the warnings the wolf had been screaming for days, I was looking forward to seeing her again.
The realization terrified me more than anything had in years.