Chapter 24 #4
“Violet, that was important.” I kept my voice low, aware of the students around us pretending not to eavesdrop. “I was trying to see her face.” I knew then my mistake.
“Going to talk to that girl was important to you?” Her cheeks were flushed, bright spots of color high on her cheekbones. Her eyes flashed with temper.
Jealous. She was jealous, and it was simultaneously infuriating and adorable.
“I did not mean important in that way—”
“Then how did you mean it? What was that?” The line moved steadily until she stormed towards the front, our diagram clutched in her hand like she was envisioning choking me.
She slapped it on Professor Wright’s desk with more force than necessary, ignoring his cheerful, “Thank you, Miss Shaw!” and marched towards the exit.
I followed, catching up to her in the hallway outside the lecture hall.
“I can explain,” I started.
“Oh yeah?” She whirled on me, her bag swinging with the momentum. “Kind of like you can explain why you had a brand-new sex toy in your closet?”
I stopped in my tracks, genuinely confused by the conversational whiplash. “What?”
“The toy, Rowan.” Her voice pitched lower, conscious of students passing us in the corridor as we moved towards a secluded corner. “The purple one you so conveniently had available when I needed it. Care to explain that?”
This is what she is focused on?
“I do not understand what you are asking, Violet.”
She stepped closer, crowding into my space, her finger poking my chest with each word. “I don’t know what weird fantasies you had about picking up college students, but you never explained why you just happened to have an unopened toy ready to go.”
We were hate-whispering at this point, our bodies inches apart, her breath hot against my chest.
“That was two weeks ago. . .” I started, then reconsidered. “Never mind. Violet, do you really want to have this conversation right now? In the middle of a hallway?”
“Yes.” She crossed her arms, her jaw set in that stubborn line I’d come to recognize as immovable.
We were at the end of the corridor now, with enough space between us and other students that our lowered voices wouldn’t carry.
“For someone who is actually thirty-three years old,” I said, letting my voice drop to something dangerous, “you do realize that acting bratty in the middle of campus will not save your ass from a spanking when we get home?”
The threat did little to deter her. If anything, her eyes brightened with challenge.
“Says the guy refusing to answer my questions.”
Ha.
The truth was far more mundane and somehow more damning. I’d merely wanted to learn a suspension tie that incorporated toy placement, challenging myself to master the technical aspects. The toy had been a necessary component for practicing the tie’s mechanics on Marie Antoinette.
Now the image of Violet wrapped in my cerulean rope, unable to escape, helpless as she was brought to orgasm after orgasm, bloomed in the dark corners of my mind with vivid clarity.
“You think I am looking for potential partners when I am occupied watching a bratty princess every night?” I let skepticism color my voice.
“Your cock did not seem to mind this bratty princess when it came all over your pants for me.” She deadpanned, rising to the challenge without hesitation.
Fuck, I loved this about her.
The verbal dance between us filled a hollow space inside me I’d never noticed existed until she’d crashed into my life.
Her vicious words struck against my weathered defenses, my calculated responses catching her when she thought herself untouchable.
Each clash left me feeling raw, exposed in ways I hadn’t experienced since my rebirth.
When her hazel eyes narrowed, and her chin tilted upward in pure defiance, my chest seized with possessive hunger that bordered on feral.
“Fine.” I leaned down, bringing my mouth close to her ear. Near enough that my breath stirred the small hairs at her temple, close enough to smell her shampoo—floral and sweet. “I was working on suspension ties that require strategic toy placement for maximum effect. Happy now?”
She blinked up at me, her pupils dilating slightly. “You mean. . . with the rope?”
I nodded, letting my lips brush against the shell of her ear as I spoke.
“Yes, Violet. You wrap the toy in rope and tie it directly against your clit where you cannot dislodge it. Then you are suspended in the air, completely at its mercy. Unable to move, unable to escape. Orgasm after orgasm until you are left a filthy, desperate mess of need and pain.”
I pulled back just enough to watch her reaction. Her breathing had gone shallow, her lips parted, a flush spreading down her throat.
“I was planning to get a larger toy for the full tie, but I wanted to practice with a smaller one first on Marie.” I held her gaze.
She nodded wordlessly, her tongue darting out to wet her lips. “And the girl?” Her voice came out smaller now, uncertain. “The blonde?”
I sighed, weighing truth against necessity. “She looked like someone I knew. Or perhaps not. I am not certain.” Mixing truth with lies, the way I’d learned to survive in my previous life.
“Someone you liked?” The question carried hesitance, vulnerability she rarely showed.
Jealousy looked lovely on her—the way her shoulders tensed, the way her eyes searched my face for deception, the slight downturn of her mouth. I wanted to tease her more, to draw out this moment of her caring enough to be jealous. But something in her expression stopped me.
“Not liked romantically.” I kept my voice gentle, honest. “Just possibly important. But it does not matter now. She is gone, and I have no way to track her.” I stepped closer, eliminating the space between us. “Only you matter, Violet.”
Her eyes lit up despite her obvious attempt to suppress the reaction, a spark of pleasure she tried to hide behind a scowl. She muttered a small apology about being “hangry,” her stomach choosing that moment to growl audibly.
I admired her features in the hallway’s fluorescent lighting—the exhaustion pulling at her eyes, the determination in the set of her jaw, the way she held herself despite being tired enough that most people would have collapsed.
She is a goddamn beast.
A fierce, protective, and dangerously possessive urge coiled inside me like a snake preparing to strike. My hands itched to shield her from every threat, every hardship, every person who’d ever hurt her or might hurt her in the future.
Which meant I needed to hunt down that shifter.
The smell of blood on her meant a kill, and a kill on campus meant a possible connection to the unsolved murder.
But I doubted the shifter would hunt during daylight hours.
Predators like that preferred darkness, the cover of night when humans felt most vulnerable.
Let us wait. For now, I need to feed my volchok.
I wrapped my arm around her shoulders, feeling her lean into the contact despite her earlier prickliness. “Let us get you fed. And if you want. . .” I let the offer hang, watching her eyes flick up to mine with renewed interest. “I can show you that suspension tie I mentioned.”
Her breath caught, and I felt her body respond—a small shiver, her heartbeat kicking up, the faint scent of arousal beginning to bloom beneath her perfume. “Really?” She tried to sound casual and failed spectacularly.
“Really.” I steered us towards the exit, already planning the evening in my mind. “But first, food. Then Hyacinth. Then I will tie you up and make you scream my name until you forget every other word in your vocabulary.”
Her laugh rang out in the corridor, bright and genuine and absolutely perfect.
“Deal.”