Chapter 8 Lilian
LILIAN
PLAYLIST: WICKED GAME – CORVYX
I've never broken any of my rules regarding women before. Now, the woman looking challengingly at me has already made me violate three of my rules, and I can't do anything about it. Perhaps I wouldn't have broken them if I didn't know Mae had moved on, or so I tell myself.
I ought to be attending to everything else—handling the company's situation, discovering who was after Jared and, by extension, me. Instead, I find myself here, drawn to her as if steered by an external force. My core burns me down as I let my lips wander over her sweetly scented skin.
I can’t wait to see her kneel for me. I have never been one for back-and-forth or long dates; I don’t have time for banalities like that, and I have expected her to request to do so.
Now, I know there is a lot more to her, and I’ll find out whatever it is she is hiding from.
My guess is her dark desires. She seems so innocent, and those who give that impression are usually the ones who deny themselves authenticity by not allowing their dirty desires to be.
I find joy in pushing women beyond what they dare to be.
It has been the same with Mae. She has been this wallflower, quiet, always perfect, shy. One year later, she was everything but. She has become confident and daring, even bratty.
It will be the very same with Ella. I am going to strip her bare until I can see her soul, and she fully submits to me—not because I make her, but because she wants to.
I kiss my way from her collarbone all the way up to her ear.
Her skin tastes so real, not diluted by perfume, simply her—and her lust. She bends back into the wall from the sensation, and I grasp her waist to pull her with me to the car.
I can feel Doug hovering behind me with the tension he's been under lately.
“Get in,” I tell Ella and almost push her in. She does as told, and a rare smile appears on my face as triumph washes through me. It was what I wanted since the day she saved my life, and now I have her.
I get in after her, and Doug closes the door. Her body language tells me she is insecure as she settles into the seat.
“They’re paid for their silence,” I tell Ella as her eyes check out the two bodyguards in the front.
“Just because they don’t say something, doesn’t mean they don’t have opinions,” says Ella, and a chuckle slips me.
“You really like to keep a certain image to the outside world, don’t you?” I ask her.
“I do.” Her eyes flash so beautifully at me.
“And being with me does what to your perfect image?” I ask because I want to know everything there is to know about her.
“You are cold, calculating, and exploitative,” she says. “I am warm, kind, and generous. It’s like I am fraternizing with the enemy.”
“Yet, you are here,” I say. I don’t care if anyone calls me cold or calculating. I actually enjoy it; it makes people worst-case respect me and best-case fear me.
“Yet, I am,” she says, and her eyes pierce me. I feel a flutter rushing through my chest. Rationally, I know it’s desire. Emotionally, I cannot grasp it. Cannot, or rather: want not.
“Tell me why,” I say, trying to push her. I want the real reason.
She tilts her head slightly, one corner of her mouth tugs up as her eyes flicker.
My heart beats faster. I know something is coming; I can feel it, and it rips the control from me.
She takes her time answering, and I know she is challenging me, testing the grounds—so much about her innocence.
It costs me all my willpower to keep the gaze. And then, she leans forward, slides towards me, and grasps my face.
My heart stumbles.
Her lips almost touch mine.
Her warm breath caresses my skin.
“Because I want to do this,” she says silently, before her soft lips meet mine in an embrace I haven’t experienced before.
I feel the need to push her away, while I hope it will never stop.
My chest heaves up and down as her tongue enters my mouth, and the kiss transforms into something feral. Longing. Consuming.
I cannot get lost in her like that.
I grab her by the throat, push her back in her seat and roll my back my shoulders.
She does not look at me but out the window, fighting a grin. She knows exactly what she did. I can only stare at her.
“So, where are we heading?” she asks after a moment, casually as if nothing had happened.
“A hotel,” I say.
“A hotel,” she repeats in a tone that calls for caution. “How…efficient.”
I smirk as I answer. “It’s neutral ground. In case it isn’t what we expect.”
She eyes me, and I know I impressed her. She didn’t expect me to be considerate, and I am not. But I prefer not to have anyone in my house whom I don’t know well—something she doesn’t need to be aware of. Until we establish all the other rules, it’ll be a hotel.
“I hope it’s not the Ritz,” she says, and I laugh.
“Wouldn’t that be amusing?” I ask sardonically.
“It would also violate several clauses of the contract,” she says dryly, calling me out on my own cheek.
Somehow, it feels so lightweight with her, and I find myself enjoying it a little too much.
Everything else seems distant; all the pressing problems are tucked away in the back of my mind, out of reach—even if I wished to access them.
We arrive at the hotel.
“Lil,” says Doug. “I’d rather keep it down, if you please.”
Of course, he couldn’t keep himself from commenting. I growl in confirmation, and Ella smirks—so much about being paid for silence.
“Miss Larsen,” continues Doug, “To avoid any further exposure, you act as an assistant on anything official, is that something you can do?”
Ella considers him for a moment, and I watch her closely.
“I don’t like pretending,” she says, eyeing me. “But as I was offered a job anyway, it’s just a bend of the truth, am I right?”
I like her better with every minute passing.
Ella gets more uncomfortable the closer we get to the room. While I like to play with my food, I also know when someone needs reassurance, and she does.
I lean against the door after it closes as Doug does his check. Ella stands in front of me in the middle of the suite, nervously glancing around with her arms crossed. I stare at her neck; her pulse is racing.
“Let’s make a rule for tonight,” I tell her, and she looks at me with big eyes. “Nothing happens unless you explicitly tell me to.”
She nods carefully. Doug tells me, with one look and a tilt of his head, that everything is alright, and he’ll be in the room to my left.
After all these years, I don’t care much about what hotel room I’m in.
I don’t care how it’s furnished or where it’s located.
What matters is practicability. In other words, clean surfaces, no clutter, industrial clean.
This here is the complete opposite. The suite is warm and inviting, and I can’t help but suspect Doug chose it not for me, but for Ella.
Meddler, I curse him in my mind, because the clutter in the room distracts me.
“What do you want to drink?” I ask her as I get to the hotel phone to order drinks.
“A water, maybe?” she says, and I roll my eyes.
“You’re drinking champagne with me,” I say, and order a bottle. When I put the phone down, I lean onto the sideboard it sits on.
“Sit down,” I tell her, and watch her do so hesitantly. I wait until she has settled down before I ask her everything I wish to know.
“When was your first time and with whom?”
“Have you always been into girls?”
“What do you know about BDSM?”
She blushes more with every question.
“Have you ever been spanked?”
“What do you like to try?”
Our Q&A session lasts exactly two hours.
I notice her energy waning, and mine as well, but there's something I can’t pinpoint right now.
I got all the answers, yes. She shows genuine emotional responses and physical reactions, yet I feel something's off. Despite the number of questions, I realize I still don’t know her, which surprises me.
I've done this six times before. And I felt a growing connection through interviewing.
My body reacts differently to her. It feels like the questions brought a distance between us.
“Do you have any questions?” I ask her at last.
“Yes,” she says, puts her glass aside, and looks me straight in the eyes. “Can we fuck now?”