11. Day Two #2
He used me. Twice today already, and the sun isn't even at its peak. He used my mouth during a business call, then bent me over his desk and fucked me like I was a piece of furniture. No kissing. No tenderness. No consideration for whether I might want something too.
Yesterday there was heat. Hunger. There was something that felt almost like mutual desire.
Today, there's nothing.
I'm a vessel. A hole. A convenient body that lives in his penthouse and exists to service his needs.
The worst part is the hurt.
I shouldn't be hurt. I should be relieved. If he's cold, if he's distant, if he treats me like property instead of a person, that's easier to survive. That's easier to compartmentalize. That's what I expected when I signed the contract.
But some stupid, traitorous part of me is hurt anyway.
Because last night he held my hand. Last night he said my defiance was affecting his judgment. Last night, there were cracks in his armor. Moments when he seemed almost human, almost real, almost someone I could understand.
Today there's nothing.
The walls are up. I'm on the outside, and I hate that I care.
I don't read.
I pace. I fume. I count the hours until I can sleep and escape into unconsciousness.
The Protocol hums in my blood, keeping me aroused, keeping me wanting, and I hate it. I hate my body for responding. I hate him for engineering this. I hate Bennett for putting me here. I hate myself for caring whether Sebastian looks at me like a person or a thing.
Around noon, the door opens.
"Lunch."
It's his voice. Flat. Commanding.
I don't move.
"Chloe. Lunch. Now."
I turn to face the doorway. He's standing there in his pristine shirt, his perfectly pressed slacks, looking at me like I'm a malfunctioning appliance.
"Did you hear me?"
"I heard you."
"Then come."
I don't move.
Something shifts in his expression. Not anger. Not yet. Curiosity, maybe. The predator noticing that the prey isn't running as expected.
"You're testing me."
"I'm not testing you." The anger in voice is sharp and brittle. "I'm trying to figure out the point."
"The point of what?"
"Of any of this." I gesture at the room, at him, at the whole impossible situation. "You fucked me last night like you actually wanted me. Today you've used me twice like I'm a warm body with convenient holes. What am I supposed to do with that?"
His expression doesn't change. "You're supposed to accept it."
"Which one? The wanting, or the using? Because they're not the same thing."
"They're whatever I decide they are." He steps into the room. "I told you—your job is to submit, not to understand."
"And I told you I'd always be fighting." I stand my ground as he approaches. "Using my mouth during your call was degrading. Bending me over your desk and not even bothering to make me come was?—"
"Was what?"
The word won't come. Because the word is cruel, and I don't know if I'm allowed to say it. Don't know if I'm allowed to feel it.
"Was exactly what you signed up for." He stops in front of me. Close enough to touch, but not touching. "You belong to me. Your body exists for my pleasure. Some days, I'll pleasure you in return. Other days, I won't. That's my choice, not yours."
"I know that."
"Then what's the problem?"
The problem is that yesterday felt like something. The problem is that I'm hurt by his coldness when I should be relieved. The problem is that the Protocol is making me want him even now, even when I hate him, even when I'm furious.
"The problem," I say slowly, "is that if every day feels like today, I won't survive a year. I'll go insane. I'll break, and I'll stop being interesting, and you'll be left with a broken thing that isn't worth keeping."
Something flickers in his eyes. There and gone.
"Is that a threat?"
"It's information." I hold his gaze. "You said you don't want to break me.
That broken things aren't interesting. Well, this—" I gesture between us, at the cold distance, at the walls.
"—this is breaking. Not quickly. Not dramatically.
But a year of being used without being seen? That breaks people."
The silence stretches.
He doesn't move. Doesn't speak. Just looks at me with those unreadable eyes, calculating something I can't see.
Then his hand comes up.
I flinch, expecting what? A blow? A grab? But he just cups my jaw. Tilts my face up. Studies me like I'm a puzzle he's trying to solve.
"You think I don't see you?"
"I think today you looked through me."
"I looked through you because if I looked at you, I'd have bent you over my desk and made you come five times before finishing the call.
" His voice is low. Rough. "I looked through you because yesterday I said things I shouldn't have said.
Admitted things I shouldn't have admitted.
And the only way I know how to correct that is distance. "
"So today was punishment?"
"Today was survival." His thumb traces my lower lip. "For both of us."
I don't know what to do with that. Don't know how to reconcile the coldness of his actions with the admission behind them.
"I'm not trying to break you," he continues. "But I'm not trying to fall for you, either. And last night—" He stops. Jaw tightening. "Last night, I said your defiance was affecting my judgment. I meant it. That's dangerous. For both of us."
"Why dangerous?"
His hand drops away.
"Lunch," he says. "Now. We'll continue this conversation there."
He turns and walks out.
I stand in my room, his cum still drying between my thighs, his words echoing in my head.
I'm not trying to fall for you either.
Either?
Like he thinks I might be falling for him.
Like that's even a possibility.
I follow him to lunch on shaking legs, and I tell myself the trembling is anger.
Just anger.
Nothing else.