Chapter 34
Sebastian
Leather cuffs held Mira’s wrists and ankles.
Black leather and fur against her ivory skin, holding her open in a way that made both my pulse and cock throb.
The shadows in the dimly lit room danced across her curves.
Her head was bowed, hair falling forward, breath slow and steady. She trusted me completely.
“Mira,” I murmured.
She lifted her head, and her gaze met mine. They held no fear. Never fear. Just a familiar mix of challenge and surrender that always undid me.
I stepped closer. Reached for her. The world narrowed to the stretch of her skin, the rise and fall of her chest, the quiet promise in the way she waited.
Then, her expression changed.
Her mouth moved, but no sound came out.
“Mira?” I said again, sharper now.
The room fractured.
A high, insistent beep cut through the silence. The room didn’t hold any warmth, and the dim light was bright white instead, breaking through my closed eyes.
I sucked in a breath, and my eyes flew open.
Ceiling tiles. Fluorescent lights. The steady, unforgiving rhythm of a heart monitor.
Pain bloomed in my side, dragging a groan from my throat as reality slammed into place.
Mira. Cyberattack. Stan. Gun.
A hospital.
I tried to turn my head but couldn’t. My throat was dry, pulse racing, and someone had put a fifty-pound bag of flour on my chest.
“Mira,” I rasped, the name tearing out of me before I could stop it.
The monitor spiked.
Someone moved at my bedside.
“Easy, man,” Ethan said as he came into view, lifting a cup with a straw toward my mouth.
I took a drink without thinking. My mouth felt like a cotton factory.
Safe.
I tried to speak, but my throat locked up. I took another sip instead, wetting my lips, grounding myself.
“Why can’t I move?” My voice came out rough, barely more than air.
Ethan huffed a quiet laugh. “You came out of anesthesia swinging. Took out an orderly and busted a stitch.”
That got my attention.
“And Mira?” I asked, already bracing for the answer.
He nodded toward the far side of the room as he carefully untied the restraint around my wrist. “She won’t leave.”
I followed his gaze.
Curled up in a chair beneath a thin hospital blanket, fast asleep, was Mira.
My Mira. She was a sight. Her hair was a mess, dark circles shadowing her eyes, exhaustion etched into every line of her body because of me.
God, she was beautiful.
“She hasn’t left your side,” Ethan said quietly. “I may have told the doctor she was your fiancée so they’d let her stay.”
He moved to the other side of the bed and released my other arm.
I didn’t say anything.
I couldn’t.
Because for the first time since I’d opened my eyes, my chest eased—not from the pain medication in the IV—but from the simple truth that she was still here and she was okay.
I sighed and grabbed my side.
“Fuck, that hurts.”
“The bullet missed anything vital,” Ethan said quietly. “But it did enough damage that they had to open you up. You lost quite a bit of blood.”
“What did you say for them to let you in?” I asked.
Ethan smiled. “Victor and I are your brothers, have been since high school, you know that.”
I huffed a laugh, then immediately regretted it as pain flared in my side. Mira stirred in the chair.
“Hey,” Ethan added, lowering his voice, “they never thought it was life-threatening, so I didn’t call your mom.”
“Thanks, the last thing I need when I’m trying to talk her into moving back here.”
“Well,” he said lightly, “the doctors say you’ll make a full recovery. You’ll be back to terrorizing employees in a few weeks.”
The mention of work sobered me instantly. I hadn’t even thought about the business.
“There’s nothing left until they recover it.” Stan had drained our accounts. The fact that we’d already traced the accounts to offshore, which meant recovering it would be close to impossible.
I frowned and reached for the cup of water, groaning as I shifted. Ethan steadied it and helped me take a drink.
“The FBI wants to talk to you,” he continued, “but the money’s already been returned.”
I lowered the cup. “What?”
He tipped his chin toward Mira. “Apparently when Stan handed her the accounts he wanted the funds routed into, she planted a Trojan of her own.”
Pride and disbelief hit me at the same time.
She shifted in her chair, the blanket slipping from her shoulder. She sighed. A small sound, but I loved that sound. I loved all the sounds she made. I’d memorized them. Each and every one of them.
I shifted, as Ethan helped put another pillow under my head. The bed creaked, barely audible, but it was enough. Her lashes fluttered open. She blinked once. Then again.
And then her eyes found mine.
She was on her feet in an instant.
“You’re awake,” she whispered.
Ethan’s hand rested briefly on my shoulder. “I’ll give you two a minute.”
Without taking my eyes off Mira, I said, “Later, brother.”
He left quietly.
I held out my hand and was surprised when she actually accepted it.
“I need to say a few things.”
“You need to rest.”
I shook my head and closed my hand around hers. “Mira, my sweet Mira.”
“Sebastian, we can talk later.” A tear slipped down her cheek.
“No,” I said softly. “If I don’t say this now, I won’t get it right.”
She stilled.
“In the club that night,” I continued, “when I walked up to you. I didn’t know it was you. When I gave you my card, I suspected—but I didn’t know for sure.” I swallowed. “Not until I wrapped that cuff around your wrist during that first session.”
Her breath hitched. “Was it a joke to you?”
I lifted my free hand and cupped her cheek, brushing the tear away with my thumb. “Never.”
Her eyes searched mine, guarded and hopeful all at once.
“For some reason,” I said quietly, “I’m different with you. I’ve been different since the first day you stepped onto the wrong elevator.”
Her lips parted, but no sound came out.
“I didn’t plan it,” I went on. “I didn’t want it. But I wanted you.” My thumb traced her cheek, reverent. “And I still do.”
“But why?”
I huffed a quiet breath. “Because it wasn’t like I could say, hey, want to grab dinner—and then add by the way, I have a complicated relationship with control and trust. I want to tie you up, bring you to the edge, again and again, and maybe I might let you come if you’re a good girl.
Oh, and you won’t be able to sit for days. ”
She smiled, turning several shades of red at the same time. God, I loved her. My heart stopped when the realization hit me like a freight train. I was falling in love with Mira Rhodes.
“I was going to end things,” she admitted quietly. “I broke the rule.”
“Which one?”
Her gaze dropped. I reached for her, sliding my fingers beneath her chin and lifting her face gently until she looked at me again.
“Mira?”
She swallowed. “I looked forward to our sessions a little too much. And sometimes… I took some of the gentler moments between my master and me as more than what they were.”
“A master and his submissive can have a strong bond,” I said carefully. “That’s not unusual.”
I paused. “But I know that’s not all of it.”
She nodded. “I went into it with my eyes open. I knew the rules before I ever said yes. But this—” She hesitated, searching for the right words. “This became more than I bargained for.”
She fell silent.
Then she spoke again.
“I caught feelings,” she admitted. “And then you—Sebastian Reid—asked me out.” A small, sad smile touched her lips. “For the first time, I thought maybe I could have something real. Something in the daylight.”
Her eyes glistened.
“But that meant giving up my master,” she finished. “And I didn’t know how to reconcile those two parts of my life without losing myself.”
I scrubbed a hand over my face. “Mira, I’ve never been good at relationships,” I said quietly. “Because my needs don’t fit neatly into normal boxes.”
She watched me carefully, waiting for my excuse.
“I should have walked away the moment I suspected it was you,” I continued. “And again when I knew for sure.” My throat tightened.
She squeezed my hand.
“You needed this. I watched you day after day, let the voices in your head get the best of you.”
Her brows knit. “You watched me?”
I nodded. “Since the elevator,” I clarified quickly. “I noticed you. The way you doubt yourself. The way you hesitate even when you’re right.”
She didn’t pull away.
“I saw your colleagues get promotions that should have been yours,” I went on. “Not because you weren’t capable, but because you didn’t put yourself forward.”
“I wasn…”
I lifted a finger, resting it lightly against her lips. Not to silence her. Just to pause her.
“Mira,” I said softly. “You are not invisible.”
Her breath caught.
“I see you,” I continued. “At your desk, clicking your pen when the numbers don’t add up. When you’re close and you know it.”
She bit her lip, a shy smile breaking through.
“I wanted to help you,” I admitted. “Not fix you. Not control you. Just… show you what it feels like when the weight lifts for a moment. When you’re allowed to let go.”
Silence settled between us again.
“I went about this all wrong, but Mira, we fit together in so many ways.”
“In the light and the dark.” She smiled as she eased onto the side of the bed. “I thought I lost you.”
“I’m not that easy to get rid of.”
“You took a bullet for me.”
“I’d do anything for you.”
“Can I touch you?” she asked unsure.
It hit me, I’d touched every inch of her body, but she’d always been bound.
“You may.” I couldn’t help the smile on my lips.
She cupped my face in her hands, leaning in, her breath mingling with mine. I couldn’t remember the last time someone touched me intimately.
“Don’t ever do that again, do you understand?”
I did my best to maintain my composure because I knew if I laughed right now it was going to hurt like hell.
“Anything else, Pet?”
I didn’t miss her sharp intake of breath.
“We’re going to need new rules.”
“Noted.”
I barely got the words out before her soft lips touched mine, my arms automatically going around her, the pain so worth it to have her in my arms. It was not our steamiest kiss, it was pretty chaste by anyone’s standards, but one of the best in my life, and when she curled into my non-injured side, her head in the crock of my arm, I felt whole.
As we both drifted off to sleep, I knew I could rebuild my company, I’d deal with the pissed off clients, but life without her wasn’t a life I wanted.