Chapter 15 #2
His mouth trailed from my lips to my jaw, then lower to my throat, teeth grazing the tendon there hard enough to sting.
I let my head fall back to give him access, exposing the vulnerable column of my neck, and felt his groan vibrate against my skin.
My hands fisted in his shirt, yanking it free of his waistband, then slid beneath to find the muscle underneath.
Warm skin that jumped under my touch. The ridged texture of old scars under my palms. I traced them with my fingertips, learning the map of his past, and felt him shudder.
"Kira." My name in his voice, rough and demanding, sent heat pooling low in my belly. Not a question. An acknowledgment. A declaration that he saw exactly what I needed and intended to give it to me.
"Don't stop," I hissed.
He didn't.
His mouth found the curve where my neck met my shoulder, and he bit down, not gently, while his hands shoved my jacket off my shoulders.
The cool air hit my bare arms, but I barely noticed.
I was too focused on getting his shirt over his head, on running my hands across the planes of his chest, on the way his muscles tensed and released under my exploration.
Clothing hit the floor in stages: his shirt, my jacket, the thin fabric beneath, the rest following with efficient inevitability.
Each item removed was another barrier eliminated, another step closer to what we both needed.
When he lifted me onto the console's edge, the surface was cool against my bare thighs, a sharp contrast to the heat of his hands spreading my knees apart.
I gasped at the sensation, at the vulnerability of being open to him like this, at the hunger in his eyes as he looked down at me.
He stepped between my thighs, and I wrapped around him with fierce deliberation, my legs locking at the small of his back, pulling him exactly where I wanted him. I could feel him pressed against me, hard and ready, and the anticipation alone made me ache.
"Now," I demanded. "I need you now."
The first press of him inside me forced the air from my lungs.
Not pain, just fullness, the kind that demanded attention, that pushed everything else out of my head until there was only this.
Only him. Only the stretch and heat of being filled completely.
I held his gaze as he seated himself to the hilt, watching the control in his expression, the way his jaw clenched with the effort of holding still, waiting for my signal before moving.
I rolled my hips, testing, adjusting, savoring the way his breath hitched.
I pushed my desire through the tether: Now. Don't hold back.
He thrust hard, with a grunt that echoed off the walls.
The rhythm we built was unhurried but relentless.
Each stroke purposeful, driving deep enough to make me gasp.
Each touch a statement of presence rather than tenderness.
His hands gripped my hips, controlling the angle, pulling me onto him with every thrust until I was meeting him stroke for stroke.
I wasn't being rescued. I wasn't surrendering.
I was using this, using him, and he was letting me, matching my intensity without trying to redirect it.
My nails raked down his back, and he hissed through his teeth, his pace faltering for just a moment before he drove into me harder. The console shook beneath us. Somewhere, something beeped a warning, and neither of us cared.
My mind didn't wander. If anything, the physical sensation sharpened my focus, burning away the noise until only a clean slate remained.
His mouth found my breast, tongue swirling, teeth grazing, and I arched into him with a moan I didn't bother to stifle.
His thumb found the bundle of nerves where we were joined, pressing in tight circles in counterpoint to his thrusts, and I felt the pleasure building like pressure behind a dam.
“Look at me,” he commanded, his voice ragged. “I want to do this together.”
I met his eyes, and the intensity there, the focus, the raw want, pushed me closer to the edge. He increased his pace, his thumb pressing harder, his thrusts growing erratic as his own control began to slip.
When the orgasm hit, it was clarifying rather than obliterating.
Sharp and bright and clean, sweeping through me in waves that made my whole body clench around him.
I kept my eyes open, watching his face as he followed me over that edge moments later.
His jaw tight. His breath was ragged. His control finally fractured into release as he buried himself deep and shuddered against me.
For a long moment, neither of us moved. Just breathing. Just existing in the aftermath, bodies still tangled together on the edge of the console.
The chaos in my head was gone. In its place: silence. Focus. Exactly what I'd needed.
We stayed tangled together afterward, breathing hard, skin cooling. His forehead rested against mine, pulse gradually slowing.
We let the quiet linger, let our thoughts reorder themselves.
"They want me isolated," I said, my voice calm and steady. "Visible. Easy to contain."
Vaelix pulled back enough to meet my eyes. He was listening. Not commenting, not advising. Just present.
"They'll offer sanctuary. Somewhere that looks like mercy but functions like a cage." The pieces were clicking into place now, clear and cold. "And they're betting I'll take it because I'm running out of options."
"Will you?"
I considered the question seriously. The closed doors, the coordinated refusals, the careful construction of a situation where accepting help would mean accepting surveillance, control, leverage. They'd built this trap with precision, counting on desperation to do what force could not.
"I'll take it," I said. "But not the way they expect."
Vaelix's expression didn't change, but something flickered in his eyes; recognition, perhaps. "You're going to let them think they've won."
"I'm going to let them think I'm desperate enough to be controlled.
" I pulled away from him slowly, reaching for my clothing, my mind already shifting to the next steps.
"They've built their trap based on assumptions about what I'll do when I'm cornered.
They're not wrong about the cornering. But they're wrong about what comes next. "
I dressed efficiently, my mind already forming the plan. Whoever made the first offer, and someone would, now that all the legitimate doors had closed, would reveal themselves by the terms they proposed.
Which meant I needed to make the first move. Reach out to Voss directly. Accept whatever poisoned apple he extended, and make sure I was the one controlling when and how I bit into it.
Vaelix watched me shift without interruption.
He didn't warn me about the risks I already knew.
Didn't caution me against the course I'd already chosen.
He simply observed, steady and silent, and when I finally turned back to him, fully dressed and fully focused, there was something in his expression that looked almost like admiration.
"I see the board now," I said.
I unlocked the door and stepped back into the corridor. I knew exactly what I needed to do. I knew what Voss was going to offer, I knew what he was going to say, and I knew exactly how to use his plans to bring his empire down.