“Sit.”
He sits. Stiff, rigid, but compliant, which is almost more intoxicating than if he’d fought me. His hands grip the arms of the chair. I can see the tension in his fingers, all that violence coiled beneath the skin. I straddle him in one motion, thighsbracketing his hips, the hem of the shirt riding up high enough to feel the heat radiating from his body.
He stares up at me, those pale eyes glassy with need and terror. For once, he looks small. Human. I want to devour him.
His hands go straight to my hips, greedy, desperate. I catch his wrists and pin them to the armrests. He could break free, snap my bones like twigs, but he doesn’t. That knowledge makes every cell in my body spark with power.
“No,” I say, savoring the word. “You don’t get to touch.”
He swallows, Adam’s apple bobbing. The mask is gone; all that’s left is the man underneath, and I wonder for a split second what would happen if I drove him past the limits of his control.
He tests my grip, flexes his wrists once, twice, then goes still. There’s a kind of worship in the way he surrenders.
“Sofia…”
The sound of my name in his mouth, desperate and pleading, is better than any apology. Better than any vengeance. I lean in, put my lips to his ear, let my hair fall in a golden curtain that blocks out the world.
“You’ve had me on my knees. You’ve made me bleed. You’ve taken whatever you wanted from me.” I bite his earlobe, just enough to make him shiver. “Tonight, I’m taking something from you.”
His breathing stutters, and I can feel him harden beneath me, the evidence of his need pressing against the thin cotton between us. I rock my hips, slow at first, savoring the way his restraint crumbles molecule by molecule.
“Please,” he says, and it sounds like a confession. “Let me touch you.”
I almost do. I almost let him have it, because I want it too. But not yet.
“No.”
I shift, grinding down until I feel the length of him, hard and insistent. He lets out a guttural sound, fists clenching white-knuckled on the wooden arms. It’s almost funny, how close he is to breaking, how much he wants to let go.
“You’ve been watching me all this time,” I say, angling my hips to drive him insane. “All those photos on the wall. All those nights you thought I didn’t notice you standing outside my door. Did you touch yourself thinking about me?”
“Yes.” The word is ripped from him, raw and unashamed.
“Did you imagine this?”
“I imagined everything.” He’s panting now, eyes dilated, voice thick with reverence and self-loathing. “I’ve imagined you killing me. I’ve imagined you fucking me. I’ve imagined you saving me.”
I’m not sure which of us he hates more in this moment.
I hold his gaze, let him see exactly who’s in control. “You’re not the only one who can take things, Alexei. You’re not the only one who knows how to hurt.”
I reach between us, find his belt, and work it open with deliberate slowness. He arches his hips, desperate for friction, but I keep him pinned. When I free him, he’s so hard it’s almost obscene. I wrap my hand around him, the heat of his skin shocking against my palm. He gasps, head falling back, throat exposed.
“Do you know how many times I’ve thought about this?” I stroke him, slow and ruthless, squeezing just enough to make him gasp again. “When you locked me in the basement. When you made me eat out of your hand. During that fucking shoe fitting.”
“You thought about my cock while I made you bleed?”
I laugh, low and mean. “I thought about making you beg.”
His eyes go dark, pupils blown wide. He shifts under me, testing the limits of my grip on his wrist, but still doesn’t breakfree, doesn’t even move his free hand from the armrest. He’s giving me this, offering himself up like a sacrifice. It’s almost pure.
“Then make me,” he says, voice breaking on the edge of a moan.
16 - Sofia
“Tell me what you want.”
The words come out steady despite the tremor running through me. I have one of Alexei's wrists pinned to the armrest of his chair, and his other is obediently resting on the other while my free hand strokes his cock.
