He smiled, and I felt it more than saw it. "Turn over."
The cuffs made it awkward, but I managed. Face down, ass up, completely vulnerable. The position should have been terrifying. Should have sent me back to training rooms and punishment. But Nathan's hands on my hips were steady. Safe. Present.
"You asked me to take control," he said. "To remind you that your body can follow other orders. So here's an order—feel this. Be present for this. Don't drift away into memory or conditioning. Stay here with me."
The first strike was light. Testing. More sound than impact. My body responded—but not with the trained arousal of Gabriel's games. This was cleaner. Simpler. Sensation without the weight of history.
"Good," Nathan said. "Another?"
"Yes, sir."
He built it slowly. Carefully. Reading my responses and adjusting. Not trying to break me or train me. Just... giving me sensation to focus on. Something immediate and real that belonged to now, not then.
"You're doing so well," he said, rubbing where the skin had warmed. "Being so good for me. My good girl, not his."
"Yours," I agreed, and meant it.
When he finally touched me properly, I was so wet it should have been embarrassing. But shame belonged to the old world. The old rules. Here, in this cheap motel with rain pattering against windows, I could want things. Could ask for things.
"Please," I managed.
"Please what?"
"Need you. Need to feel you."
"Soon." His fingers worked me with the same careful precision he'd used to map my scars. "But first, I want to taste you. Want to know what you're like when you're not performing. Not trying to be perfect. Just feeling."
He uncuffed one hand so I could turn over, then secured it again. The asymmetry should have bothered me—Gabriel had been obsessive about balance, symmetry, perfection. But this was better. More real. More human.
When his mouth found me, I forgot about programming. Forgot about conditioning. Forgot about everything except the present moment and the man taking me apart with reverent determination.
"Let me hear you," he said against my skin. "Want to know how you sound when you're not afraid."
The permission broke something open in me. Sounds I'd trained myself to suppress spilled out—gasps and moans and hisname repeated like a prayer. Not a performance. Not trying to be Daddy's good girl. Just... feeling.
When I came, it was with my free hand twisted in his hair and my body arching off the bed. No shame. No fear. Just sensation and release and the knowledge that this pleasure was mine to take.
"Beautiful," Nathan said, kissing his way back up my body. "You're beautiful when you let go."
"Want to taste you too," I managed when my brain came back online. "Please."
He studied my face, then nodded. Uncuffed my other hand but left the metal around my wrists—a reminder of choices made and control given. I pushed him back, taking charge even within the structure we'd established.
He was already hard, had been for a while judging by the wet spot on his boxers. I took my time, returning the favor of careful attention. Learning what made him curse, what made his hands tighten in my hair, what made him say my name like it was holy.
"Fuck," he breathed when I took him deep. "Bunny... Christ..."
I hummed around him, pleased at the reaction. This was wanting to give pleasure because I chose to. Because it made me feel powerful in ways that had nothing to do with conditioning.
"Stop," he said suddenly, pulling me up. "Not like that. Not this time."
I blinked at him, confused. "But—"
"Inside you," he clarified, voice rough. "I need to be inside you. Need you to feel me tomorrow when we're hunting. Remember who you belong to now."
"Yes." The word came out desperate. "Please. Yes."
He kissed me, deep and possessive, and I could taste myself on his tongue. Could taste us, mixed together. Creating something new.
