Nude, he picked up his bundle of clothes and pulled at the soundproof door that led into the penthouse proper. The door was heavy, but it wasn’t locked, and when Adrian applied enough force, it opened. He let himselfinside.
When the door settled back in place and blocked out the music from the club, Adrian’s ears picked up on a tiny sound that he might have overlooked had he not been so attuned to his surroundings. Sterling was playing the piano. Where, exactly, there was a piano or how it had made it to the third floor of a club, Adrian didn’t know. He didn’t ask questions. Instead, he followed the music to its source, unimpressed andunderwhelmed.
Sterling was setting himself up as some classical, refined, multi-talented god, and it was already getting old. Adrian didn’t care if he knew how to play the piano any more than he cared about pictures of food people insisted on posting on theinternet.
The subtle brag grated on hisnerves.
He was here for sex, and maybe to get over the strange feeling in his chest that was inexplicably tied to thoughts of Sterling. Unless Sterling intended to hog-tie him to the piano and strike him with its hammers as punishment, Adrian couldn’t care less about Sterling’s musicalprowess.
But when he arrived in the living room, it wasn’t a piano he found—Sterling was seated in one of his leather armchairs, an ancient-looking tome propped open in his hand, engrossed in his reading. The music came from a stereo system, its speakers artfully concealed in different corners of thehouse.
Walking in on Sterling reading some big, fancy book was almost as bad as walking in to find him playing thepiano.
Sterling glanced over the top of the book, then tucked a bookmark between its pages and set it down. From the coffee table he picked up a tiny remote, and with a push of a button, the piano musicstopped.
“You’re here,” Sterlingremarked.
“I’m here.” Adrian watched Sterling’s eyes, expecting his gaze to dip downward. Itdidn’t.
“For someone who’s been visiting The Shepherd since the night of his twenty-first birthday, you’re certainly rusty on what submission means. We agreed to a total power exchange. If you are to speak, you will always conclude your statements with a sign of your respecttowardme.”
God, was he insufferable. Adrian resisted the urge to cross his arms over his chest, but only because he knew if he misbehaved on all fronts from the start, Sterling might change his mind about their agreement and forbid him from returning to The Shepherd, and Adrian couldn’t afford that. The Shepherd was his oasis—a haven totally separated from the disaster that was his home life. If he couldn’t return, then where wouldhego?
“Now…” Sterling picked up his book again, but didn’t yet open it to his previous place. “Come here and kneel. I want you beneathmyfeet.”
“Excuse me?” Adrian remained where he stood, but he dropped his clothes on the floor by the table to free his arms just in case they were needed. With a stubborn streak a mile wide and resentment for Sterling burning in his soul, he risked setting Sterling off, but a request like that was worth the upset. Adrian knew what a total power exchange involved, but he refused to let himself be degraded. There was nothing between him and Sterling but animosity, anyway. What did Sterling expect wouldhappen?
Sterling arched a brow. “Come here, get on your hands and knees,andstay.”
Out of those three commands, Adrian accomplished one. He crossed the room to stand in front of Sterling, then snatched the book from his hand. Jaw clenched, he glared at Sterling with every ounce of distaste that he could muster. “We agreed on terms.Nohousework. I amnotgoing to be your livingfootstool.”
“We never agreed on that.” Sterling made no attempt to take his book back, nor did he make an effort to rise from his chair. He looked up at Adrian with calm, almost mocking amusement. “Do you need to be reminded what a total power exchangemeans?”
“No.” Adrian’s fingers dug against the old, papery jacket that hid the book’s hard cover. “I know what it means, but we also made an agreement.Nohousework.”
“This isnothousework.”
“Really?” Adrian cast the book onto the coffee table. It skidded a short distance, then came to a stop just out of Sterling’s reach. “I think pretending to be household furniture for your humiliation kink is the most literal definition of houseworkthereis.”
The words were meant to be abrasive, and Adrian braced himself for a fight. He expected to see Sterling’s brows knit together as the expression on his face grew stony and worrisome, but it never happened. Instead, Sterling arched a brow as the corner of his mouth twitchedupward.
The smug look on his face pissed Adrian thehelloff.
“You’ve given power over to me, Adrian. That’s what this arrangement is about. Your care is in my hands, and my word is your will. We came to an agreement last week and I am happy to respect it, but youknowthat you’re stretching the terms weagreedupon.”
“And so what?” There were goosebumps down Adrian’s arms that he couldn’t explain away. Anger had squared his jaw, but the inexplicable feeling muted the heat of his anger and made him more frustrated than ever. He hated Sterling for being so smug and for bending the rules in his favor, so why wasn’t his body letting him fully rile himself up? Adrian had gone toe to toe with several alphas before Sterling—it wasn’t like he was wading into unfamiliarterritory.
So why the hell did his chest tighten and tingle like it did when he lookedSterling’sway?
“So you need to start listening, or Iwillpunish you for your disobedience.” Sterling’s gaze never wavered, but Adrian didn’t care. No matter how long it took, he wouldnotgivein.
“Youthink you’re going to punishme?” Adrian was near hysterics now, his voice a pitch higher than it usually was. Each word he spoke wavered as he neared the point of disbelief. “So wait, wait just a second, hear me out. This is how our wholerelationshiphas gonesofar.”
Sterling said nothing, but the intrigued glimmer in his eyes said he waslistening.
“You find me breaking the rules. You take my phone from me as collateral, and then demand that I be your quivering little submissive for a month if I want to save my club membership.” The more he broke it down, the angrier it made him feel. None of this was fair. “So we make arrangements and compromise on what I’ll be doing while I’m here. I show up, strip for you, put on these leather cuffs, and then what? Then I walk over to you—almost a near stranger who has madezeroeffort to know who I really am or what I like—and you expect me to submit to you? You expect me to drop to my knees and be your footstool? Are youinsane?”
Now that Adrian had started, he couldn’t bring himself to stop. His tongue navigated the words he spoke with fluidity, never tripping or tying itself in knots. Anger fueled himonward.
