His lips twitch, battling against the amusement from my quip, but then he shoves my panties back into my mouth. “There. That’s better. You have a habit of being noisy.”
There’s something so empowering about him mesmerized by all the sides of me—whether I’m witty, fierce, or even pathetic. That’s the draw of degradation and humiliation for me, the notion of being craved and revered, worthy and used.
He rummages through his drawer, producing a piece of duct tape and adhering it firmly over my lips. When he’s done, he sits back and admires his work. “Spellbinding, my ravishing Thorn.”
Then I’m under his desk. It’s natural wood—probably hand-crafted—and massive, with an opening fit for two or three of me to hide under here. I straddle his foot, and he angles it just right so the leather and laces graze my neglected clit. God, he was right to gag me because I can barely hold in the purr of satisfaction itching to burst from me. I wrap my arms aroundhis leg, and he fists my hair snuggly. The scrape of every follicle needles my scalp.
When I move, it shouldn’t feel this delicious. But it does. The ache in my nipples and bounce of my breasts. The fullness in my ass. The abrasion of his exquisite wool against my flesh and the rough drag of his shoe on my cunt. It’s all so much on top of the thrill and disgrace and contentment of being a tawdry secret, taking what I need. I’m so lost to it all that I nearly miss the fact that he’s talking to someone.
“You can bring my dinner in now, Stella. Thank you for waiting.”
Bring it in?
Panic surges through me. I’m hidden, but that’s not much consolation. My rocking slows to a halt, and I instantly feel Axel’s renewed grip on the strands, which reminds me of his instructions.
“I’ll grip your hair. If I switch to palming your head, you can slow down. Otherwise, you trust my judgment and keep moving, or I’ll leave you needy for days.”
I could tap his leg, and he’d call her off. That makes this so much more obscene. It shifts it entirely to my choice. And my stubbornness shouts that I can’t be the one to back down.
With hesitation still loitering beneath this desk with me, I resume my cadence, and my body detonates with greed. I’m almost outside of myself at this point, pursuing the summit at all costs.
“Good girl,” Axel coos. “Chase it, darling. No matter what threatens it.”
His door opens in the next beat, and I’m grinding against his shoe, riding with abandon, only capable of absorbing the echo of what’s happening above desk level.
“Late night?” Stella asks, and there’s a subdued clatter of what I’m assuming is dishes on the desktop.
“Always,” Axel sighs, tugging on my locks. “But there’s nothing more important than what I’m diving into tonight.”
If I wasn’t muzzled, naked, or about to come, I’d laugh. He’s rarely cheeky.
Stella does laugh—or snickers—like she suspects that Axel has someone in here. “Well, no matter howimportant, nothing lasts forever,” she sings. “There’s always a chance for something new or something you haven’t considered. But I do hope you enjoy your … work.”
She’s flirting. And whether I have any right to be jealous or not, it enrages me and boils my blood. That only accelerates the climb to my peak. My vision is cloudy, my limbs shaking. There’s a tightness in my muscles and tingling low in my abs.
Oh fuck, what if I come while she’s in here?
“Thank you,” Axel returns, pressing his foot up into me, the added friction causing me to choke back a moan. “I suppose my idea of forever is a thorn in a haystack.”
Stella huffs another giggle, her heels clomping a path to the door. “Mercy is rubbing off on you. It’s needle.”
Their conversation drones to a staccato rhythm that will simply dictate the tempo of my climax. I’m so close. So otherworldly close. I couldn’t stop my hips if my life depended on it. I’d already be exploding if it wasn’t for these aberrant circumstances. Of course, if I’m honest with myself, every twinge and pang is that much more alluring and galvanizing because of the filthy scenario unfolding.
“That may be the saying, but … I’m confident my treasure will be a thorn.” The audacious hint pointing to my nickname—a moniker no one knows—and his placid delivery give him and Stella pause before he tacks on, “Could you stop by Miss West’s office on your way out and tell her she can send me the translation tomorrow since I won’t have time to review it tonight? I texted, but she didn’t respond.”
“Of course,” Stella replies, almost tentatively, but then the door finally clicks, and there’s a buzz on the desktop.
“Yeah?” Axel clips, probably answering a call. “Put him through.”
But it’s too late for me. I erupt, gagged and clamped and filled, curled around Axel’s leg and undulating my hips just enough to keep myself in flight. The climax tears through me like a beast, shattering me from the inside out. Healing decimation shoots from my core to the tips of my fingers and toes. Up my spine to steal the air from my lungs.
Shameful to savored.
Hidden to seen.
Lost to coming home.
And I don’t think about the impermanence of it all. I shudder and soar and revel in every brush of the king holding me and carrying my shame, pain, fears, and burdens. And my pleasure.
