I moved lower, my mouth tracing the path my hands had mapped. His stomach tensed under my lips. His hands found my hair, not guiding but holding on, the way a drowning man holds onto driftwood. By the time I reached his hips, he was already hard, already leaking, already trembling with the anticipation I'd so carefully built.
"Look at me," I said.
His eyes met mine, dark with want, and I held his gaze as I took him in my mouth.
The technique was flawless. Gabriel had trained me to be flawless, and Nathan had never complained about the results. I used every trick I'd learned—theslow descent that made him gasp, the hollowing of my cheeks that made him curse, the rhythmic swallowing that made his hands tighten in my hair. I worked him with the patience of a sculptor, building his pleasure layer by layer until he was shaking with the effort of holding back.
"Bunny, I'm going to—"
I pulled back just before the edge, letting him cool down, then started again. The denial was calculated—Gabriel had taught me that too—but Nathan didn't seem to mind. His head fell back against the pillows, his chest heaving, his control crumbling with every pass of my tongue.
"Please," he finally gasped. "Please, I need—"
"What do you need?" I asked, my voice sweet as honey.
"Your mouth. God, your mouth. Please don't stop."
I gave him what he asked for. I took him deep, deeper than was comfortable, and hummed against his length in a way that made him cry out. When he came, it was with my name on his lips and his hands fisted in the sheets, his whole body shuddering with the force of his release.
I swallowed everything. Gabriel had trained me to do that, too.
Afterward, I crawled up his body and rested my head on his chest, listening to his heartbeat slow from frantic to steady. His arms wrapped around me, and hepressed a kiss to my forehead with a tenderness that almost felt real.
"You're amazing," he murmured. "I don't deserve you."
"I'm the one who doesn't deserve you," I said, and the words were true in ways he'd never understand.
We lay in comfortable silence, his fingers tracing idle patterns on my shoulder. I could feel him drifting toward sleep, his body heavy and sated, his defenses lowered by pleasure and wine and the illusion of safety.
"Hey," I said softly. "Can I ask you something?"
"Mm?"
"When we were going through the Volosin files, you mentioned a name. Monika, I think. Who was she?"
The question was casual. Almost sleepy. But I felt his body tense beneath me, just for a moment, before relaxing again.
"Monika?" His voice was carefully neutral. "She was part of a case I worked a few years back. Trafficking victim. She helped us bring down a ring in Miami."
"What happened to her?"
"Witness protection, last I heard. She's fine. Why do you ask?"
"I just... the name sounded familiar. I thought maybe I'd met her somewhere. One of the shelters, maybe."
"No." His hand resumed its lazy stroking on my shoulder. "She was before your time. Before I even knew you existed."
Before I even knew you existed.The phrase hit something in my chest—a chord that resonated with implications I couldn't quite name. Nathan had never mentioned a Monika before. Had never mentioned Miami. Had never mentioned any trafficking cases he'd worked before he found me.
I filed the name away with the photograph and the ledgers and the pill in my medicine cabinet. Pieces of a puzzle I was only beginning to assemble.
"I love you," I whispered.
"Love you too, baby." His voice was slurred with approaching sleep. "More than anything."
Within minutes, his breathing had evened out into the deep rhythm of unconsciousness. I lay beside him, staring at the ceiling, my mind racing through the data I'd collected. Monika. Mercy Logistics. The payments. The timeline. The photograph of two brothers who'd grown up to become very different kinds of monsters.
Who are you, Nathan Cross?I thought.And what have you done to me?
