"I know." Gabriel's hand found mine. "And I'm going to help you."
Later, I sank to my knees in front of him.
It was a calculated move—a performance designed to make him believe I was grateful, submissive, exactly the good girl he'd always wanted me to be. But it was also something else. Something that came from a place deeper than calculation, deeper than manipulation. Some part of me wanted to kneel. Wanted to offer myself. Wanted to feel the weight of his hand on my hair and the sound of his voice calling me perfect.
"Bunny." His voice was rough with surprise. "You don't haveto—"
"I know." I looked up at him through my lashes, the way he'd taught me. "I want to."
The words were true in ways I couldn't fully explain. Gabriel had broken me, yes. He'd manipulated me, conditioned me, turned me into something that existed only in relation to him. But he'd also been honest about what he was doing. He'd never pretended to be my savior. He'd never wrapped his control in the language of love and freedom and healing.
Nathan had done all of those things. Nathan had made me believe I was choosing him, when really I was following a script he'd written before we ever met.
Gabriel's hand found my hair, gentle and uncertain. "You're sure?"
"I'm sure."
I unbuttoned his pants with steady fingers, freeing him with the practiced ease of someone who'd been trained to please. He was already half-hard—had been since the session, since my body had responded to his touch with an intensity that surprised us both. I took him in my hand and looked up at him.
"Tell me about the safehouse," I said.
"What?"
"The safehouse. The layout. The security." I stroked him slowly, watching his pupils dilate. "I need to understand how you've survived here. How Nathan hasn't found you."
"I—" He swallowed hard. "It's an old church. Abandoned for decades. The locals think it's haunted. No one comes near it."
"And the security?"
"Motion sensors around the perimeter. Cameras at every entrance. A panic room behind the altar." His breath hitched as I lowered my mouth. "Bunny, you don't have to do this while we're discussing logistics—"
"I want to." I took him in my mouth, and the words died in his throat.
The act was a performance, but it was also something more. I was memorizing the layout of his sanctuary, filing away every detail he'd mentioned, but I was also offering him something real—a gesture of trust, however complicated, however compromised. He'd given me information. I was giving him pleasure. The transaction was honest in a way that Nathan's manipulations had never been.
"Good girl," Gabriel breathed, his hand tightening in my hair.
The phrase should have triggered revulsion. Instead, it triggered something else—a complex mixture of anger and arousal and the strange, twisted comfort of being seen by someone who'd never pretended I was anything other than what he'd made me.
I worked him with the skill of long practice, every movement calculated to bring him to the edge withoutpushing him over. His breathing grew ragged. His hand in my hair tightened. I could feel him fighting for control, the way he'd always fought, the clinical distance crumbling under the weight of sensation.
"Bunny, I'm—"
I pulled back just before the edge, looking up at him with a smile that didn't reach my eyes. "Tell me about the panic room."
"The—what?"
"The panic room behind the altar. How do I access it?"
"There's a keypad. The code is—" He stopped, his eyes focusing on me with sudden clarity. "You're gathering intelligence."
"Yes." I didn't bother denying it. "I'm always gathering intelligence. You taught me that."
Something flickered in his expression—not anger, but something closer to admiration. "My perfect girl."
I lowered my mouth again.
I took him deep, and this time I didn't stop. I brought him to the edge and over it, swallowing everything he gave me with the efficiency of someone who'd been trained not to waste. His release was a shuddering groan, his hand fisting in my hair, my name on his lips like a prayer.
