Page 8 of Safe Word

I blinked once, then again. Her eyes gleamed, but my fingers trembled against the armrest. She looked powerful, her cheeks flushed with desire. But I still looked like a mirage to myself.

My body… it was working against me. Or maybe it wasn’t. Maybe it was memory. A reminder of who I used to be – before I offered up that version to Ghost.

‘Scarlett,’ he prompted.

I turned my attention back to him. The knife was tracing a path down my collarbone and past the curve of my breast before dipping lower. His hand pressed lightly against the inside of my knee. Then the steel replaced it, sliding up the softer flesh of my thigh with unhurried precision. The contrast between the biting chill of the blade and the heat pooling in my core made my skin pebble.

It climbed higher, teasing, grazing against the delicate fabric covering my most sensitive spot.

The pressure was fleeting yet devastating, and I couldn’t stop the soft whimper that escaped my lips. The sound echoed between us, and his head snapped up quickly, the weight of his attentiveness pinning me in place.

His shoulders tensed, his fingers flexing as if to ground himself. He moved the blade again, this time slower.

I felt it – the moment he ran the flat of the blade along my folds, cold metal tracing wet heat.

A gasp slipped from my lips, my hips twitching as shame and arousal collided in the space between breaths.

He stilled. Just for a moment, tilting his head to the side. That black and white, unreadable mask, those endless eyes caught the next tremble that his steel drew out of me like a reluctant confession.

When he retreated, the knife glistened faintly, catching the soft light in a wet sheen that had nothing to do with polished steel.

My cheeks burned.

With unhurried confidence, he lifted the mask just enough to reveal the lower half of his face. My lips parted as I watched, transfixed. He brought the blade to his mouth, his tongue darting out to lick the dampness. It traced the blade’s edge, tasting me. Like an offering.

My thoughts reeled from the intoxicating mix of fear and power it gave me. I wanted to see more – to watch his tongue move against the blade, to see his expression as he tasted me. But the mask obscured most of his face like a reprimand for wanting wrong things.

Rising slowly, he moved with a fluidity unusual for a man his size. His footsteps were heavy on the naked tiles as he circled me, the faint rustling of his jeans the only sound as he disappeared behind me.

The anticipation tugged at the fraying edges of my composure, and when the blunt side of the blade pressed against my neck again, fear bloomed across my skin. It wasn’t the touch of the knife that startled me – it was the flood of memories it brought with it. Dark, suffocating memories that clawed at my mind, threatening to pull me under.

I squeezed my eyes shut, my heartbeat erratic as I fought against the rising tide of panic. But before it could consume me, the blade shifted. The flat side of the steel nudged under my chin, tilting my head upwards.

‘Eyes on me,’ he said, his voice firm and calm, unlike the voice that came with the memories. And it cut through the chaos in my mind just like that.

I blinked, my gaze snapping up to meet the hollow black of his. The world around us narrowed, and I latched onto the sound of his voice as if it were the only solid thing in the dark.

‘Calm your breathing,’ he instructed, his tone softer but no less commanding. ‘Use the safe word.’

I hesitated for only a breath, the warmth of his touch coaxing me to submission.

He waited.

Calming myself was easier said than done. Each inhale came shallow, but the weight of his presence was steady, anchoring me in a way I hadn’t felt in years.

‘Green,’ I exhaled.

Slowly, I pulled air back into my lungs, matching the rhythm of his own. He was patient, but unyielding, until my pulse began to slow, my panic dissolving under the sheer certainty of his control.

‘Good girl,’ he soothed.

The knife began its journey again, tracing a path down the column of my neck. Each inch it passed sent contradictory signals through my body – pleasure and panic, heat and ice. I flinched, just once, when it passed my collarbone.

Not because he hurt me – but because another room flashed over my eyes, another hand… another knife, but without rules.

But this wasn’t that room. This was me choosing this blade. Me, watching Ghost wield it in pleasure – not punishment.

The weapon dipped lower. This time, I met it without a tremor, following its arc with a held breath.