by L. V. Lane
Basement; that had to be for the basement where Kade had brought me in.
I stabbed the button, and then again when it did not light up.
“No!” I jabbed it several more times before my mind caught up, and I realized that it would not move.
I stepped out, heart beating so erratically in my chest that my vision came through a tunnel. Would Lucian know I had tried to leave? Was he watching me? Was he even now returning?
I turned full circle and saw nothing of the room. A kind of madness gripped me, and I went through the apartment like a thief, searching for something—anything—that might help me to get out.
The more time passed, the more my anxiety grew. The sense of imminent danger became a blanket suffocating me. I tore through drawers and cupboards. Searched for signs of a communication hub or computer, and found nothing.
I had begun to despair when I came across an ear-communicator tossed in the back of a drawer below the entertainment viewer in the lounge. The tiny panel lay hanging off, but a light came on when I tapped it.
Putting it to my ear, all I heard was a crackle.
My head turned toward the elevator. It was possible…
My feet pounded so swiftly, I barely felt the ground. It opened against my frantic pressing on the call, and when I stepped inside, all the buttons were subtly lit.
Fingers shaking, I pressed for the basement.
The doors slid smoothly shut, and the elevator moved.
The descent caused another cycle of panic. I had no idea what I would do when I reached the bottom, but I was out of Lucian's apartment and could not shift past the imperative need to flee.
Numbers counted down, and my eyes glued on the ticking illumination as my body became bathed in a cold sweat.
My heart lodged in my throat as the voice announced the arrival. The door began to glide open…and then slammed shut.
What? “No!” I stabbed the button frantically, my whole body shaking.
Then the elevator began to ascend.
Dread consumed me. I had fucked up. I did not know what would happen next, but I was sure it would be bad. The count up was like the countdown to my doom. And when the doors opened once more to his lavish apartment, I was utterly distraught.
I had been found out, I knew it. Lucian would be coming, and he would punish me in dark ways my mind could not even imagine.
I walked without awareness. I was in regression, falling down the rabbit hole again, fingers scraping over crumbling earth as I tried to claw my way out. I wasn’t safe, danger ravaged me with the tenacity of a wild, starving beast. Yet his scent offered a warped form of safety.
The soft bedding was ripped from the bed, dragged deep into the furthest corner of the closet. Clothing was thrust aside to make room, and yet more linen gathered until the bed was utterly bare. It was rich with his scent, soft, and it made the perfect nest. I became a child again making my first nest, only I wasn’t a child, I was a woman, and yet the allure was still as strong.
I pushed, fluffed, and petted softness into place. Crawled deep within the mass and tugged the giant fluffy quilt over my head.
Darkness entombed me, along with his scent.
I was safe. Here, I was safe.
Laying upon my side, I tucked myself into the tiniest ball I could—knees drawn to chest, chin to knees.
Slowly, my breath steadied, and my thumping heart slowed until finally, exhaustion dragged me under.
It felt like I had been gone a long time, in actuality, it was only a few hours.
Rhett, wearing a pair of sweatpants and nothing else, was waiting for me when I entered my suite lounge.
“What the fuck do you want?” I demanded on seeing him there. Then my eyes shot to the left where the corridor led to the bedroom. “What are you doing here?”
I stalked toward him and he backed up, raising both hands. “Fuck me! Do I look stupid? I got here like thirty-seconds before you did! She tried to fucking leave!”
In all the years since we had left Lyus, all Rhett’s bullshit, I had never once struck my brother, and it was telling that his mere presence, close to Madelyn, had driven me to the point where I was ready to.
I released his throat and stepped back. He was trembling; I should care about that, but I didn’t.
“Leave?” My attention returned to the corridor leading to the bedroom.
“Yeah, she’s in the bedroom, hiding in the closet. I’m guessing she knows she fucked up. I was busy with some of the other shit, so I didn’t realize what she was doing until I got a warning that the elevator was moving. She found one of your coms devices and the elevator registered it as you. I redirected it back to this level and locked it.”
He held out his open palm. In it was an integral tracker band.
I smirked as I took it from him. “Thank you. Now get the fuck out of my suite and don’t come again without an invitation.”
After he left, I took a moment to compose myself, examining the tracker band in my hand. It had been a shitty day, and I was getting nowhere with Malaxos. I’d found three more of his lackeys in my nightclub—he had balls—that I wanted to cut off and force down his throat.
I drew a deep breath in. I needed a fucking cigarette, but I needed to check on my pet more. Stripping off my jacket, I tossed it over the low lounge suite, then unclipped my gun holster before dumping the whole of it in my safe. Not the time to leave that lying around if Madelyn was feeling mutinous. I’d known she was conflicted after yesterday’s conversation, but she’d imprinted on me, and I had foolishly presumed that would keep her in line.
I removed my cuff links as I entered the bedroom, dropping them on the dresser as my eyes alighted on the bed.
My lips tugged up, and rolling my sleeves, I approached the closet.
“Come on out, Pet.”
There was a warning in my voice, and she must have sensed how close I was to losing my shit because the bedding mountain shifted, and a disheveled redhead emerged. The control I prided myself on was perilously close to unleashing at the sight of the nest, but her choice of clothing was a whole other test.
She stood before me, head lowered, slight body trembling.
“I have a present for you.” I let her contemplate my mood. Turning, I left her because if I spent one more second looking at her standing beside the nest in the pink negligee, she was going to get fucked in ways she only thought she wanted. I had been imagining her in my collar from the moment I first saw her; now, I craved it like a junkie.
And because I was a sick fuck, I was going to make her beg for it, even if it killed me.
It was definitely going to kill me.
I sat on the edge of the stripped bed, and put a call through to housekeeping to send fresh bedding while I waited for her to emerge. The nest could stay exactly how it was. I would have a proper look at it later once I’d gotten myself under control.
My breath caught when she appeared at the doorway. That negligee was going to be my personal destruction.
I crooked a finger at her, and she padded over.
“You’re not allowed to be angry with me,” she said, stopping just out of arms reach. There was a mulish set to her jaw, and much as I didn’t want to encourage her defiance, I had missed her sass.
“Did you go in the elevator wearing that?”
She nodded, and the second time in as many minutes, I nearly lost my shit.
“Which part of this am I not allowed to be angry about?” I tried to keep my tone even, but I suspected some of my anger leaked out. An hour ago, I had ordered a man burned to death—his stench was on me. “You trying to leave, or you trying to leave wearing an invitation to fuck? Because I’ve got to be honest, love. I’m pissed about both.”
She flinched, and her lips trembled before she surprised me by asking, “What is the present?” In a way that said she was highly suspicious.
Turning my hand over, I opened my palm. The glance she sent my way was confused. “A bracelet? I was expecting a
whip or something evil like that.”
“Whips aren’t evil, Pet,” I said, feeling some of my tension ease and amusement take its place. “Not unless you use them wrong. Would you like a demonstration?”
“No thank you.” Her eyes shot to mine, but she had stepped a little closer. “Do you really have a whip?”
I nodded, closing my fingers loosely over her wrist and drawing her toward me so I could clip the bracelet on. “I have several, love. But I am a master, and as we have already established, I like to keep pets.”
“What?” She tried to jerk out of my hold and set to clawing at her wrist. “What have you done? Get it off me!”
Fearing she was about to hurt herself, I tugged her onto my lap and caught her writs. “It’s a tracker band. A new kind, and it has now meshed with your skin.” After that loaded conversation yesterday, I had encouraged her, in a not so very subtle way to suck my cock. She had imprinted on me, and her body craved a connection of any kind. I had even cum for her. I considered her mine, and I liked to keep what was mine. “It can’t be removed, Pet. It’s part of you now.”
Her face bore an expression of horror, and she started to hyperventilate. Closing my hand over the front of her throat, I pressed her cheek to my chest and offered the rumble that set her instantly softening. After a few minutes, she quieted.
“I can’t allow you to leave—you know this. It wouldn’t be safe for you to do so.” I lifted her chin. “Look at me.”
“You can’t just keep a person,” she said softly.
Lowering my head, I brushed my lips over hers. “I recommend you don’t try leaving again, Pet.” I nibbled at her lips, feeling the last of my anger drain away when she opened and let me in. I had fisted a handful of her hair before I realized what I was doing.
She moaned, sucking on my tongue.
I pulled her off by the hair and we stared at one another, both breathing hard.
“Do you like that?” I tightened my fist when she didn’t immediately answer, and the heady scent of slick and pheromones gave me her answer. Yet it became imperative that I hear it from her lips.
“Yes!”
My gaze lowered to where her tits strained the sheer pink material, and I cupped the weight, rubbing my thumb back and forth over the hard peak until she began to squirm and rub her thighs together. Then I pinched and rolled it roughly between my fingers.
Her little body arched and I let up, repeating on the other side until they were both beautifully distended.
“Ask me to collar you.”
She turned her face away, refusing to answer, but her body was on a different path to her mind. I lowered my lips close to her ear. “Open for me, love.” A shiver rippled over her body, and a needy little whimper escaped her lips. I pressed soft kisses over the shell of her ear, and her breathing turned erratic as her little hands made fists.
Her soft, sweet body and innate goodness were everything that I was not. I wanted to corrupt her, to smother her light with my darkness, and make her into my perfect little pet. I would use her body and mind against her, use every trick I had learned with ruthless intent.
When my hand began to trail up the inside of her leg, her breath turned choppy. I ran my tongue around the shell of her ear as I pushed her little panties aside and pressed a single digit in her slick, wet heat. “Wider, Pet,” I growled.
With a strangled sob, she did as I asked, and I lifted my head to watch my hand slide back and forth as I fingered her under the hem of her pink negligee. I was going to buy a hundred of the fucking things in every available shade of pink. “You’re becoming very needy. It’s only been a few hours since you had my cock and look at how desperate you are.” I pressed a kiss to her temple and pushed a second finger in.
“Oh god!”
“Ask me to collar you,” I growled, clamping an arm around her waist to hold her still and forced a third finger in.
Newly awakened to an Alpha cock, it was a lot for her to take, and her tight passage fluttered around my invading fingers.
She shook her head frantically and tried to clamp her knees shut even as her pussy bathed my hand in slick.
Burning impatience gripped me. I was a king in Chimera. I got what I wanted when I wanted it. I withdrew, and standing, let her fall to the floor.
“No!” She doubled over, one hand planted to the floor, and the other wrapped protectively about her waist.
I stared down, feeling cold and determined.
One small hand stretched toward my shoe. “Don’t touch.”
She shrank back. “Please,” she whispered.
“Do you want your master’s cock?”
She shook her head again, the little brat, so I left her there, stripped and took a shower to get rid of the day’s events. My cock was hard, ruddy, and leaking. I wanted to storm back in there, fist her hair and fuck her face until my cock spewed cum down her throat.
I could still see her recoiling from the venom in my tone, but I needed her in my fucking collar more than I needed my next breath.
She was still there when I returned, and her head lifted to reveal a tear-stained face.
“Please,” she said softly, her beautiful eyes heavy with her tears.
“Ask your master for his cock.” My earlier anger had returned full bore. I needed a fucking drink and a cigarette—I needed rough sex, but I needed her in a collar more. Were she not here, I would be balls deep in one of the Beta bitches with my hand wrapped around her throat, listening to the sweet sounds of her choking while her pussy spasmed around my cock.
I still wanted all of that, but I wanted it with the redheaded goddess on her knees, wanted to feel her perfect pussy fisting my cock while I squeezed my fingers around her delicate throat.
It would leave a mark; I wanted it to leave a mark. I would admire it and kiss her while I inspected it the next day, and tell her how perfect she was. It wouldn’t be the only mark, I would litter every inch of her perfect body with them.
Bites, bruises, welts—she would come screaming while I made them, and would beg her master for more.
My cock jerked vigorously as I sank deeper into the fantasy, and a long thread of pre-cum trickled from the slit.
“Please, I need your cock.”
I had forgotten she was there. It wasn’t a new fantasy, I had ruined many a Beta while playing out such an erotic scene. Her soft voice and that heady scent dragged me back to the now.
Her glorious hair was silky smooth under my fingers, and I pressed a kiss to her temple as I drew in her heady scent.
I held out my hand.
She placed her hand in mine, and I guided her to the bed, empty of everything but a sheet. I couldn’t even think about the fucking nest she had made in the closet.
As I helped her out of her clothes, I closed my mind to everything but this moment. Lying back on the empty bed, hands behind my head, I waited patiently while she climbed over me. I took it all in, from her tear-stained face, her peaked nipples begging to be sucked, and her slick-coated thighs. Steeled myself for heaven and hell as she sank her hot, wet pussy over my cock. Then watched it all through hooded eyes as she rode herself to climax after climax, and only then, when she was close to exhaustion and fell to begging, did I take her under me, knot her, and let her have my cum.
CHAPTER TWELVE
IT HAD BEEN two weeks since I had become Lucian’s pet. Two weeks of mind games and endless fucking until I collapsed exhausted beside him, where I would breathe in his sinful scent as I drifted into a dreamless sleep.
Sometimes he would relent and give me his knot.
Sometimes he would not.
“Eat your dinner, Pet.”
I glanced up at his reflection in the window, then over my shoulder to make sure. Lucian wasn’t even facing my way. How did he know what I was or wasn’t eating?
I glared at the back of his head before returning my attention to my dinner. I scooped up more creamy vegetable mash, and feeling militant, shoved it into my mouth. I w
as sitting at the dining table, alone, wearing a pink negligee. An entire collection of them had been delivered the day after my infamous nesting incident, all in shades of pink. Today's was a pale pearlescent color; I was out of context in his home where everything was dark and foreboding, and even the windows had a sepia tint that cut the last of the glare from the fading sun.
The occasional spot cast subtle lighting into the darkest corners of the room, or over art, both pictures and sculptures, which adorned the walls and nooks. An expansive entertainment viewer filled one wall, although my wanderings in his brief absences had discovered a dedicated media room.
Understated opulence. The chair I sat on was tall-backed and arty, the table before me a shimmering gray stone, and even the cutlery had a heaviness to it that smacked of quality.
Lucian stood talking to Jordan and Kade on the other side of his lounge, who were both decked out in their usual black shirt and pants. Lucian wore a suit, which today was also dark with a very faint stripe. He looked good in a suit. He looked good without a suit.
Sighing, I shuffled the vegetables around the plate and tried to ignore the enticing reflection.
Moments before Jordan and Kade had arrived, his lawyer, whom I was convinced was not, in fact, his lawyer, but his brother had been here. It was a tenuous familial link to make because the younger Alpha was possibly the scruffiest person I had ever met, and Lucian was so…put together. The younger Banner had darker hair, but the same bright green eyes—and he had shoes on today, which wasn’t a given.
At the risk of being dramatic, both the earlier and present conversations had been tense.
I knew very little about Lucian’s world, only snippets I had gathered during our short acquaintance, but I thought his world to be as dark as his choice of clothing and home. He was keeping me against my will, although in his opinion, he was saving me from myself. It was an excuse, and we both knew it.
A thick bang of my red hair fell forward, and I pushed it behind my ear. Between the negligee and my hair, I felt like a beacon in the black of night.