A Thousand Cuts (Underworld Kings)

His body was warm against mine, pressing into me, engulfing me. Fear and arousal mixed inside me.

“You and I both know that I won’t have to force myself on you,” he murmured, mouth inches from mine.

His hand moved to skim down the sides of my body until it reached the hem of my skirt, running it up my stocking covered thigh.

I didn’t push him away. I didn’t fight him. Nothing. I stayed still, holding my breath as his fingers skimmed upward, to my bare thigh, rubbing at the skin of my bikini line, his eyes locked on mine.

I didn’t even fight him as his fingers climbed, moving against my clit.

Outside of my control, a moan escaped my lips as my body continued to betray me.

Cold, empty air hit me as Cristian stepped back, his point made.

I couldn’t decide who I hated more in that moment, him or myself. He lifted his fingers to his mouth, tasting my arousal on them. Tasting his victory.

“You chose this, Sienna. You chose this by coming with me that day. You chose this by connecting yourself to a coward who had no idea how to handle you. No idea what he was giving away.”

My eyes snapped to his. “I-I’m not his possession to give away,” I stuttered. “I’m not anyone’s possession. And I’m certainly not yours to own.”

His stare splintered my insides. “You’re right, he never had you,” he mused. “But I owned you the second I saw you in that restaurant. I owned you then, and I own you now.”

There was a dull roar in my ears.

I didn’t have the strength to argue with him, didn’t have the strength to lie to myself.

A car picked me up from my apartment that night.

I’d worked on autopilot for the rest of the afternoon, leaving Cristian’s office after he told me he’d ‘be in touch.’ I’d walked through the hallways, ignoring the smiling receptionist as she instructed me to have a good day.

There had been a car waiting for me outside the building.

Felix was standing outside of it, eyes on me the second I emerged. He looked exactly the same as the last time I saw him, tall, lean, white hair, clad in all black. His ivory skin all the more shocking in the bright afternoon light. People stared at him as they walked past. New Yorkers stared at him. Which said something about the kind of man he was. New Yorkers didn’t blink when they walked past someone shitting in the street, not even as they bumped into a runway model or sitcom star. New Yorkers were much too jaded to be impressed or scared of anyone.

Yet there it was, in all of their eyes as they passed. Fear and appreciation.

Felix didn’t look anywhere but at me. It was there, in his eyes again, that knowing. It was a fucking taunt, and I hated it. Hated him. He opened the door for me. I got in. Without a fight. Without making a scene. I just fucking got in.

“You know about what your boss is doing.” I shot the statement at him as we sped through Midtown. It had taken me minutes to form the words. To find my anger. I was furious at Felix, even though he wasn’t the one forcing me to marry him. He was part of it somehow. He was under my skin.

He didn’t answer.

He knew.

And he wasn’t going to do a fucking thing about it. He certainly wasn’t going to be my savior. He was interested in me. I was smart enough to recognize that. But in that same cold, toxic way Cristian was. Definitely not on Cristian’s level. And he was loyal. He had to be. He was aware that his boss was forcing a woman to marry him through threats. Yet he did not drive me to a police station. We arrived back at my office.

“Check your email.”

It was the first time he’d spoken to me. I’d been prepared to shout at him, tell him what a piece of shit he was, but that fire had died out, a numb resignation taking its place.

I did as ordered, my heart stopping, seeing Cristian’s name in my inbox. He’d sent it mere minutes after I’d left.

I didn’t know what I expected to be in the email ... surveillance photos of Jessica to prove he wasn’t bluffing, something to scare me into submission. I expected something sinister.

The contents of the email had to do with work. Specifically cases he wanted the firm to deal with. Cases, I quickly estimated, that would earn the firm six figures in billables. Cases that would be great for my career and standing in the firm. And that would provide a valid reason for the meeting we’d just had. They were above board, of course, to do with the restaurant, a chain of laundromats he owned, contracts for the venture capitalist firm, companies they were acquiring.