by C. Lymari
When the world was at war, one of Russia’s greatest treasures disappeared and was never found again. When they built the runway, they brought back the room, dismantled and left it here. Only when the Sekt began to grow in power did they reconstruct it. I lit the torches by the door, illuminating them—large white doors with gold trim that made you feel insignificant.
Once inside, I started to light some of the chandeliers knowing that if I fell, it was risky, but this room was an experience, a piece of history. It would be a sin to practice in here in the dark.
When I stormed out of Daphne’s room, I couldn’t bring myself to go to my own. I tried to think about my next move.
“Did you ever wonder why I didn’t want you here in the first place?”
It couldn’t mean what I thought it did, right?
But that little confession made me want to change my plans, and I needed to figure out why Damian watched her like a hawk, what he had on her, and why when I had her cornered, she wanted to run.
So instead of going to my room, I stood in the shadows, waiting to see if she would try to see someone or if someone else would come to her room. For the first time since getting here, I was glad for the lack of light, which made me blend in much easier.
When her door opened, adrenaline coursed through my veins. Over my dead fucking body if she was on her way to see someone. I would kill them. I didn’t care about the repercussions.
It was too dark for me to see her since there was barely any light down here. Instead of coming to the stairs where I was hiding, she went toward where the torch was lit and grabbed it, carrying it deeper into the catacombs.
Keeping my distance, I followed the glow of the light, waiting to see who the fuck she was meeting up with.
She came to a halt a few minutes later, and then she pulled a door open. From where I was standing, the doors seemed to go on forever. When I heard the door shut, I followed to where she had disappeared. I was in the dark, so I reached back to pull out the Zippo. I flicked the dial and saw white in front of me.
I kept moving my hand, marveling at the gold trimming on the door. With my other hand, I reached out, trying to scratch it. Before going through the door, I walked back to get another torch.
When I made it back, I had a better view of what was in front of me. When you’re in the business, you make it your mission to know things of value—from art to flesh.
There’s a market for everything, and the more you know, the more power to you.
The only reason I knew about this place was because of the night I’d spent with Daphne in London. The object she was after was one of the four crown jewels stolen from Russia. In my search, I came across what was called the eighth wonder of the world, and if I was correct, I was now staring at it.
With my free hand, I pulled the door open, hoping it didn’t make much noise. The last thing I wanted was Daphne on her guard.
The room was dimly lit. The glow came from the chandeliers at the top. My eyes quickly scanned them, noticing a ladder that was around seven feet in height reclined against the wall.
The arches, gold designs, and angels were enough to render me speechless. They might have replicated the Amber Room, but you couldn’t replicate art; the second version was never as good as the first.
Then my eyes found her, and for a second, I lost my ability to fucking breathe. There were many layers to Daphne that somewhere along the way, I forgot there was femininity in her. She was more than a broken girl with no soul.
She had a blindfold over her eyes; that’s why she hadn’t seen me come in, and I could see the wireless pods in her ears. But the reason I couldn’t fucking breathe that was another stab from how little I actually knew about her was that she was dancing.
I always thought she had the body of a warrior, but I never thought she had one of a dancer until now when I watched her do a pirouette. Her movement was smooth and graceful, but when she raised her foot and kicked, it was with the force of a soldier.
Moving back, I leaned against the wall uncaring about the painting on the ceiling or the baroque style of the room. My eyes were only for the woman who was in front of me.
With one arm raised and the other down, she brought her torso down and then her leg up. Slowly, with precision, she brought her torso up again and walked on her tiptoes before laying them flat again. I watched as she started to move with more speed and do a flip. She was doing something between ballet and fighting.
I pulled her lighter from my back pocket, and even though it was too dark to see what it had engraved, I ran my thumb through the carving of the ballerina.
No one needed to tell me that it was given to her, that she was supposed to be what the engraving portrayed. Moments like this were when I knew more things about her than anyone else. My fury came back, and this time it wasn’t just me being mad at her because she had left me to die. Somewhere along the way, that didn’t matter; it was just another move in the game of chess we’d been playing. I had made the first move in Chicago and she made another in Colombia. Now the only thing that mattered was that I was going to show her that the queen would not trump a king—at least not me.
The reason I was angry as I watched her was that as a little girl, they demanded everything from her. Making her a killer wasn’t enough, so they forced grace, patience, and rhythm through ballet.
She was crafted into a perfect weapon. At least I had a somewhat normal childhood if you didn’t take into account the shit I had to watch, but my petal, because she was fucking mine, she never stood a chance.
If one thing was fucking clear, it was that she was good at learning things, so if I had to teach her to fucking worship me, then I would.
Pushing off from the wall, I made my way to her. She was so engrossed in what she was doing, she didn’t even feel me.
She was ready to do another turn when I grabbed her by the hips and pulled her back to me, grinding her arse against my hard-on. There was no way I was going to watch her and not get hard. She could fucking breathe in my direction and I was done for. That’s how much power she had over me.
Daphne went still as soon as I touched her. I brought my hand up, skimming her stomach and the curve of her breast, something I never got to play with much, and then I rested it above her heart. It was beating wildly, barely contained, playing her fears to the beat of my lust.
Still holding her waist, I moved my other hand higher and removed one of the headphones, then the other, and threw them on the floor.
“I’m still so fucking angry,” I whispered harshly in her ear. “I’m going to take you back to your room where I’m going to work my anger between your legs until your pussy is drenched in my cum.”
With her in my arms, I never felt more right. It didn’t matter she didn’t want me here, or that this was some kind of test for both of us. One way or another, we always ended up like this.
“You shouldn’t be here,” she said, sounding resigned to what was about to happen. She was ready to give in, but she didn’t know how.
“Petal,” I mumbled her name, my lips brushing the shell of her ear, causing her body to shiver. “Stop fighting it. You don’t have to do anything on your own.”
I forced her to walk with me. I held her close, my arm banding into her waist like a cage, trying to keep her with me. The hall was dark, and even if I could barely see, she was still blindfolded and at my mercy. As soon as we were in the hall, I slowly moved my arm below the waistline of her leggings.
The skin there was warm and calloused against my cold fingers. A shiver ran down her back, and I felt the way she twitched against my cock.
“Did you stop and think that if I died, you’d never have this again?” I mocked against her ear as I thrust my hips to her arse.
We kept walking with her in my arms and one of my hands sliding closer to her pussy each time. When I saw the glow from the lamp, I grinned, knowing we were close to her room.
“Tell you what, baby, you pass this test, and I’ll l
eave you alone,” I said because I could bet my life she would fail.
She took a second to answer, and when she did, she sounded unsure because deep down, she didn’t want me to let go. “What test?”
I didn’t answer her; instead, I brought two fingers to her pussy. Daphne got on her tiptoes with the intrusion of my fingers, her back arching and her head resting on my chest.
“You just failed, love,” I said triumphantly. My fingers swirled around her wetness before I pulled out my hand and brought it to her mouth, where I rubbed the moisture into her lips. When we were by the door, I turned her around and slammed her back against it. I bent my head to lick her lips, savoring the taste.
With the tip of my tongue, I traced the faint scar from the cut I had made on her lip. “Did you think of me every time the cut stung?”
She whimpered, and I brought her lip into my mouth, sucking it.
I dug into my pocket, looking for the key while I wrapped my other arm around her waist.
“I keep telling you, Petal, you can lie all you want, but I’ll always taste the truth.” Pushing the door open, my hands came to her waist, and I carried her as I kissed her lips brutally, not giving her any other option than to kiss me back.
Her hands wrapped around my neck, and it could be for support or because she wanted it, but right now, I didn’t care.
When I stepped into the room, I kicked the door with my foot. I walked us to the fire, then set Daphne down gently and turned her around. Her chest was rising and falling, her hand coming up to take off the blindfold.
Immediately, I grabbed both hands and brought them behind her back.
“Let me go,” she hissed.
“Nyet,” I ground out. Holding both her hands with one hand, I undid the blindfold with the other, then brought it down to tie her up. “It’s in your best interest to do as I say, Petal.”
“Then you have the wrong woman,” she said without turning to look at me. I bit my lip, containing my smile.
“I’m going to give you the option to kneel right now, and maybe I’ll tell you about the present I got you.”
Slowly I counted to three when she didn’t speak. I brought my foot up and pressed behind her knee at the same time I pushed her body down, forcing her to kneel for me.
“Let go of me,” she said. I knew she was seething, and what I would say would only get her angrier. Good, because I was fucking angry too.
“I’m done playing by your rules, baby. Now, we are going to play by mine.”
“What you need to do is get out of this room right now and forget you ever met me,” she bit back.
“Forget I met you?” I asked in disbelief. I tipped her jaw back so she was forced to look up at me. “That’s like asking me to forget the feel of rain on my skin or the warmth of the sunrays—impossible.”
She was getting me pissed off. It was time I retook control. I took a step around her until I was in front of her and she was kneeling before me.
Daphne made a move to try to get up, but I raised my foot and put it on her shoulder to stop her. She glared at me and was seconds away from knocking me on my arse.
“If you don’t do as I say, baby, I’m going to go to the pale demon and tell him about what really happened in Colombia plus your little trip to Italy.”
“What is it that you want?” she finally said, and I smiled. I removed my foot and stood there, looking down at her.
“I’m enjoying this, love,” I said, and she scowled. “Tell you what. I’m a nice guy—I mean, guess that’s why you decided to fuck me over raw, right?” Her eyes flashed with pain, and I gulped. Good, I affected her. “I’ll leave you alone forever. All you’ve got to do is past this last test.”
You reap what you sow, and here was my labor—colder and deadlier than ever, but I wasn’t afraid.
Having him here in my home, in the castle of horrors, threw me off my game a little bit; that’s how he managed to surprise me in the Amber Room. It took just a few seconds when he had grabbed me for my body to relax. I’d know his unique smell anywhere.
This was a power play, and I was impressed.
Gideon smirked at me, and the sight had my belly fluttering despite trying to make my body obey otherwise. Desire and longing had their own rules and didn’t want to play, but the ones I set for myself a long time ago. There was a weakness in me that grew the more time I spent with him. I hated that he was here, but deep down, I didn’t want him away.
“Wipe that smirk off before I stop playing nice and wipe the floor with your face,” I told him. He thought he got to make demands, but that’s because he didn’t know everything.
Gideon cocked his head and gave me a wolfish smile. I tried to hide the pain I felt at seeing how I had ruined his eye. My handsome man was scarred, and I feared to know if anything had been done to him beyond that.
“Oh Petal, there are many places I’d like to put my face, and the floor isn’t one of them.” His voice had dropped to a seductive purr that had every single part of me hyperaware.
The wolf rug under my feet was thick enough that made kneeling on it comfortable. Still, I didn’t like being like this, not only because I didn’t like kneeling but because it took me back to when I was a young girl. Back then I didn’t have to kneel. Back then I was at a perfect size for men to just stand there and violate me.
“Say your piece and then leave,” I said, looking away from him and staring at the fire, focusing on the steady glow of the flames.
He took another step toward me, and with my peripheral vision, I saw his hand go to his crotch. The sound of his zipper being pulled down was loud enough that I knew where this was heading.
“You can suck me off without getting wet, and I’ll forget I ever met you.”
I turned to look at him just as he was taking off his shirt. My God was he handsome, fucked-up eye or not. He was many things, but he didn’t belong here in the Sekt. It was one of the reasons I voted no in the first place. He was sunshine. He was the peace I sought, and somehow I only found it when I was with him. Wanting peace was dangerous when you were heading for war.
“If you want me as a whore like everyone else does, then that’s what you’ll get,” I ground out, and his eyes flared with anger.
I leaned forward and took him deep until his dick choked me. He grabbed me by the hair and fucked my face. Three brutal thrusts that had tears falling from my eyes. He pulled out of me with a loud popping sound from my mouth, and then he pushed me forward as he took a few steps back, causing me to fall at his feet.
Gideon was behind me in a second, his body pressing down on mine and his dick poking my ass.
“Did you like kneeling for me, love?” he mocked as he pushed my pants and undergarments aside.
His hand came around my waist and lifted me so I kneeled with my ass in the air.
When I felt his cold hand on my ass, I closed my eyes and bit my lip. I was not afraid of him, and I knew what the point was that he wanted to prove. He was humiliating me, and I was getting off on it.
“Have I ever told you how much I love your arse?” he mumbled softly as he gave my waist a soft peck. I felt his smile widening against my skin.
My cheek rubbed against the rug the moment Gideon smacked my ass hard. The sound echoed in my room, the sting of pain taking root. He did it again and again until I knew my bottom was probably red from all the hits he gave me, and I’d be lucky if I could sit without any pain.
The insides of my cheeks were torn and sore from where I kept biting them so I could stop myself from making any noise.
“Fucking hell, Petal, you look divine,” he said with awe in his voice, and that made me feel warm.
His hot breath was on my cheeks, and I winced at the small sting of pain it caused. With his tongue, he traced the globe of my ass, causing me to squirm. The slow ache that had been building in the Amber Room was now throbbing and demanding attention.
“Do you think I should keep going until I draw blood?” he asked right bef
ore he bit me. I cried out when I felt his teeth sinking into the tender flesh, digging into the skin.
Gideon undid the bind he had on my hand and flipped me around. He put his hands on either side of me. He looked unhinged, his whiskey eyes wide with lust and anger, and I needed him. I wanted him more than ever because I thought I had lost him. I thought I had killed him and that was weighing on my soul.
He just glared at me as he removed my flats and finished pulling my pants down, leaving me naked from the waist down.
“Bend your legs,” he demanded as he gazed down at me, and at that moment, I wanted to know his every thought. To see if his emotions mirrored my own, but most of all, I wanted to know if he hated me.
Without breaking eye contact, I did as he asked, and without being told, I spread my legs wider.
Gideon’s eyes traveled down my body leisurely until he got to the apex of my thighs, and his nose flared, his chest rising and falling.
His hand struck out and grabbed me by my throat, making it hard to breathe. “Did you even care about killing me?”
He didn’t loosen his grip so I could answer. I saw his hand reach behind his back and pull out a small scalpel. He removed the hand on my throat and made a small cut across my throat. I felt the sting of pain followed by the warmness of blood coating me. Then he thrust inside me. My body arched with the feel of him. I was soaked, and he was so mad he didn’t even gloat about it anymore. Incoherent whimpers left my lips as he fucked me harder with each thrust.
He was here, he was alive, and this might be the last time I ever thought of him as mine.
Gideon bent and licked the blood off my neck. “He almost killed me.”
My legs wrapped around his, giving up trying to resist him, and the moment I did that, he froze above me. He pulled back to look at me, and then he bent so his forehead pressed against mine. Our chests rose and fell in synch as our bodies were connected.
