CHAPTER FOUR
MY RITUAL
PAST
I checked my watch again, then took it off impatiently, tossing it into a drawer.
She was supposed to be here in fifteen minutes, but I'd been ready for her for hours. I was too preoccupied to work, instead putting my efforts into grueling workouts and dinner prep.
I began to pace.
I was antsy, distracted, and restless in a way that was foreign to me.
I'd dismissed my staff halfway through the day, needing total solitude in this strange mood of mine.
For the first time that I could remember, I wasn't sure how the evening was supposed to play out or the best way to handle things. This sort of meeting usually only went one way for me. It didn't start with dinner, and it didn't end with a sleepover.
I didn't know what she wanted from me, or what she expected, and that was the whole problem, because I wanted many things from her. Things she didn't seem remotely interested in.
It was safe to say I'd never run into this problem before.
Taking off my watch was no help, as I was checking the time again a scant two minutes later.
Where was she? Would she really cut it this close?
With a curse, I sought out a phone and called her.
"Hello," Bianca answered breathlessly.
It had me on instant alert, my entire body stiffening. "Where are you?" I heard myself asking, voice unwillingly harsh.
"I was just about to head out," she said, tone so strange that I found myself dissecting every word, looking for a clue to what it was about it that had my jaw clenching.
"I'll be there in about twenty minutes," she continued, "if I don't make any wrong turns."
"What's going on? You sound strange. And you're going to be late. This is one of many reasons why I wanted to send a driver."
"I'll be right there." Her voice broke on that sentence, and that's when I knew what I heard in her voice.
Desire. Need.
"What are you doing?" I purred, eyes closing in pleasure. If she was in this state now, I knew just how to control the situation, and the shift in power gave me instant relief. Reaching down, I pinched the tip of my erect c**k hard. "Why do you sound so breathless?"
There was a long pause on the other end, but finally she answered, "Nothing."
A lie.
My jaw clenched, and I pinched myself harder. "Are you touching yourself?" I bit out.
"No," she lied again.
"Do you remember what I said I'd do to you if you lied to me?" I asked her, in equal parts turned on and infuriated by her defiance. "I believe that's three times now. Don't make yourself come. Your cunt is mine, and so is your pleasure. You're not allowed to come unless I say so."
She moaned, and I just about came in my hand.
"If you don't get into your car this second, I'm coming there, and then I won't let you come for hours," I barked, hanging up on her.
I went into the one of the property's control rooms, waiting impatiently for her vehicle, my mind filled with the ways I would own her in a few short minutes.
It was her first time, but I didn't want to take it slow or easy on her, didn't know if I was capable of it. Was she a true masochist? Would she find some enjoyment even in that sort of pain?
I was beyond impatient, yearning, longing to find out.
I opened the gate as soon as I finally saw a car approach, shrugging out of my shirt and heading to the entrance hall to watch for her.
I swung the front door wide as she reached the bottom of the small set of stairs that led up to the entrance, taking her in with gimlet-eyed satisfaction.
She paused there, and we stared at each other for a long time.
The lust in the air just then was so thick I felt like I could reach out and touch it with my hand. Could stick out my tongue and taste it. It was heady, drugging.
All-consuming.
She wore a sheer black dress with flowers painted across it. It was flimsy, revealing her figure even in the near dark.
Even delivered to my doorstep, clearly dressed for sex, she looked cool and untouchable.
I would make her touchable. I knew it and she knew it, and it drove me wild.
"Get in here," I told her, wondering how I was even going to last from here to the bedroom.
She obeyed without a word, her expression stoic.
I was taking up most of the open doorway, which forced her to brush very close to me.
I sucked in a breath.
Just how out of line would it be to take her virginity on the floor of my entryway? How uncouth and unforgivable? I wondered. Because it was about a second away from happening.
"I had dinner ready, but that's going to have to wait," I informed her, my tone clipped, patience shot. "You're a little minx, you know that?"
She shook her head, looking nonchalant as she glanced around.
Her silence made my jaw clench. I didn't know what to do with it.
"I gave my entire staff the night off, so we're quite alone," I explained to her, to reassure her of our privacy in the event that I did, in fact, take her where she stood.
I held onto my control by the thinnest thread. I'd had my fingers inside of her, had felt the barrier of her hymen, and been obsessed with it ever since. I'd had time to dwell on just why it consumed my thoughts and came to the conclusion that it was the ownership it gave me. It was mine to take, to claim, to break, and in the breaking, I'd own a part of her that no one else had ever touched.
She ignored me as though I hadn't spoken, moving to run her hand along the heavy rail of the stairway that ran to the second floor.
I couldn't take it. I moved behind her, a breath away from touching her, a heartbeat away from losing it.
"Where's your bedroom?" she asked, her tone damn near casual.
A deep, primitive hunger rocked through my body. I shuddered in pleasure, my hand gripping her nape. I squeezed, then began to rub.
She leaned into the contact.
I grabbed her hair, making it into a handle at her nape, and began to lead her upstairs.
If she was going to refrain from all artifice, all teasing, I could restrain myself for at least the time I took to get near my bed.
I led her like that to my bedroom, stopping just inside of the door to let her take it in.
I'd arranged things just how I liked them, not pulling any punches. I wanted no misunderstanding here.
Restraints hung from the latticed top of the bed, others strewn at the posters. It was spelled out in barbaric letters all over the room. This was where I would take her body, claim ownership of it.