Metal clinked faintly as I shifted my position. With one leg drawn up and the other hanging down over the side of the bed, I tilted my head and inserted my makeshift lockpicks again. It felt as though I was getting closer. I had finally figured out how to position the lockpicks so that they reached the locking mechanism, so now it was only a matter of finding the right places to push the needle against.
I might have gotten Callan to agree that he wouldn’t try to make me do a formal surrender anymore, but who knew how long that would last. Dark mages broke promises all the time. And I trusted Callan about as much as a starving wolf, so I had to get out of these manacles and shove a knife into his heart before he decided that he was done playing nice.
Footsteps sounded in the corridor outside.
My heart leaped into my throat. Based on the walking pattern, it was Callan. He had left me in here on my own since Sienna left yesterday, and it was already evening now, so I had thought he would leave me alone the entire day today. But apparently not.
Rolling over, I yanked open the small drawer in the bedside table and pushed the lockpicks into the tiny gap underneath it. After closing it silently, I snatched up the book I had placed on the nightstand and threw myself down on the bed.
Just as I flipped it open to a random page, the handle was pushed down and then the door was shoved open.
I shot upright as if it had surprised me. When my gaze found Callan’s face, I drew my eyebrows down in a scowl. “Still haven’t learned to knock, I see.”
His eyes drifted over me where I sat on the bed, and then his gaze snagged on the book I was still holding. Since I was using it as a distraction, I had picked the smuttiest-sounding book on the entire shelf. Either Callan had read it or he had stocked the bookshelf himself, because he appeared to recognize it.
Snapping his gaze back up to my face, he smothered the brief flash of surprise and instead let a lethal glint creep into his eyes. “Still haven’t learned how to address me with proper respect, I see.”
“Oh if that’s what you’re waiting for, darling, you’re going to be waiting for a long time.”
He advanced on me. Placing the book back on the nightstand, I slid off the bed and straightened right as Callan reached me. For a moment, he only stood there. Watching me. Considering. As if he was trying to decide what to do. But in the end, he just slid a key out of his pocket and then crouched down before grabbing the manacle around my ankle.
A smirk played over my lips as I watched him insert the key. “This is my favorite part of the day.”
Pausing before he could turn the key, he tilted his head back and met my gaze. “Because I free you?”
“No.” The smug smile on my mouth turned even more wicked. “Because you kneel before me.”
Surprise flickered in his eyes. It was followed by some kind of emotion that I mistook for approval, before at last, a sharp smile curled his lips. While straightening, he pulled the key back out without actually unlocking the manacle. It disappeared into his pocket again as he pressed forward, using his lean muscled body to back me the final steps towards the wall.
I had to suppress a satisfied laugh as my back hit the smooth marble. By all hell, he was so easy to rile. I was almost going to miss baiting him like this after I had killed him.
A small shiver of pleasure coursed through my body as Callan trailed light fingers over my collarbones. I drew in a treacherously shuddering breath as he moved his hand higher before wrapping it around my throat. While keeping it in a firm grip, he leaned closer to my face.
“Don’t forget who holds the power here,” he said, his voice laced with quiet command.
Reaching forward, I palmed his cock through his pants. It hardened instantly. I smirked up at him. “I never do.”
Dark desire flared up in his eyes. It burned with an intensity that left me speechless for a moment.
Callan tightened his grip on my throat, pushing me harder against the wall. Leaning down, he brushed his lips over my jaw. “Then how about a bet?”
“What kind of bet?”
“If you can stop yourself from coming, I will admit that you hold the power here.” His lips reached that spot below my ear, making my whole body shudder. “But if I can make you come, you will follow my orders without question.”
“That doesn’t seem like a very fair exchange.”
“Alright, you only have to follow my orders until I leave this room again.” His lips made their way back along my jaw before he slanted them over mine. “Deal?”
His warm breath against my skin made my core throb with need. “Deal.”
He withdrew. Taking his hand from my throat, he touched his palms together. A thrill raced up my spine. Though I would never admit it to his face, the way he used his vibrating force magic was another thing I was going to miss when he was dead. I’d best enjoy it while I could.
Magic sprang to life around his left hand. While locking eyes with me, Callan reached down with his right and grabbed the dark green skirt of my dress. Then he started drawing it up my legs.
The fabric bunched in his hand as he worked.
When the hem at last joined the rest of the fabric in his hand, the dress had been lifted high enough that it only covered the top of my thighs. Callan paused. My heart thumped in my chest. For a while, he just watched me, his eyes searing into me as he studied every inch of my face. The anticipation of what was to come made my pulse thrum in my ears.
A satisfied smile tugged at Callan’s lips, as if he could read the impatience in my eyes.
At last, he moved his left hand. Faint pulses of force magic skittered over my skin as Callan drew his hand up my thigh. His eyes tracked my reaction. Then his fingers reached my entrance, and I had to suppress a gasp. But to my surprise, it was Callan’s eyes that widened.
“You’re not wearing any panties,” he stated, his voice a rough whisper.
“Of course not.” I raised my eyebrows at him. “You made me strip down yesterday to check for knives, and then you locked the manacle around my ankle and stalked out. How was I supposed to get any panties up my right leg with this chain on?”
Instead of answering, he briefly closed his eyes as if trying to compose himself. I was just about to taunt him again when he opened his eyes and pressed his fingers against my pussy at the same time. The words died on my tongue and a gasp tore from my throat instead.
“Obviously, you weren’t,” he answered with a new mocking glint in his eyes. “Now, I’d focus on the task at hand, if I were you. Unless you secretly want to lose this bet.”
As much as I wanted an orgasm, I wanted to hear Callan admit that I held the power even more. So I leaned my head back against the cool marble wall and blew out a long breath to steady myself. I was going to win this.
Force magic pulsed against my clit. I jerked upwards slightly in response to it. Callan released my dress, letting it rest against his left forearm, and moved his right hand up to my hip. Taking it in a firm grip, he forced me down to the soles of my feet again.
The strength of the vibrations increased. I sucked in a bracing breath as pleasure started building inside me. Closing my eyes, I tried to block out the feeling.
A tremor racked my body as Callan’s lips suddenly appeared on my skin. Starting in that dangerous spot below my ear, he kissed his way down my throat while his magic continued pulsing against my clit.
I forced in a deep breath.
Irrational thoughts shot through my mind. I wanted Callan’s hands all over my body. I wanted his naked skin against mine. I wanted his cock inside me. And I didn’t want this to be the last time. Hell damn it all, why did I have to be attracted to Callan fucking Blackwell?
A sharp breath ripped from my lungs as Callan shifted his fingers. While his thumb was pressed against my clit, sending vibrations straight to it, he pushed two fingers inside me. Force magic was wrapped around them as well.
My brain shut down for a second and a low moan rolled from my chest.
Callan placed a kiss at the crook of my neck while he started pumping his vibrating fingers in and out. I let out an unintentional whimper.
The edge drew closer. I tried to hold it off, to block out the pulsing pleasure inside me, but it was impossible. It was as if I was sliding along wet ice towards the sharp precipice ahead, unable to get any purchase on the slick surface.
He increased the strength of the vibrations.
I scrambled to make my brain work again and stop the impending fall. It was useless. I slid across the cliff, pleasure washing over me as my body gave in.
Callan smiled against my skin and continued pumping his fingers in and out of my trembling pussy as I came all over his hand. Unintelligible moans escaped my mouth when his force magic kept pulsing against my already throbbing clit.
When he at last withdrew his hand, I just slumped back against the wall. My chest heaved. Opening my eyes, I found Callan smirking down at me.
“Well, Audrey, looks like you’ll be following my orders then.”
I sucked in a deep breath to calm my racing heart. Fuck.
He let out a dark laugh as he sauntered over to the brown leather armchair next to the bookshelf. Light from the oil lamps danced over his sharp cheekbones as he turned back to face me while stopping in front of the armchair. It creaked faintly as he sat down, settling his powerful form against the smooth leather.
Bracing his right elbow against the armrest, he raised his hand and rested the side of his head against it. Amusement swirled in his eyes as he watched me where I still leaned against the pale marble wall. Outside the window, a fox barked into the quickly darkening evening.
“Strip,” Callan said, his voice dark and dripping with power.
Slowly turning my head, I met his gaze head on. He just raised his eyebrows expectantly. A thrill coursed through me at the way his whole body exuded authority.
After pushing off from the wall, I took a few steps forward so that I was standing right in his field of vision where he sat across the room. While holding his gaze, I reached up and started undoing the laces on the back of my dress. Callan’s eyes darkened.
I bit my lip.
He gripped the armrest hard with his left hand.
The laces loosened enough for me to get it off, so I drew my hand over my collarbones and then pushed my fingers under the short sleeve of the dress. It slid over my shoulder and down my arm. Callan’s lips parted slightly as I did the same thing with the other sleeve.
Once both sleeves were drooping down my arms, I started easing my way out of the dress. Callan’s chest seemed to rise and fall at a faster pace as the garment slid down my chest.
Just like the dress that Callan had ripped open in the bathroom in that rented house in Eldar, this dress didn’t require me to wear a brassiere underneath it, so when the smooth green fabric fell down to my waist, it left my breasts completely naked. My nipples hardened at both the memory and the exposure.
Drawing my hands down my body, I crossed my arms over my stomach and grabbed the dress where it hung around my hips. Callan sucked in a long breath. With practiced moves, I lifted the silky garment and pulled it over my head in one fluid motion. The dress rustled slightly as I dropped it, letting it fall down to rest on the dark wooden floorboards beside me.
Since I hadn’t been wearing any panties or a brassiere, the move left me standing there completely naked. Callan raked his eyes over my body as if drinking in every curve and every line. His intense gaze made my stomach do a strange flip.
“By all hell,” he began in a breathless voice. “You really are gorgeous.”
An unexpected blush heated my cheeks.
Panic flashed across Callan’s face. Clearing his throat, he wiped that mesmerized expression off his features. When he met my gaze again, only cool command remained on his face like a sheet of ice. But he was sitting with his legs spread wide, and I could see the bulge in his dark pants where his hard cock strained against the fabric.
“Kneel,” he ordered.
It sent a pulse of desire through my body. While holding his gaze, I lowered myself to my knees. The chain attached to the padded manacle around my ankle clanked as I moved. Callan watched me intently, but nothing of that wondrous disbelief remained on his face. Only that expression of unforgiving power. A sharp smile curled his lips.
“Crawl to me.”
I let out a surprised laugh. “What?”
“You heard me.”
For another few seconds, I just continued staring at him, my mouth slightly open.
He leaned forward, bracing his elbows on his knees, and leveled hard eyes on me. “Don’t make me repeat myself.”
Heat pooled at my core. Leaning forward, I placed my palms against the floor.
And then I crawled. On my hands and knees. Towards where Callan still sat in his leather armchair.
The chain rattled across the floorboards behind me.
My heart was beating so hard against my ribs that I thought Callan could surely hear it from across the room. By all hell, why was I turned on by this? I had just fought with everything I had to stop him from forcing me to do a formal surrender, and now I was crawling naked to him because he told me to. How was this any different? It was as if there was a huge disconnect between what I wanted from Callan behind a closed bedroom door and what I wanted from him in all other situations. And I didn’t know how to reconcile those two sides of me.
Before I could finish sorting through my confusing emotions, I reached the spot before the armchair. Taking my hands off the wooden floor, I sat back on my heels, kneeling between Callan’s legs.
When I tilted my head back and met his gaze, I found his eyes burning with enough desire to steal the breath from my lungs.
“I really was right before,” he said in a voice that sounded rough and a bit fractured. Reaching out, he trailed his hand along my jaw, drawing a pleasant shudder from me. “I do love watching you crawl.”
Lightning crackled across my skin as he traced his fingers over my throat.
A smirk blew across his lips. He jerked his chin. “Get on the bed.”
Placing my palms on his thighs, I used his legs as support to push myself to my feet. When I was once more standing up, I paused where I stood between his legs and leaned down until I could draw my own fingers along his jaw. I was rewarded with a shudder of pleasure as his eyes briefly fluttered closed.
Before he could do anything else, I stepped back and made my way towards the bed. While I climbed onto it and positioned myself in the middle of the large mattress, Callan stripped out of his own clothes and draped them across the back of the leather armchair. But when he started towards the bed, he moved to the side of it rather than climbing up on it.
Metallic clanking filled the room as he grabbed the chain still connected to the foot of the bed. Using his other hand, he grabbed the manacle around my ankle.
I tracked Callan’s movements as he started towards the headboard. As he walked, he lifted my leg upwards. Confusion rippled through me, but I said nothing.
When my leg was positioned straight up into the air, I thought he might stop. But he didn’t. Instead, he shifted his grip to my calf and continued pushing my leg back until it was tilted back towards my shoulder.
While holding it in that position, he used his other hand to draw the folded chain around the bedpost. Twisting my head to the side, I tried to figure out what he was doing.
He flashed me a wicked smirk before placing the loop of the folded chain over my head.
Stunned disbelief clanged through me. A moment later, it was replaced by a throbbing sense of need.
After Callan moved back to the foot of the bed, he paused to admire his handiwork. My leg was stretched up, tilting slightly back towards my shoulder, which exposed my whole pussy to him. The chain that kept my leg raised like that had also been drawn behind the bedpost and then looped over my throat. That meant that if I tried to lower my leg, I would choke myself on the chain. I could of course have just reached up and used my hands to lift it back over my head, but for some reason, I really didn’t want to.
Callan smiled like a villain.
I shifted my other leg and repositioned my hips to get into a more comfortable position while Callan at last climbed onto the bed. The mattress dipped underneath me as he knelt between my legs.
A gasp ripped from my throat as he brushed his knuckles over my pussy.
“You’re soaking wet,” he stated. With that wicked smile still on his lips, he braced his other fist on the bed and leaned over me. The fingers of his right hand trailed back up over my throbbing entrance. “Tell me how it felt to crawl before me.”
I drew in a shuddering breath as he traced his thumb over my clit.
“Tell me,” he coaxed.
His fingers skimmed my entrance while his thumb continued circling. Frustration crackled through me.
“No,” I growled. Grabbing the back of his neck, I yanked his face closer to mine. “No more fingers. No more teasing. I want you to fuck me.”
He leaned down farther while his fingers continued their torture, and spoke his next words directly against my lips. “Then tell me how it felt.”
“I liked it,” I gasped out. “I liked it. Okay? Now fuck me.”
A dark laugh rolled from his chest, making his warm breath caress my skin. Reaching up, he wrapped his hands around my wrists and pulled them downwards, forcing me to break my grip on the back of his neck.
Soft sheets appeared against the back of my hands as Callan pushed them down against the mattress on either side of my head. While keeping them pinned like that, he shifted his hips and positioned his cock against my entrance. I let out a low moan as he drew the tip through my wetness.
He pushed into me.
My body jerked against the bed and my leg dipped lower, making the chain around my neck tighten. I sucked in a startled breath and raised my leg higher again while Callan drew out and then slowly slid in again.
“I said, fuck me,” I snapped in frustration at his slowness. “You damn—”
He crushed his lips against mine, cutting off my insult, while shoving his cock all the way in. I gasped into his mouth. Pushing his tongue between my teeth, he tangled it with mine at the same time as he pulled out his cock and then thrust deeper inside me again. A moan came from deep within my chest. I arched my back, and my leg dropped lower again.
The chain pressed into the sensitive skin of my throat. Callan tightened his grip on my wrists and shoved inside me once more. I forced my mind to keep working and moved my leg closer to my shoulder again, easing the pressure on my neck.
Callan tore his lips from mine and traced them along my jaw and towards that spot below my ear, as if he knew how much I liked it when he kissed me there, while thrusting his cock in and out at a steady rhythm.
My chest heaved, and my muscles trembled from trying to keep my leg in that strained position. I pulled against his strong hands that kept my wrists pinned to the mattress, but he didn’t let up. Instead, he let his warm breath skitter across my skin before kissing that spot below my ear that always made me fall apart.
A violent shudder racked my body.
I let out a pitiful moan from the back of my throat.
Callan smiled against my skin before stealing a savage kiss from my lips. Then he started back towards that same spot again. My leg shook and I was quickly losing my ability to form coherent thoughts.
The chain tightened across my throat as I let my leg drop into a more comfortable position. I could still breathe. But barely.
Callan thrust into me all the way to the hilt. Pleasure rolled over me at the feeling of his hard cock filling me completely. I arched my back, but that only cut off my air more. I didn’t care. I wanted more. More of this. More of him.
While pounding into me, he stole what little breath I had left with furious kisses. I let out a dark moan as my tongue tasted the inside of his mouth. Pleasure continued building inside me.
My lungs screamed for air.
But I didn’t care because that waiting edge sped closer.
His cock hit the perfect spot. I bit down on his bottom lip as sweet release crashed over me.
The chain rattled as my leg shook violently in the air. Needy groans spilled from my lips. My pussy clamped down around Callan’s thick cock as he continued sliding in and out of me. I tried to suck in a breath, but my leg had dipped so low that I could no longer get any air through at all.
While prolonging my orgasm, Callan released one of my wrists and placed his palm against the back of my thigh, pushing my leg back up.
Air flooded my lungs.
I sucked in desperate breaths while the final tremors coursed through my body.
Callan abruptly yanked his cock out before he could come as well.
While continuing to brace my leg with his hand, he unhooked the chain from around my throat. The metal clanked against the wood below as Callan slowly lowered my leg and placed it back on the bed, making the chain slide to the floor. I just lay there. Gasping in breaths while my mind spun with the aftershocks of my orgasm.
The mattress shifted underneath me before Callan’s face appeared above my own. I was having trouble focusing my eyes, but it almost looked as if a small smile played over his lips while he studied me. And for a moment, I thought he might lean down and brush a soft kiss against my mouth. But then he gave his head a quick shake and rolled off the bed instead.
A soft click sounded as he unlocked the manacle and removed it from my ankle. It hit the floor next to the bed with a thud.
“Now, go take a shower and put some clothes on,” he ordered while stalking over to the armchair and pulling his pants back on. “Let the guard outside know when you’re ready.”
Without waiting for me to reply, he grabbed the rest of his clothes in one hand and strode out the door in nothing but his pants.
An unbidden thought blew through my mind.
As soon as I could pick the lock on my own, I was going to kill him.
So when I watched the way his lethal muscles shifted as he walked away from me, I couldn’t help but wonder if this had been the last time that we would ever do something like this.
