Page 7 of Dirty Game (Broken Blood #1)

His eyes darken. "I get to watch you learn that you're worth more than your virginity. Worth more than six million dollars. Worth breaking bones over."

He pulls back, and I want to chase his touch.

Want to lean into his hand.

Want things I don't have words for.

"Why did you really break his nose?" I ask. "And his wrist?"

"They insulted what's mine."

"You let them insult me for fifteen minutes before that."

His jaw tightens. "I was testing something."

"What?"

"How much you'd take. How deep the conditioning goes." He moves back to the window, the distance between us like cold water. "Your uncle did a number on you. Your brother, too. Made you think you deserve that kind of treatment."

"Maybe I do."

He turns on me so fast I gasp.

In two strides, he's back, hands on either side of me on the bed, caging me in.

"You don't. Whatever your uncle told you, whatever your brother did to you, whatever you've convinced yourself you deserve—you're wrong.

" His face is inches from mine. "You deserve to eat without fear.

To sleep without wondering who might come into your room.

To exist without men discussing you like meat. "

"I don't know how to do that."

"Then I'll teach you." He straightens, picks up another strawberry from the tray. "Open."

I open my mouth, and he feeds me the strawberry, his fingers brushing my lips.

This time, when juice runs down my chin, I catch it myself, but he watches the movement of my hand like it means something.

"Good girl," he says, and something low in my belly clenches at the praise.

I've never felt anything like this.

This pull, this ache, this need for him to touch me again.

When Marco's friends would leer at me, when Uncle Enzo's creditors would make suggestions, I felt nothing but disgust and fear.

But Varrick feeding me strawberries, calling me a good girl, makes me want things I don't understand.

"Finish the soup," he orders, moving back to his chair. "All of it."

I eat while he watches, hyperaware of every movement.

The way his eyes track my throat when I swallow.

The way he shifts in his chair when I lick soup from the spoon.

The way his hands clench when I unconsciously bite my lip.

"The chocolate too," he says when I finish the soup. "The one in the wrapper."

I unwrap what turns out to be a truffle, something expensive and dark.

When I bite into it, I can't suppress a small sound of pleasure.

It's the best thing I've ever tasted.

"Christ," he mutters, and when I look at him, his expression is almost pained. "You can't make sounds like that."

"Like what?"

"Like you're..." He stops, runs a hand through his hair. "Just eat the chocolate."

I finish it, confused by his reaction. "Did I do something wrong?"

"No." He stands abruptly. "You did everything right. That's the problem."

He walks to the door, pauses with his hand on the knob.

"The Corsinis will spread word about tonight. About what you did to their men." He doesn't turn around. "Good. Let them all know that anyone who touches you, anyone who even speaks about you wrong, will bleed for it."

"Why?" The question escapes before I can stop it. "Why do I matter?"

He's quiet for so long, I think he won't answer.

Then, without looking back, "Because you're the first person in this penthouse who isn't here by choice, but you still found a way to be valuable.

Because you look at how violent I am and don't run.

Because when I feed you chocolate, you make sounds that.

.." He stops, takes a breath. "Because you're mine, and I don't let anyone hurt what's mine. "

He leaves before I can respond, closing the door with a soft click.

I sit on my bed, empty tray in my lap, and touch my bottom lip where his thumb was.

I can still feel it, that contact that lit up nerve endings I didn't know existed.

I can still taste chocolate and strawberries, still feel the ghost of his fingers against my mouth.

Is this desire?

This warm, pulling feeling that makes me want him to come back, to touch me again, to explain why my body is suddenly speaking a language I don't understand?

I stand, walk to my bathroom, and look at myself in the mirror.

My lips are slightly swollen from his thumb, stained red from strawberries.

My pupils are dilated, cheeks flushed. I look... alive.

For the first time in years, I look alive.

I press my fingers to my lip where his thumb was, trying to recreate the sensation.

But my own touch does nothing.

It's him—specifically him—that makes my body react this way.

Between my thighs, there's an ache I've never felt before.

A warmth, a wetness that makes no sense.

Is this what those men were talking about?

This feeling?

But they made it sound violent, painful, something to endure.

This doesn't feel like something to endure.

This feels like something to chase.

I think about his thumb on my lip.

His fingers feeding me strawberries.

The way he said "good girl" like it was a reward.

My hand drifts to my stomach, to the heat building there, but I don't know what to do with it.

I don't know how to ease this ache.

Tomorrow, I'll go back to the books.

I'll find more thieves in his organization.

I'll be useful in the way that keeps me safe.

But tonight, I lie in bed and replay every moment—his violence in the restaurant, his gentleness feeding me, the way his eyes went dark when I made that sound while eating chocolate.

I've been taught my whole life that my virginity is my only value.

That my body is currency.

That I exist to be used by whatever man owns me.

But Varrick Bane doesn't look at me like I'm currency.

He looks at me like I'm his to protect, his to defend, his to keep safe.

His to feed strawberries to. His to call "good girl." His to want, if that darkness in his eyes meant what I think it did.

The thought should terrify me.

I'm already his property, bought and paid for with my father’s debt.

Adding desire to that equation should feel like another cage closing around me.

Instead, it feels like the first time I've ever wanted to be touched.

I press my thighs together, trying to ease the ache there, but it only makes it worse.

Makes me think about his hands, his mouth, parts of him touching parts of me in ways I don't fully understand but suddenly, desperately want to.

I dream of him coming back.

Of what might happen if he did.

Of learning what this heat means, what this ache is becoming, what my body is trying to tell me.

I dream of belonging to someone who breaks bones for my honor.

Who notices when I don't eat.

Who touches me like I'm something that might shatter, but also like he's fighting not to grasp me tighter.

Tomorrow, I'll pretend none of this happened.

But tonight, in the dark of this too-soft bed in this too-safe room, I let myself admit the truth.

I want Varrick Bane to touch me again.

And that terrifies me more than all his violence ever could.

Because being violent is simple. Predictable. It has rules.

But this feeling? This warmth, the desire I don't have words for?

This could destroy me in ways Uncle Enzo never could.

And I think I might let it.