Page 42 of Her Obedience (Ruin & Gold #1)

"Excuse me," I call to the driver. "Are you available after this drop-off?"

He glances up, assessing my evening wear and confident tone. "Twenty minutes, back here?"

"I need to leave now," I say, opening my clutch to flash the sapphires. "I'll pay extra."

His eyes widen at the glimpse of jewelry. "Where to?"

"Bus station," I reply, sliding into the backseat. "Greyhound."

As we pull away, I don't look back at the glittering hotel hosting my husband and three hundred of Chicago's elite. My absence won't be noticed immediately—Gage has been in deep conversation with the mayor and developers, pleased with my apparent acceptance of my role these past weeks.

The bus to New York leaves in twenty minutes, with stops in Indianapolis, Louisville, Cincinnati before continuing east. I pay cash, keeping my wrap tightly closed over my makeshift dress. One advantage of bus travel—anonymity that airports with their ID requirements can't provide.

In the grimy terminal bathroom, I transform myself further. The silk gown gets folded into a tight bundle and stuffed into a garbage bin. My wrap, belted with the decorative sash from the gown, becomes a simple black dress. I scrub makeup from my face with rough paper towels.

The woman who boards the bus looks nothing like Mrs. Blackwood.

The Greyhound pulls away from the station at 11:42 PM, exactly as scheduled. I press my forehead against cool glass, watching Chicago's skyline recede into darkness, heart hammering against my ribs. This is really happening. I'm really leaving.

But leaving what, exactly? The question gnaws at me as state lines blur past my window.

Leaving a prison, yes – but also leaving comfort, security, and a passion that still haunts my dreams despite my waking resistance.

Leaving a man who owns me completely but looks at me with something that sometimes resembles genuine admiration.

Am I running from captivity, or from the terrifying realization that parts of me have begun to accept it? To crave it? The question keeps me awake as other passengers doze around me, their soft snores a counterpoint to my racing thoughts.

For six hours, I barely breathe. Indianapolis appears through early morning fog – the second scheduled stop on the long route to New York. Passengers disembark for a thirty-minute break, stretching legs and seeking caffeine.

The convenience store across from the bus station offers overpriced coffee and packaged pastries. I purchase both, calculating remaining funds with obsessive precision. The cashier barely glances at me – just another traveler passing through.

Outside, morning light casts long shadows across the parking lot. Twenty minutes until the bus departs again. I sip bitter coffee, scanning surroundings with the hypervigilance of prey.

That's when I see it – a black Aston Martin idling at the far end of the lot.

My coffee slips from nerveless fingers, splashing across cracked concrete. No. Not possible. Not this quickly.

I turn to flee back toward the station, but he's already there, materializing from the shadows between buildings. Gage, still in evening clothes, bow tie undone, stubble darkening his jaw. His eyes burn with an intensity that freezes me mid-step.

"Going somewhere?" His voice is dangerously soft.

I back away, glancing desperately toward the station where my bus waits. "How did you?—"

Before I can finish, he's closed the distance between us, one hand gripping my upper arm, the other at my waist as he pulls me into the narrow alley between the convenience store and adjacent building.

"Did you really think I wouldn't find you?" His breath fans hot against my ear as he presses me against rough brick. "That I'd let you go?"

"Let me go," I demand, pushing against his chest, though we both know it's futile. "I don't belong to you."

"Don't you?" His hand slides to my throat, not squeezing, just resting there – a reminder of his physical dominance. "Tell me, Penelope. Where exactly were you running to? Who were you planning to be?"

The questions hit with unexpected force. Who was I planning to be? The terrifying truth is I don't know anymore.

"It doesn't matter," I whisper. "Anywhere but your cage."

"My cage?" His laugh lacks humor. "You mean our home? Our life?"

His mouth crashes down on mine, stealing breath and protests alike. The kiss is punishing, possessive – all teeth and tongue, claiming rather than seducing. I tell myself I'm resisting, but my body betrays me as always, my lips parting, my tongue meeting his with equal fervor.

His hands are everywhere – in my hair, gripping my waist, sliding down to cup my ass through the thin fabric of my makeshift dress. When he pulls back, we're both breathing hard, desire and fury mingling in the scant space between us.

"You're mine," he growls, spinning me to face the wall. The rough brick scrapes my palms as I brace against it. "I'll remind you exactly who you belong to."

His hand slides up the back of my thigh, discovering my lack of underwear with a sharp inhale. "No panties, Mrs. Blackwood? Were you hoping to catch someone's attention on that bus?"

"Fuck you," I gasp as his fingers move higher, sliding through slick folds that betray my body's response to his dominance.

"Already wet for me," he observes, voice dropping to that dangerous tone that makes my knees weak. "Even as you're running away, your body knows who it belongs to."

Two fingers thrust inside me without warning, curling to find that spot that makes my vision blur. My forehead presses against cool brick as I bite my lip to keep from crying out.

"Someone could see us," I protest weakly, even as my hips rock back against his invading fingers.

"Let them." The sound of his belt unbuckling sends a thrill of anticipation racing down my spine. "Let them see exactly what happens when you try to leave me."

He withdraws his fingers, replacing them with the thick head of his cock, teasing my entrance with maddening restraint. "Tell me who you belong to."

Pride wars with desperate need. "No one," I manage, though my body contradicts me, pressing back, seeking more.

His response is swift – one powerful thrust that buries him to the hilt, stretching me completely, drawing a cry I can't suppress. One large hand clamps over my mouth, muffling sounds that might attract attention.

"Wrong answer," he whispers against my ear, withdrawing almost completely before slamming back in. "Try again."

The brutal pace he sets leaves no room for thought, only sensation. Each thrust drives me harder against the wall, the friction of rough brick through thin fabric adding painful counterpoint to the pleasure building between my legs.

His free hand snakes around to find my clit, circling with devastating precision. "Who do you belong to, Penelope?"

"You," I gasp against his palm, shame and arousal twining into an emotion I can't name. "You, Gage."

"That's right." His fingers increase their pace, matching the relentless rhythm of his cock as it drives into me. "Mine. Every. Fucking. Inch."

The dual stimulation—his cock stretching me to my limits, his fingers working my clit with expert knowledge of exactly how to break me—pushes me toward an edge I've tried desperately to resist.

"You don't get to leave," he growls, biting down on my earlobe hard enough to sting. "You don't get to run from this. From us. From me ."

My body tightens around him, inner walls clenching as release approaches with humiliating speed. I hate that he can do this to me—reduce me to desperate need with such effortless skill—yet I can't fight the rising tide of pleasure.

"Come," he commands, voice strained with his own approaching climax. "Come on my cock while I remind you exactly who owns this perfect body."

The orgasm hits like violence—waves of pleasure so intense they border on pain, radiating outward from where we're joined. My scream is muffled by his hand, but I feel the vibration of it through my entire body as I convulse around him.

He drives into me one last time, deep and claiming, holding me flush as his release pulses inside, sealing his mark with every throb. His teeth sink into the juncture of my neck and shoulder, claiming me in the most primal way possible.

For endless moments, we remain locked together, both trembling in the aftermath. Reality seeps back slowly—the discomfort of brick against my chest, the distant sounds of the bus station, the cooling stickiness between my thighs.

As Gage withdraws, I feel empty in more ways than physical. He turns me gently to face him, his expression smoothing back into controlled neutrality despite the evidence of our encounter.

"Why did you run?" he asks, voice softer now as he tucks himself away, straightens his clothing.

The question pierces deeper than his physical claiming. Why did I run? Because I should want freedom. Because a woman with dignity wouldn't accept what I've accepted. Because I'm terrified by how easily my body submits to his. Because I'm more frightened by how my mind has begun to follow.

"I don't know who I am anymore," I admit, the truth spilling out before I can stop it. "I don't know if I'm still me, or just what you've made me."

His thumb traces my lower lip, gentle now where he was forceful before.

"You're still you, Penelope." His hand moves to cup my cheek. "The difference is you're also mine."

As reality reasserts itself, as Gage helps straighten my makeshift dress with surprisingly tender movements, the terrible truth crystallizes with painful clarity: I don't know who I am without him anymore. Freedom has become a theoretical concept rather than practical reality.

"The car is waiting," he says, voice returning to its usual controlled cadence. "We're going back to Chicago."

I follow him across the parking lot, legs still trembling from both pleasure and revelation. The bus to New York departs without me.

Freedom was always an illusion.

The Aston Martin purrs through the night, devouring miles of highway back toward Chicago. I lean my head against the cool window, watching raindrops race across the glass—each one disappearing as quickly as it forms, like my attempts at freedom.

Gage drives in silence, his knuckles white on the steering wheel, jaw clenched with the remnants of his fury. The space between us crackles with unspoken words and the lingering scent of what happened in that alley.

I taste salt and realize tears are streaming down my face. Not the dramatic, heaving sobs of Hollywood heroines, but the quiet, devastating kind that come when something inside you has fundamentally broken.

"Why are you crying?" Gage asks, his voice unnervingly gentle now that victory is secured.

I don't answer immediately, watching the highway lights blur through my tears. What could I possibly say? That I'm mourning the woman I used to be? That I hate how my body betrays me, how it craves his touch even as my mind screams for freedom?

"Look at me, Penelope."

I keep my gaze fixed on the darkness beyond the window. "There's nothing left to say."

"There's everything to say." His hand reaches for mine, but I jerk away.

"Don't." The word holds all the venom I can muster. "Don't pretend this is anything but what it is."

He falls silent again, and I close my eyes, desperate to escape into momentary darkness. But even there, I see him—feel him—the phantom sensation of his hands on my skin, his mouth claiming mine, the pleasure I never wanted to feel.

"I hate you," I whisper, the words falling between us like broken glass.

"I know."

His calm acceptance only fuels the fire burning inside me. "You've taken everything from me—my freedom, my business, my dignity. And now..." My voice breaks. "Now you've even taken my resistance."

Rain beats harder against the windshield, mirroring the storm raging inside me.

"I hate that I respond to you," I continue, the confession tearing from somewhere deep and wounded. "I hate that my body betrays me every time you touch me. I hate that sometimes, I forget to hate you at all."

Gage pulls the car to the shoulder without warning, killing the engine. In the sudden silence, my breathing sounds harsh and ragged. He turns to face me, those blue eyes seeing far too much.

"I don't need your love, Penelope," he says quietly. "Just your presence."

A broken laugh escapes me, the sound raw and painful. "You have both," I whisper, the admission costing me everything I have left. "And I hate myself for it."

His hand reaches out, gently wiping tears from my cheek. I should pull away. I should slap him. I should scream until my throat is raw.

Instead, I close my eyes and lean into his touch, surrendering to the truth I've been fighting since Paris: the cage isn't just around me anymore—it's inside me too.