Page 9 of His to Command (Obsessed #7)

eight

. . .

Hudson

I watch Robin sleep beside me in her small bed, her body curled toward mine like she's seeking warmth even in unconsciousness.

Her dark hair spills across the pillow we share, one strand caught in the corner of her parted lips.

I want to touch her—to trace the soft curve of her cheek, to brush that strand away, to wake her with my mouth on hers—but for once in my life, I restrain myself.

Let her rest. Tomorrow, everything changes.

Tomorrow, I lay waste to the last of her defenses.

Sleep eludes me. Has since the moment I saw her in that boardroom, looking up at me with those gold-flecked eyes.

I've built empires on less sleep than I've had this week, but this exhaustion feels different—bone-deep, exhilarating, necessary.

The price of revelation. The cost of finding something I never knew I was searching for.

Robin makes a small sound in her sleep, shifts closer to me. Her apartment is cold—the heating unreliable, the windows drafty. Tomorrow she moves in with me. She doesn't know it yet, but this will be her last night in this shoebox. I've already instructed my staff to prepare for her arrival.

But first, I need her to understand. To believe. To surrender not just her body but her doubts.

The gray light of dawn filters through her cheap blinds, painting stripes across her sleeping form.

She wears an oversized t-shirt, cotton panties—nothing like the lingerie women usually don for me.

The sight of her natural, unadorned beauty tightens something in my chest that has nothing to do with lust and everything to do with possession.

Mine. The word pulses with my heartbeat. Not just a desire anymore. A fact. A law of nature as immutable as gravity.

Her eyes flutter open, unfocused at first, then widening as she registers my presence. "You stayed," she whispers, voice rough with sleep.

"I told you I would." I finally give in to the urge to touch her, brushing that wayward strand from her lips. "I keep my promises, Robin."

She sits up, drawing the blanket around her like armor. Even now, even after everything, she tries to hide from me. That ends today.

"Do you want coffee?" she asks, a transparent attempt at normalcy.

"No." I sit up beside her, my back against her headboard. "I want to talk."

Wariness enters her eyes. "About?"

"Everything. No more games. No more corporate pretense." I take her hand, feeling the slight tremor in her fingers. "Just truth."

She nods, uncertain but willing. This courage of hers—this willingness to face what terrifies her—is part of what makes her mine.

"I've never wanted anyone before you," I begin, the words tasting strange on my tongue. I don't explain myself to people. Don't justify my desires. But Robin needs this, and so I give it to her. "I've had women. Used them. Discarded them when I grew bored. Sex was a physical release, nothing more."

Her cheeks flush, but she doesn't look away. Progress.

"The moment I saw you in that meeting, something... changed." I struggle to articulate what I've never had to put into words before. "Like recognition. Like finding something I didn't know was lost."

"That's just attraction," she argues softly. "Chemistry."

"No." The word comes out sharper than intended. I moderate my tone. "I know attraction. This is different. This is..." I search for the word, find only inadequate approximations. "Necessary."

Her lips part slightly, eyes widening at the raw honesty in my voice.

"You hide," I continue, reaching to touch her face. "Behind shapeless clothes and tight buns and professional distance. You make yourself small, invisible. And yet I saw you immediately. Only you."

"Why?" The question is barely audible.

"Because you're extraordinary." My thumb traces her lower lip. "Because you challenge me. Because you see me—not the CEO, not the billionaire. Me."

Her eyes search mine, looking for deception, for manipulation. She won't find any. For perhaps the first time in my adult life, I'm being completely honest.

"Hudson, this is?—"

"Let me finish." I cup her face between my palms. "I want you to understand what's happening here. What I'm offering."

She nods within my grasp, pulse visibly racing in her throat.

"I will tear down the world if it means keeping you." The vow emerges from some primal place I didn't know existed within me. "My company, my reputation, my empire—none of it matters compared to having you."

Tears gather in her eyes, but don't fall. "That's insane."

"Yes." I lean closer, our foreheads nearly touching. "Completely insane. Unprecedented. Terrifying."

"You don't even know me." It's her last defense, weak and crumbling.

"Then let me." I release her face, hands moving to the hem of her t-shirt. "Show me all of you, Robin. Not just your body. Everything you hide."

A shiver runs through her. Fear? Anticipation? Both? It doesn't matter. She raises her arms, letting me pull the shirt over her head.

The sight of her bare breasts in the morning light steals my breath. Full, lush, perfect—everything about her body is an ode to femininity, to softness. I've been with models, actresses, women society deems flawless. None of them affect me like the sight of Robin's generous curves.

"Beautiful," I murmur, hands hovering but not touching yet. "So fucking beautiful."

She crosses her arms instinctively, trying to hide. I gently pull them away.

"No more hiding." I guide her to lie back against her pillows. "Not from me."

Her breathing quickens as I look my fill, memorizing every dip and curve, every freckle, every place where her skin flushes under my gaze. I strip away her panties, removing the last barrier between us.

"Hudson," she whispers, uncertainty in her voice.

"Shhh." I press a kiss to her sternum, feeling her heart race beneath my lips. "Let me worship you."

I take my time, using mouth and hands to map every inch of her body. I trace the curve of her hip with reverent fingers, kiss the soft swell of her belly, nuzzle the underside of her breast. Places she's been taught to be ashamed of, I adore with deliberate attention.

"You're perfect," I tell her between kisses. "Every inch of you. Made for my hands. My mouth. My cock."

She moans as I take one nipple between my lips, suckling gently then with increasing pressure as she arches into my touch. My hand slides down her stomach, finding the wet heat between her thighs. She's already slick, ready for me.

"Look at you," I murmur against her skin. "So responsive. So eager."

"Please," she gasps as my fingers circle her clit, building a rhythm that has her hips lifting off the mattress.

"Please what?" I nip at her throat, leaving a mark that will show tomorrow. Let everyone see she's claimed. "Tell me what you need, Robin."

"You," she breathes, reaching for me. "Just you."

I shed my clothes quickly, efficiently, need overriding any desire for a show. When I cover her body with mine, skin to skin with nothing between us, we both groan at the contact. Perfect. Like two pieces of a puzzle finally aligned.

But I don't enter her yet. Instead, I work my way down her body, kissing, tasting, savoring. When I reach the junction of her thighs, I look up to find her watching me, lips parted, eyes heavy with desire.

"Mine," I growl against her inner thigh before licking a slow stripe through her center.

Her cry of pleasure is the sweetest sound I've ever heard. I devour her like a starving man, using tongue and lips and fingers to drive her higher, to prove with every touch that I worship her completely.

"Hudson!" she cries, hands fisting in my hair as she comes against my mouth. I don't let up, working her through the orgasm and immediately building toward another.

"That's it," I encourage as she writhes beneath me. "Let go. Show me."

Her second release is even more powerful than the first, her entire body arching off the bed, my name a broken chant on her lips. Only then do I move back up her body, positioning myself at her entrance.

"Look at me," I command softly.

Those remarkable eyes meet mine, hazy with pleasure but clear with certainty.

"If you walk away after this," I tell her, voice rough with emotion, "it will break me. Do you understand? You have that power."

Vulnerability has never come easily to me. Has never come at all, if I'm honest. But Robin needs to know. Needs to understand what she's doing to me.

Her hands come up to frame my face, mirroring how I held her earlier. "I'm not walking away," she whispers.

The sincerity in her eyes undoes me. I push into her in one long, deep thrust, both of us gasping at the sensation. She's tight, hot, perfect around me. Made for me. I establish a steady rhythm, deep and controlled, watching her face for every flicker of pleasure.

"You feel what this is," I say against her lips, punctuating each word with a thrust. "How right. How necessary."

"Yes," she agrees, legs wrapping around my waist, taking me deeper. "Yes, Hudson."

My name in her mouth is a benediction. I increase my pace, driven by a need that transcends the physical. Her fingernails dig into my back, marking me as I've marked her. Good. Let us both carry evidence of this claiming.

"Mine," I growl, the word a vow, a prayer, a declaration of war against anything that tries to separate us.

"Yours," she gasps, and something primitive in me roars in satisfaction.

I reach between us, finding the spot that makes her cry out, rubbing in time with my thrusts. Her inner muscles clench around me as her third orgasm builds. I'm close too, control fraying with each meeting of our bodies.

"Together," I demand, holding back my release through sheer willpower. "Come with me."

Her eyes lock with mine as pleasure overtakes her. The sight of her coming undone shatters my last restraint. I thrust once, twice more, then empty myself inside her with a guttural sound that barely sounds human.

For long moments, we remain joined, breathing hard, sweat-slick skin pressed together. I should move, should worry about crushing her beneath my weight. Instead, I bury my face in her neck, inhaling her scent, imprinting this moment in my memory.

"Hudson?" Her voice is soft, questioning.

I lift my head to find her watching me with something like wonder. "Yes?"

"You meant what you said? About...breaking you?"

The vulnerability in her question makes something in my chest constrict painfully. I consider lying—falling back on the impenetrable facade I've cultivated for decades. But Robin deserves truth. Only truth.

"Yes." I brush damp hair from her forehead. "You're the first person who's ever had that power over me. The only one."

She studies my face, searching for deception, finding none. "That's a lot of responsibility."

"It's not a burden I give you lightly." I ease off her, pulling her against my side. "But it's yours nonetheless."

She rests her head on my chest, finger tracing idle patterns through the light dusting of hair there. "What happens now?"

"Now?" I press a kiss to the top of her head. "Now we begin."

Robin tilts her face up to mine, and I see in her eyes that she understands the magnitude of what I'm offering. Not just my body. Not just my wealth or power or protection. But myself. The core that no one has ever reached. The vulnerability I've never shown.

When she kisses me, soft and certain, I know I've won. Know she's finally mine in all the ways that matter.

For the first time in my life, surrender feels like victory.