Page 97 of Shadow Waltz
“I've never had anyone kill for me before,” he said quietly, stopping just within arm's reach. “I've had people die because of me, people hurt trying to protect me, but never someone who chose violence specifically to defend my honor.”
The distinction mattered to him, I could see it in the way he held himself, the careful way he chose his words. This wasn't about gratitude for rescue—this was about recognition of worth, about the message my actions had sent to everyone in that room.
“The way he looked at me,” Ash continued, fingers moving unconsciously to touch the collar at his throat. “Like I was something he could sample, something he could take. You saw it too.”
“I saw it,” I confirmed, feeling that familiar heat rise in my chest at the memory. “And I made sure he understood his mistake before he died.”
Ash nodded slowly, processing not just the violence but its meaning. “In all those years, all those owners, no one ever...” He trailed off, searching for words that could encompass the significance of what had just happened.
“No one ever considered you worth defending,” I finished for him.
He looked away then, but not before I caught the flash of old pain in his eyes.
“You've been underestimated your entire life,” I said, and it wasn't a question.
“Unti now.” Ash turned from the window to look at me directly, and the gratitude in his expression was almost overwhelming. “Until you decided I was worth more than the sum of my parts.”
I could feel something shifting in the carefully constructed dynamics of our relationship, something that went beyond ownership or submission into territory that felt infinitely more valuable and infinitely more dangerous.
“Come here,” I said, voice dropping to the register that made his pulse jump visibly at his throat.
Ash obeyed, moving across the office with the fluid grace that had first caught my attention at the auction. But now his submission carried different weight, felt like gift rather than compulsion, choice rather than inevitability.
When he reached my chair, I pulled him down until he was straddling my lap, collar pressing against my chest as I claimed his mouth with lazy thoroughness. He tasted like coffee and ambition and something that might have been happiness, and kissing him felt like claiming territory that had always belonged to me.
“Tonight,” I said against his lips, hands finding the collar at his throat and using it to pull him closer, “I want to explore what you need from this dynamic. What you crave beyond simple submission.”
Ash's breath caught, and I felt the way his body responded to the promise in my voice. “What do you have in mind?”
“Patience, control, the kind of anticipation that makes release feel like revelation.” I bit at his lower lip just hard enough to make him gasp. “I want to map every boundary you have and learn to dance along their edges.”
“And what do you get from that?” Ash asked, though his hips were already moving against mine with subtle pressure that made my cock twitch with interest.
“I get to watch you discover exactly how much pleasure you can handle,” I replied, letting my hands slide down to cup his ass through expensive fabric. “I get to be the one who gives you experiences that redefine what submission means to you.”
The promise sent a shiver through him that I felt in my bones, and when he kissed me again, it was with the kind of desperate hunger that spoke to needs being acknowledged and fed for the first time.
I shifted in my chair, drawing Ash closer, feeling the tension coil through his thighs as I pressed a kiss beneath his jaw, just above the collar. “Stand up,” I murmured. He obeyed, sliding gracefully from my lap, standing between my knees, breath already coming faster. I let my hands rest on his hips, thumbs brushing the buckle of his belt.
Slowly, methodically, I undid his slacks and pushed them over his hips, letting them fall to the floor. The bulge in his briefs was already obvious, cock straining against the soft fabric, a dark spot of precome blooming at the tip. I ran my hand over him, gentle at first, just enough to make him twitch.
“Keep your hands at your sides,” I said, voice soft but commanding. “No touching, no rushing me. You get nothing unless I give it.”
He nodded, jaw tight, fingers curling into fists at his thighs as I peeled his briefs away and let his cock spring free—thick, flushed, the head already leaking, desperate for attention. I didn't touch it. Instead, I dragged my nails up his inner thighs,watching the way his muscles jumped and flexed under my hands.
“Patience,” I murmured, and leaned forward to press a kiss to his hip, then another lower, biting gently at the crease where thigh met groin. I let my breath ghost over his cock, close enough for him to feel the heat but not close enough to satisfy. He made a soft, frustrated noise, hips rocking forward before he remembered himself and went still.
I smiled, pressing my lips to the inside of his thigh, sucking a bruise into the tender flesh. My hands slid up, caressing his hips, fingers dancing lightly around the base of his cock, never quite giving him what he wanted.
“Please,” Ash whispered, voice already rough with need.
“Not yet,” I said, savoring the way he shivered. “Tonight, you're going to learn what it feels like to want so badly it hurts.”
I ran my tongue up the length of his cock, slow and deliberate, tracing the vein from base to tip, pausing to lap up the precome beading at the head. I took him into my mouth, but only the tip, sucking just enough to make him gasp, then pulled back and blew cool air over the wet skin.
His thighs trembled with restraint, every muscle tight with anticipation. I reached between his legs, cupping his balls, rolling them gently in my palm, then squeezing just enough to make his breath hitch. I let my thumb slide back, tracing the sensitive skin behind his balls, then teasing the rim of his hole with the lightest touch.
Every time he tried to rock forward, I pulled away, murmuring praise and threats in equal measure—telling him how beautiful he was, how much I loved watching him suffer for me, how good he was for holding back.