Page 23 of Venom (St. Sebastian’s at Cravenmoor Academy #1)

Venetia

W ith deliberate movements, he undresses me.

He unbuttons my shirt, his movements slow and methodical, each button a small victory he claims without a fight.

I stand there, a statue carved from rage and defiance, but my body betrays me.

Goosebumps prick my skin where his fingers graze me.

Predictable. The word is a whip, lashing at my pride.

I wanted to see him lose control, to descend into the same primal desire as Rafferty.

Instead, he’s become this. A cold, calculating force of nature.

He pushes the shirt from my shoulders, letting it pool at my feet.

His eyes rake over my bra, a flimsy piece of lace he could rip away in a second, but he doesn’t.

He reaches for the clasp on my back, his touch clinical, precise.

He unhooks it with an infuriating ease. The bra joins the shirt on the floor.

My heels are next, and then my jeans. He unbuttons them, his knuckles a deliberate brand against my lower stomach, and shoves them down my legs until I’m forced to step out of them, leaving me in nothing since I went commando just for him, well, and Rafferty as it turned out.

Rafferty’s cum, a sticky, cooling reminder of my rebellion, is a brand of shame against my skin.

Viper’s gaze drops to my damp pussy, his lip curling in a sneer of pure disgust. He doesn’t speak.

He doesn’t have to. He takes my hand and leads me into the en-suite.

The cold tiles are a shock against my bare feet.

He turns the shower on, the spray hissing, and pushes me under the arctic water without a word.

I gasp, the icy-cold a shock, but it’s nothing compared to the frostbite of his stare.

He steps into the shower, still barefoot and shirtless but otherwise clothed, and picks up the soap and sponge.

“Daddy’s going to clean every inch of you. You won’t move, and you won’t speak.”

His hands are rough, the sponge abrasive against my skin.

He starts with my neck, scrubbing at the love bite Rafferty left, his touch impersonal, erasing.

I stand rigid under the icy spray, my bones aching and my teeth chattering from the cold and the sheer, overwhelming force of his will.

This isn’t the explosive rage I provoked.

This is something colder, more terrifying. This is calculated possession.

He works his way down my body, washing me with a brutal efficiency that strips away more than just Rafferty’s scent.

It strips away my pride, my defiant victory in the locker room.

Predictable. The word echoes in my skull, a litany of my own failure.

He saw my move for what it was—a desperate attempt to rattle his cage—and he refused to play.

Instead, he’s rewriting the entire fucking game.

His hands move between my legs, and my breath hitches. His fingers are clinical as they wash away the evidence of my tryst, cleaning another man’s cum from me. The act is so profoundly intimate, so utterly dominant, it bypasses lust and goes straight to ownership. He is cleansing his property.

When he’s done, he steps back, his gaze sweeping over me, assessing his work.

The water continues to sluice over my numb skin.

I am clean. I am his. And I have never been more terrified, or more turned on, in my entire life.

He turns off the water, plunging us into a dripping silence, and I wait for my sentence.

He reaches for a towel, not for me, but for his own hands, drying them with a meticulousness that is maddening. He leads me, freezing and dripping wet out of the bathroom, a prisoner being escorted back to her cell.

He bends me over the bed, my cold, peaked nipples brushing the covers.

“You belong to me,” he states, his voice a flat, undeniable fact. “Not Locke. Not Warrick. Me. When you fuck, you fuck who I tell you to fuck. When you come, you come because I allow it. Is that clear?”

I can’t speak. The words are trapped in my throat, choked by humiliation and a terrifying, soul-deep submission. I manage a single, sharp nod.

“Good girl,” he says, the words a chilling brand on my soul, and then he spanks me so hard, I cry out.

The sting of his palm against my arse is a pain that blossoms into a searing heat.

It’s not a playful smack; it’s a brutal, punishing strike that steals my breath and brings hot, furious tears to my eyes.

Another follows, just as hard, on the other cheek.

A choked sob escapes my lips, a sound of pure, unadulterated shock and pain.

“Tears?” he says, his voice a low, cold whip-crack of sound next to my ear. “Are you crying because it hurts, or because you finally understand who has control here?”

He doesn’t wait for an answer. He grabs my hips, his fingers digging into my flesh, and hauls me up, turning me to face him.

His eyes are glacial, devoid of the lust that had been simmering there earlier.

This isn’t about pleasure. This is about erasure.

It’s about breaking my will and reforging it into something that answers only to him.

“Did you think I would break, Venetia? Did you think I would rip you from him and give you what you’ve been craving since you ground down on my cock in my club?”

His words are a brutal, accurate dissection of my motives, and the truth of them is a fresh wave of humiliation that makes my stomach clench. I wanted to see the monster. I wanted him to lose his iron-clad control and ravage me. I wanted to be the one who finally broke him.

“Yes,” I whisper, the admission torn from me, tasting of defeat and shame. A single tear escapes and traces a hot path down my cold cheek.

He doesn’t wipe it away. He watches it fall, his expression unyielding. “That’s your weakness, Venetia. You think this is a game of seduction. It’s not. It’s survival.” His thumb presses against the frantic pulse in my throat. “And my control is the only thing keeping you alive right now.”

He lets me go, stepping back. The loss of his heat is as punishing as his touch.

“I’m sorry,” I mutter with absolute humiliation.

He tilts his head, as if confused by my apology. “For what?”

I frown. “For disappointing you.”

He raises an eyebrow. “I can’t say I expected that. Now I’m doubly disappointed.”

“What?” I spit out. “What the fuck are you doing to me?”

“Stick to your convictions, Venetia. No regrets. Don’t apologise to me because you think that’s what I want to hear.”

“Fuck you,” I grit out, my hands clenching.

A slow, dangerous smile spreads across his face. “There she is,” he murmurs, his voice a low, approving rumble. “That’s my girl. I thought I’d broken you.”

I know what he’s doing now. He’s testing me.

Testing my limits. Pushing my boundaries, and I fell for it like the idiot he seems to make me around him.

I give him the middle finger. “Swivel on the apology, you fucking cock,” I snarl.

“I didn’t mean it. I will never mean it.

You can douse me in freezing cold water all you like, but I am not your subbie, you got that? ”

His laugh is a low, dark rumble of pure satisfaction. It crawls over my skin, raising goosebumps that have nothing to do with the cold. “That’s my wildcat,” he murmurs, stepping forward until he’s caging me against the bed again. “Never apologise for being a fucking queen.”

He reaches out to trail a single finger between my breasts, over my stomach, leaving a trail of fire in its wake. My breath hitches. The cold, calculated monster is gone, replaced by the apex predator I provoked in the first place.

“You wanted a reaction,” he whispers, his voice dropping to a gravelly intimacy that makes my knees weak. “You got one. But don’t ever mistake my control for weakness.” His gaze drops to my mouth, hungry and possessive. “And don’t ever think I’m not a hundred steps ahead of you.”

His words are a slap and a caress, a threat and a promise. I’m left reeling in the whiplash of his moods, from cold fury to hot, possessive approval. He’s not just a monster; he’s a fucking labyrinth, and I’m lost in the centre with him.

He steps back, breaking the spell, and peels off his soaked combat pants.

Naked, he walks over to the wardrobe, pulling the doors open.

“Now that we have an understanding,” he says, his back to me, “it’s time to prepare for your welcoming party.

” He rifles through my clothes with a proprietary air that makes my teeth grind.

He pulls out a dress. It’s black, sinfully short, with a neckline that plunges to my navel.

It’s a dress designed for seduction and sin.

A declaration of war. And I have no idea why that ended up in my case.

It is a dress that Nathan bought for me so he could show me off before accusing me of being a slut. Why did I even keep it?

He tosses it onto the bed. “Wear that. No bra. No knickers.”

I stare at the dress, then at him. I gulp as the memories flood back. “No.”

“No?”

“No. Not that one.”

His eyes narrow, the predatory approval from moments before vanishing like smoke. He stalks towards me, his naked body a testament to raw, intimidating power. “We just had a conversation about who’s in charge, wildcat. Did you forget the lesson already?”

My heart hammers against my ribs, a frantic bird beating against a cage. The sight of that dress, the feel of its cheap satin against my skin in my memory, the memory of Nathan’s slimy possessiveness as he paraded me around in it—it’s a violation I won’t endure again. Not even for Viper.

“I remember,” I say, my voice trembling slightly but holding firm. “But I’m not wearing his dress.”

The possessive pronoun hangs in the air between us, a landmine I’ve just willingly stepped on. Viper stops, his gaze sharpening, the anger shifting to a dangerous, predatory curiosity. “ His ?”

I press my lips into a thin line, lifting my chin higher.

He nods slowly. “Nathan?”