Page 69 of Wicked Believer

And he’ll love me despite it.

The same as I do for him.

“You can look up now, Charlotte.”

I bite my lip, but I do as I’m told, lifting my gaze to find him standing a few paces away. He’s stripped off his suit coat, and hissuspenders are cut across his back like some kind of shoulder holster. I watch hungrily as he rolls up the cuffs of his sleeves.

Holy fuck.

How is it possible for me to want someone so badly? For anyone to be so beautiful? For me to feel so greedy for him, even when he’s away?

I want him on me, in me, everywhere.

This second.

But I have to wait patiently. Show him how good I can be—when I want to.

My subservience will be worth it in the end.

He finishes rolling up his shirtsleeves and then steps toward me, his movements so deliberate it feels like a delicious dance choreographed just for me. “How many times did you touch yourself while I was away?”

“I . . .”

“Answer me,” he growls.

I swallow thickly. “F-four times, sir.”

“Everyday?” he says, his voice going a bit higher at the end like he can’t believe how impossibly bratty I’ve been.

I nod weakly, heat filling my cheeks.

“On the bondage table,” he orders, his tone full of reprimand. When I don’t immediately start moving from where I’m too busy sulking at how ashamed I am of myself, he snarls, “Now.”

I scramble to my feet, eyes lowered as I head toward the bondage table, where he directed me, and kneel on top of it. It’s smooth handcrafted wood, the top covered in a layer of lush black padding and the sides lined with gleaming silver hooks. For a piece of furniture, it’s incredibly sexy. Custom made. The height of luxury. Just like everything Lucifer owns.

Me included.

I bite down on my lip, trying to suppress the nervous giggle that bubbles up in my throat, but I fail miserably. It’s true, after all.

I’m the most expensive whore New York City’s ever seen.

“Is something funny?”

“No, sir.”

Lucifer appears at my side a moment later, a length of rope in his hands as he tips my chin up, forcing me to look at him. “Next time you won’t be laughing if you don’t crawl for me. Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir,” I whisper, dropping my gaze.

“Good girl,” he purrs, though from the derisive way he says it, we both know he’s taunting me, daring me to disobey him again. “Now, spread your legs for me.”

I do as I’m told, spreading my thighs as he checks how wet I am, drawing a whimper from me. Using the rope, he starts at my wrists, binding me with an intense, methodical precision, the repetition so mesmerizing that I quickly fall into what feels like a trance.

A familiar feeling of lightness settles over me, the natural fibers brushing against my skin as any thought of the outside world, of anything beyondthis, beyond us, simply fades away. The process is so focused, so deliberate and meditative, even, the unyielding tension of the rope and his movements as he binds my hands and feet together behind my back so soothing that I feel all the stress I’ve been carrying start to melt off me.

His attention to detail and precision is overwhelming.

Thisis how I know that he cares for me.