Page 52 of Take Her

“Lia,” he said, in a calm tone, “what is it that you want?”

I felt my heartbeat thundering in my face.

If I told him the truth—that I wanted him and only him—I’d have to bring up Uncle Freddie and the fire, and I didn’t know if I could do that, even if I wanted to.

So I gave him the next truest answer I could stand. “I want Corvo.” One of his eyebrows cocked imperiously, but he didn’t move otherwise, so I continued. “I know my father doesn’t believe in me, and I know Freddie Senior’s next in line.” At the thought of my uncle being responsible for anything about my future life or finances, I full-body shuddered. “And then Junior, probably. But it should be mine—and I know I can’t get it without you.” A long moment passed between us and made me reckless. “And I’m willing to do anything to make that happen.”

His expression darkened. “You already know my opinion on offering yourself wholesale, Lia.”

I did—I remembered him chastising me at the club. “I’m not a fool. But I am desperate.” And he hadn’t walked away yet, so I doubled down. “You could teach me. Train me. Here...and anywhere else you wanted to.” I hoped he saw what I was implying in my eyes.

A muscle beneath his jaw clenched. “And wait for your father to kill me?” he asked.

“I would never tell.” I shook my head in his hand, willing him to believe. “I haven’t yet, have I?”

“Because apparently I have something you need.” His voice had turned acerbic.

I straightened in the chair and spoke primly, staring up at him with challenge in my eyes. “You’ve been hard around me often enough—apparently I have something you need, too.”

He met my gaze head on, and spoke with the gangster drawl he must have had before neckties choked it out of him. “You think tight pussy’s worth burning down my world for?”

“Fuck me and report back.” I watched his nostrils flare and his pupils almost imperceptibly widen, then added, “Sir.”

The corners of his lips rose cruelly. I wouldn’t have said that he was happy with me, so much as he was happier when I was fighting—and I wondered what that boded for my future.

He continued to contemplate me, and then shook my chin a little. “Open.”

I did as he commanded, dropping my jaw, same as I had when I’d swallowed the note, only this time not fading back, just staring willfully up at him, as he brought up his thumb to swipe across my mouth. It caught on my lipstick, dragging the tender flesh a little as he traced it in a circle around my lips, and it felt like the beginning of everything I’d ever wanted—and then he sank his thumb between my lips.

I sucked on it without thinking—and without asking, he pulled it back and shoved his two forefingers in, instead, skating my teeth up to his knuckles. I tasted him on my tongue and when he hit the back of my throat I—I dropped.

Not physically, but mentally, spiritually, emotionally—and any other “ly” words that could be associated with who the fuck I was?

I wasn’t anymore.

There was nothing but being his.

Ten years of my life had led to this very moment, and no matter how shitty the intervening time had been, everything suddenly became worthwhile.

I felt all the other confusing doors in my soul closing, one by one, until it was just him and me, and when I fluttered my eyes open, feeling calm for the first time in a decade, I found him watching me like a dark deity. His face was nearly expressionless, his lips tilted towards their omnipresent frown—but his eyes were so frighteningly bright they made me shiver.

And then he leaned down, bringing his lips even to my ear. “Did you really want a daddy, Lia?” he whispered roughly.

A brutal mélange of hope and atrocity rose up inside my chest, and I nodded so hard I almost gagged myself on his fingers. Maybe I hadn’t known it until that night at Vertigo, but now that I was with him, I wanted it with my whole being.

He rocked back to standing and he pulled his hand away, a string of my saliva dripping from his fingers. “What a good girl you are,” he said softly, retrieving a handkerchief from inside his suit to wipe off the rime of mauve I’d left against his skin. “Don’t ever be embarrassed again unless I tell you to be,” he said, his voice quiet but firm. “Go fix your lipstick.”

My consciousness crash landed back into my body—and propelled all of me back into the real world. I closed my mouth with an audible click as my teeth met.

I was here, with him, and we’d just done that?—

But I’d just been given my first command. I stood shakily and walked into the other office in a daze, picking up my phone and flipping the camera on so that I could see myself on my still-cracked screen, like looking into a broken mirror.

Who’s the craziest of them all? I thought, and snorted softly, before using my thumb to touch up the edges of my lipstick he’d streaked as he came up behind me.

“We need to talk,” he said at a normal volume, and it was his turn to hand me a note—with an address and a date and a time—noon, Sunday morning.

I said the only thing I could. “Yes, sir.”