Chapter 83: Red in the Net – Part V

Adrienne

I didn’t waste time with silence or pretense. The door shut, the guards stepped aside, and I was on him before he settled in the chair. My hand gripped his jaw, forcing his head up. His smirk was sharp as a blade.

“You’ve stopped circling,” he said, words muffled. “Must mean you’re running out of patience.”

I tightened my grip. “It means I’ve stopped playing.”

His eyes glimmered, unfazed. “That’s what I said.”

Leaning closer, I let my thumb brush over his racing pulse. “Your body knows what your mouth denies.”

Riven chuckled, a low sound against my hand. “If you keep saying that, maybe you’ll believe it.”

The jab hit harder than I wanted. I forced a smile, unyielding. “Belief doesn’t matter. Only outcome does.”

He grinned, his pulse betraying him as it hammered beneath my touch. Yet, his eyes remained steady, reading me deeper than I liked.

Releasing him with a flick, I stepped back but held his gaze. His smirk lingered, as if he’d won. Let him think that. The game was only sharpening.

I didn’t give him time to breathe through the release. My hand moved from his jaw to his chest, slow and deliberate, sliding over the fabric until my palm rested against the steady rise and fall. His heartbeat drummed beneath it, quickened by a touch he would never admit was effective.

“You think this is patience,” I murmured. “It isn’t. It’s inevitability.”

Riven’s lips curled into that damned grin, even as his chest betrayed him. “Sounds like you’re trying to convince yourself.”

I pressed harder, not enough to bruise, but enough to let him feel the weight of my claim. The scent I’d woven into the air clung thickly now, slipping into every inhale he couldn’t control. His shoulders tensed as the breath shuddered through him, shallow at first, then drawn deeper.

“There,” I whispered, my mouth close to his ear. “Instinct doesn’t lie. Every breath tells me who holds the rhythm.”

He turned his head slightly, meeting my gaze with dark, unflinching eyes. “Or it tells me you’re leaning on tricks. Scent. Touch. Proximity. Strip those away, and what’s left?”

The words burned, sharper than they should. I let my nails trail lightly down the fabric covering his chest, then pressed them just enough to make a threat. He didn’t flinch. Instead, his grin widened, infuriatingly steady.

“You call it inevitability,” he said. “I call it performance. And I think you’re the one who needs the audience.”

My fingers curled into the cloth, the urge to tear it open almost too strong. Control was mine, not his. His body had already betrayed him—heartbeat racing, breath faltering, shoulders tight. Yet his mouth kept pace, twisting every step into something that threatened my rhythm.

I pulled my hand back at last, slow and deliberate, denying him the pressure he thought he’d turned against me. “Keep pretending it’s performance,” I said, voice low, sharp. “Pretending only lasts until the mask slips.”

His smirk sharpened into something crueler. “Then we’re both waiting on the same mask, aren’t we?”

The heat under my skin flared, but I smothered it with a smile. He was still breathing my air, still racing under my touch. That was proof enough.

For now.

I shifted my weight forward until the chair’s frame groaned beneath us both. My hand slid back to his throat, my thumb pressing lightly against the hollow at its base. He stiffened, his pulse hammering against my skin. I let my lips hover at the edge of his jaw, close enough for warmth to spill across him but never close enough to satisfy.

“You’re already giving in,” I whispered. “Every muscle betrays it. Every breath.”

Riven’s chest rose unevenly, the rhythm cracked, but his voice came low and steady, threaded with mockery. “If this is what you call surrender, then you’ve never seen a fight worth the name.”

I pressed harder at his throat, then withdrew just enough to brush my mouth against his jawline—a fleeting ghost of contact, deliberate and sharp. His breath stuttered, while mine steadied with satisfaction.

“You want to make this about fights?” I murmured. “Then you’ve already lost. Because I don’t fight. I take.”

His laugh rasped close to my ear, the sound threading through my pulse. “You take because you can’t win.”

The words slid under my mask, stinging hotter than they should have. My hand shifted—gentle at first, fingers trailing along his skin—then suddenly tightened in his hair, pulling his head back. The chair jolted faintly under the force.

He gritted his teeth, but still managed to wear that wide, reckless grin. “There it is,” he said through the strain. “Not control. Need.”

My breath sharpened before I could catch it. I leaned in until our faces nearly touched, letting my scent smother the space between us. His eyes flicked to my mouth, unguarded for a heartbeat, and I seized on it.

“Need is yours,” I said, my voice like steel. “Mine is certainty. And certainty doesn’t waver.”

He chuckled, ragged but unbroken, the sound vibrating through my grip. “Then why do you keep proving me right?”

I yanked back, releasing him all at once. The absence left a hollow space; his chest heaved, mine tight with something I refused to name.

He thought his resistance made him strong. It didn’t. It only proved he was circling the edge, waiting for the fall.

And if I had to break myself against him to get there, then so be it.

I cut the session short before his grin could carve any deeper. A sharp nod brought the guards in; their footsteps echoed loudly in the sterile quiet. My heart still beat too hard, but my face remained calm, the same mask I’d worn for years.

They unclasped the restraints, metal scraping against metal. Riven rolled his shoulders slowly and deliberately, as though he’d spent the hour lounging instead of under my hand. He didn’t speak at first. He only smiled at me, the kind of smile meant to linger.

I turned to the guards. “Physiological responses spiked. He’s showing progress.” My tone was even and clinical, detached.

The lie slid smoothly from my lips because it wasn’t entirely a lie. His pulse had raced, his breath had caught, and his muscles had betrayed him over and over. That was progress—my progress.

But when he finally opened his mouth, his voice coiled like smoke. “You’ll be back,” he said, quiet and certain. “Because you need this more than I do.”

The words sank deep, catching somewhere I refused to acknowledge. I smoothed my sleeve, straightened my spine, and stepped through the doorway before any cracks could show.

The door shut behind me with a solid click, sealing him in. I told myself that his body’s betrayal was proof enough, that his words meant nothing.

Still, they echoed in the silence I carried with me, whispering through every measured step: You need this more than I do.

I walked on—steady, certain—but the echo stayed, a splinter under my skin.