Chapter 35
Elise's POV
My face burned.
"I don't want to," I said.
Not loud, but clear enough.
Victor's hand stilled against my face. Didn't pull away, didn't continue. He just stayed like that, looking at me with an expression so calm it didn't match someone making this kind of demand of a woman. More like an interviewer waiting for an answer.
"Don't want to?"
"Right."
"Because of Liam?"
"Not because of anyone. Because I don't want to."
I said it decisively.
Victor was silent for two seconds.
Then he nodded.
"Alright."
He straightened up, withdrew the arm he'd braced against the sofa back, and stepped away. I let out a breath of relief, thinking he'd respected my refusal. But he was only removing his suit jacket, draping it casually over the chair beside the bookshelf. Then he started on his cufflinks—one, then the other—moving with the ease of someone performing the most ordinary task imaginable.
"You—"
"I didn't hear you say 'no,'" he interrupted, tone flat. "I only heard 'don't want to.' There's a fundamental difference between those two phrases."
He rolled his sleeves up his forearms, revealing the solid lines of muscle and that old scar on his wrist.
"'No' is refusal. 'Don't want to' is emotion. And I—"
He walked toward me again.
This time he didn't stop in front of me.
He sat down.
Right beside me.
The leather cushion dipped under his weight, and my body tilted involuntarily toward him, gravity doing what my will couldn't resist.
"—don't manage your emotions."
His hand came up and closed around the back of my neck.
Different from Liam. When Liam gripped the back of my neck, there was a possessive pleasure in it, like confirming the prey in his hands couldn't escape. Victor was different. His grip was steady, his five fingers curving just enough to encompass that small, vulnerable section of skin completely, his palm pressed against it. It didn't hurt, but it communicated one thing with absolute clarity: he could move whenever he wanted, and I could do nothing about it.
"Victor—"
His lips came down and sealed off every unfinished word.
---
This wasn't a kiss.
This was occupation.
When his lips covered mine, there was no prelude—no testing, no tenderness, no time given for response. Direct, precise, indisputable, like a knife sliding in and finding its mark immediately. His tongue pried open my lips and teeth, driving straight through.
I instinctively tried to push him away.
My hands came up against his chest, and through the thin fabric of his T-shirt I could feel the warmth of his body and his heartbeat—steady, that infuriatingly steady rhythm, as if no matter what happened, this precision instrument's operating frequency would never change.
But my hands didn't apply pressure.
I don't know why they didn't.
Maybe because the numbness from last night hadn't completely faded. Maybe because his kiss was like his commands—allowing no room to breathe. Maybe because when his tongue swept across my palate, something inside my brain resonated, a string I'd thought long broken.
His hand slid from the back of my neck to behind my ear, his thumb pressing the spot just behind my earlobe—a point that made my knees weak, though I didn't know when he'd discovered it. Maybe some night after a tattoo session. Maybe earlier.
My body leaned back, the sofa cushion blocking any retreat.
He followed, pressing forward, one hand braced on the sofa back beside my ear while the other had already found its way beneath the hem of my T-shirt.
I shuddered when his fingertips touched the skin at my waist.
Cold and scorching—his palm was hot, but his fingertips carried the slight coolness left by years of holding pens. Both temperatures pressed against me simultaneously, and my nerve endings didn't know how to respond.
"You're still thinking you don't want this."
He lifted his head an inch above my lips, his voice considerably rougher now, his breath falling against my mouth, frighteningly hot.
"Thinking doesn't help," he said. "Your body is far more honest than your mouth."
I wanted to argue. Wanted to say "let me go." Wanted to say "who do you think you are." Wanted to say any sentence that could prove I still held some agency. But when I opened my mouth—only an uncontrolled gasp escaped.
His hand had already slid from my waist to my chest, his palm covering me, and through the complete lack of barrier I could feel the outline of each finger. Then he lowered his head and bit down on my collarbone. Not kissed—bit. The kind of pressure where teeth sank into skin—not hard enough to leave a mark, but absolutely enough to make my whole body tremble.
My hands slid from his chest to his shoulders. Not pushing. Gripping. Clutching at the muscle of his shoulders, knuckles white, like a drowning person grasping the last piece of driftwood.
Victor felt it.
He raised his head, and in those gray-blue eyes there was finally some change—not a smile, not satisfaction, but something deeper, like the knowing look of a hunter watching prey walk into the trap on its own.
"Elise."
He said my name.
Voice so low it seemed to rumble from his chest.
Victor's palm slid from my chest to my back, pulling me toward him. Our bodies pressed tightly together, his heartbeat transmitting through the thin T-shirt—no longer quite so steady. Faster, just a little. Just enough to let me know this precision instrument wasn't entirely unaffected either.
"Look at me."
He said.
I looked at him.
Those gray-blue eyes were less than three inches away, pupils dilated, reflecting my disheveled hair and flushed cheeks.
"Tell me—" his voice returned to that commanding calm, but the end carried a barely perceptible roughness, "do you still want to leave here?"
This was a trap.
If I said "yes," it was surrender.
If I said "no," it was a lie—and he would see through it.
I chose a third path.
I moved my hands from his shoulders to both sides of his face, cupped his face, lifted my head, and kissed his lips.
Victor perhaps hadn't expected me to be so bold, but I heard him give a soft laugh. He bent down, letting himself press more heavily against me. My clothes were stripped away piece by piece until I was completely bare. This was the second time tonight I'd been naked before him, but the feeling was entirely different.
Victor kissed continuously across my body—though his initial demand had been for me to please him, now the one feeling pleased was me. I felt my body heating, becoming increasingly sensitive with Victor's kisses and caresses, unable to suppress the low moans that escaped.
His brow twitched slightly—a very subtle change that I would never have noticed if we weren't this close.
"Victor." I said his name, voice hoarse but every word clear. "I will leave Liam."
His eyes narrowed.
"But not now." I continued. "I have things to handle. The inheritance issue. Settling the tattoo shop. And some—"
"You need time," he finished for me.
"Yes."
He stared at me for three seconds.
During those three seconds, his hand never left my back, the pressure of his five fingers remaining constant—a reminder that negotiations aside, control still rested in his hands.
"How long?"
"Give me two weeks."
"One week."
"Ten days."
He was silent for two seconds.
"Seven days," he said. "Not one day more."
I looked at him.
He looked at me.
Then he released the grip on my back and leaned against the sofa cushion, his posture suddenly much more relaxed—like someone whose high-intensity work had just ended, the whole body unwinding.
"Deal," he said.
Tone as casual as if negotiating an ordinary business transaction.
I sat beside him, straightening my disheveled T-shirt and hair, my heartbeat not yet completely settled. Victor glanced at me sideways, the faintest smile appearing at the corner of his mouth.
"The way you look now—" he said, pausing, "is much better than when you were sitting there like a statue earlier."
I didn't respond.
Because I was thinking about something more important.
Seven days from now.
Seven days from now I would need to give Liam an explanation. Need to handle the inheritance issue. Need to draw a line between Victor and Liam—a line I couldn't cross back over.
The seven-day countdown would begin the moment I stepped through that door.
And right now I didn't even know where my shoes were.