Chapter 17 Victoria
The dorm room was quiet except for the low hum of their breathing and the wet, lazy drag of Sophia’s hips as she took him slow and deep again. Sunlight slanted across her back, gilding every bruise, every bead of sweat. Alex’s hands were on her waist, guiding her rhythm, eyes half-lidded and drunk on her. Then…
Drrt…. drrtt….
His phone vibated hard against the hardwood floor, skittering in circles like it was trying to escape.Sophia stilled, buried to the hilt inside her, and glanced down at him with a playful smirk.
“Ignore it.”
Drrt… drrtt…
It rang again. Unknown number. Paris country code. Alex’s jaw flexed. He reached down blindly, thumbed the green button, and put it on speaker without thinking.
“Jesus Alex, pick up your goddamn phone!”
Lili’s voice cracked through the room like a whip. Sophia froze. Alex’s entire body went rigid beneath her; every muscle locked, cock still throbbing inside her. Then Lili again, softer but no less urgent.
“I’ve been calling for hours. They’re tearing the Paris office apart looking for you. You vanished mid-deal, Alex. The board is losing their minds.”
Sophia’s eyes flicked to his, something unreadable flashing across her face. She didn’t move, just watched, waiting. Alex swallowed, voice coming out rougher than he intended.
“Lili. I’m… handling something.” Lili laughed, low and incredulous.
“Handling something? Or handling someone? Who is she, Alex?”
Sophia’s nails dug into his chest. Her hips gave the tiniest, deliberate roll, reminding him exactly where he was buried.
Alex’s hand shot to Sophia’s hip, gripping hard warning or plea, he wasn’t sure. His eyes never left hers.
“None of your business,” he said into the phone, voice like gravel.
Lili’s exhale crackled through the speaker.
“Fine. Keep your secrets. But you have exactly six hours to get your ass on a plane before they send security to drag you back. And Alex?” Her tone turned velvet and venom.
“Tell whoever’s riding you right now that she’s not the first, and she won’t be the last to think she’s special.”
Click.
The line went dead. The phone slipped from his hand and clattered to the floor. Sophia’s gaze was molten, anger, jealousy, and pure, filthy possessiveness all tangled together. She leaned down until her lips brushed his ear.
“I’m not riding you,” she whispered, clenching hard around his cock just once.
“You’re inside me. And I am the last.”
Then she sat up, planted both palms on his chest, and started moving slow, punishing, claiming every inch of him with rolling, deliberate strokes that dragged a broken groan from his throat.
“Say it! Say I’m the last one who gets this” she breathed, nails raking down his abs.
Alex’s hands gripped her thighs hard enough to bruise anew. His hips snapped up to meet hers, driving deeper, harder.
“You’re the last,” he snarled, voice wrecked.
“The only. Fuck, Soph, the only.”
She smiled and rode him like she was erasing every woman who’d ever come before her.
The sky had gone violet beyond the window, the room lit only by the lamp and the low glow of Alex’s discarded phone screen. They were sprawled sideways across the bed, limbs tangled, skin cooling, hearts finally beginning to slow.
Sophia traced the fresh bite mark she’d left on his shoulder and smiled against his throat. That was when the knock came: three sharp, impatient raps that sounded like money and entitlement.
“Expecting someone?”
Before he could answer, the door opened and a woman stepped inside as if she owned the building.
Tall. Ice-blonde hair twisted into a perfect chignon. A tailored camel coat over a black silk dress that cost more than most people’s rent. Heels sharp enough to draw blood.
She took one look at the scene, Sophia naked and glowing, Alex marked head-to-toe, the room reeking of sex and arched one perfectly sculpted brow.
“Well,” she drawled in crisp Received Pronunciation, “this explains the radio silence.”
Alex sat up slowly, every line of his body suddenly dangerous.
“What the hell are you doing here, Victoria?”
Victoria Langford, heiress to the Langford & Co investment empire, Alex’s former fiancée, and the one woman in London who had always believed she was destined to have him, let her gaze slide over Sophia like she was appraising a mildly interesting painting.
Then she smiled.
“Darling,” she said, voice honey over broken glass, “the board sent me to fetch their missing CEO. Apparently when Lili couldn’t drag you back by phone, they decided to send someone you couldn’t ignore.”
She stepped fully into the room, letting the door click shut behind her. The scent of her perfume cut through the sex-heavy air like a blade.
Her eyes flicked to the bruises on Sophia’s neck, the fingerprints on her hips, and the unmistakable evidence of Alex still glistening on her inner thighs.
Victoria’s smile never wavered, but something feral flashed behind the ice-blue.
“I see you’ve been keeping yourself… occupied.” She shrugged off her coat, revealing the plunging neckline of her dress and the diamond choker at her throat that had once been a gift from Alex himself.
“But playtime’s over, darling. We’re expected at the Langford gala tonight. Black tie. The merger vote happens at midnight, and your signature is required.”
She let her gaze linger deliberately on Sophia.
“Run along, sweetheart,” she said, soft and venomous. “He always comes back when the adults need to talk.”
Sophia didn’t flinch. She sat up slowly, sheet clutched loosely to her chest. Then she smiled, slow and filthy, and leaned in to press an open-mouthed kiss to the bruise she’d put on Alex’s collarbone.
“Actually,” Sophia said, voice husky from hours of screaming his name, “he’s a little tied up right now.”
Victoria’s eyes narrowed to slits. Alex exhaled through his teeth, the sound of a man caught between a landmine and a lit fuse. He looked at Sophia then at Victoria
“Get out, Vic. We’re done,” he said, voice low and final.
Victoria’s smile froze. Sophia’s sharpened into something victorious. The war for Alex Maxwell had just found its new battlefield, and Victoria Langford had never lost a fight in her life. She stepped closer, heels clicking like gunfire.
“Oh, darling. You have no idea who you’re playing with,” she murmured, eyes locked on Sophia.