this is how i obsess

The guard stopped at the threshold of the familiar chamber.

He hesitated. Not from fear, here was no fear left in him. Just want. Want like rot in the gut, thick and spreading, festering more with every day you left him.

The heavy curtain in front of him stayed unmoving in the breeze. Just fabric. Just a room. And yet every breath beyond it was yours. Your scent. Your shape. Your power. Ghost could already feel it wrapping around his ribs like a chain pulled too tight. Since you’d summoned him last, something had broken open in him. Split like flesh under a blade. A hollow that no food, no blood, no fight could fill. Made him cruel in training, vicious in sparring. Your voice had haunted him. Your eyes. The way you watched him, unflinching, almost amused by the things that made others look away.

He hadn’t slept properly in days. Couldn’t.

That first time had ruined his peace.

He thought he’d been hardened by the years. That the ache of being wanted had been bled dry in the dust of defeat and the sands of the arena, along with everything else that made him a man. But you — you had looked at him like he was still something alive.

And worse, you had touched something alive in him.

He’d tried to quiet it. Tried to fuck it out of himself in the dark, fists tight around his cock, thinking of your wine-slick mouth, your fingers wrapped around the stem of your cup like you’d wrap them around him. But nothing scratched the itch. The pleasure he could wring from himself, once enough to take the edge off, to quiet the snarl under his skin, was nothing now.

A pale thing. A shadow. He could stroke himself raw thinking of you, and still the satisfaction never came. Not really. The release meant nothing. It was you he wanted. Your hands. Your mouth. Your breath against his throat.

You hadn’t touched him. Hadn’t fucked him. Hadn’t even taken your clothes off.

You’d spoiled him.

The hand he'd used every night since he was old enough to have want in his blood had become worthless. You’d broken that too, without even trying.

The summons came just as the torches had dimmed in the barracks. No morning announcement. No scroll or slave to explain. Just the sharp voice of a guard barking his name, the clatter of keys, and the press of his collar against his throat and shackles around his limbs as they hauled him out again. No other gladiators summoned. No event to parade for.

It was too late for anything formal. Too sudden for politics.

Which meant it was you.

And despite the bite of exhaustion in his legs and the bruises under his skin, he was alert. Alive in a way he hadn’t been all day. Blood warm and thick, every muscle strung tight.

He could’ve been halfway dead and still, at the thought of you, his spine straightened. His chest filled. That was enough to stoke something low and greedy in him. He didn’t try to name it. Just held onto it, let it burn steady and clean under his ribs.

Ghost had no more patience left to give. Not for guards. Not for time. And least of all, for the distance between you.

The curtain finally stirred. Not from the breeze, but from his hand. The velvet slipped through his fingers, a simple motion that unraveled everything to come.

The room was darker than he remembered, the flicker of the lone fire casting restless shadows that danced on the marble floor. You sat there, half-reclined, the silk loose and careless around your body, nearly falling from one shoulder, hair only half-pinned, strands falling wild across your neck. No sandals. No jewels. The gold mask was the only thing still perfectly in place, an unyielding barrier between the wildness beneath and the world outside.

Your eyes snapped up to meet his as soon as he stepped inside. No hesitation, no pretense. Just that raw, piercing look, the one that made his breath catch, made every muscle in his body coil tighter.

You set the wine cup down with a soft clink, the only sound aside from the faint clatter of chains as the guard secured his leash to a column before slipping away.

There’s no food on the table. Only the bell. And a full carafe of wine.

He didn’t linger near the threshold this time. Without waiting, he walked forward, the chains pulling taut but unheeded. His steps echoed softly on the marble as he closed the distance, chest rising and falling.

His voice broke the silence, sharp, assured.

“Domina.”

“You took your time,” you chastised, voice quieter than before, heat simmering just beneath.

He held your gaze behind the mask. “Wasn’t me who delayed. If it were up to me, I’d have come straight from the barracks.”

“You… would have come.”

The tilt of your head was almost inquisitive in its consideration, like he just revealed to you a secret as sweet as nectar.

Something in your demeanor shifted. Your shoulders pulled back, spine straightened, bare feet touched the cool marble. He saw the tension ripple through you like a blade being drawn from its sheath.

“You were waiting,” you said, head tilted, voice edged with something sharper than amusement. “Weren’t you?”

He didn’t answer right away. Just let the chain rattle softly as he stepped closer, as far as it would allow, until the pull at his collar stopped him. His eyes never left you. Neither did yours.

He should have lied. Or said something clever. That was what they told him to do — be good, be respectful, keep his head bowed, always call you by your title.

Looking at you now, he knew that was a lot of rubbish.

If that’s what you wanted, you’d have been at the banquet. Draped in gold, laughing behind your hand, whispering about men like him from a safe distance. You’d have chosen perfume and poetry and turned your nose from far above.

But you were here.

And he wasn’t like that either. Not gentle. Not polished. Not meant to be dressed up and paraded. He didn’t know how to flatter or play coy. His hands weren’t made for serving.

“I wasn’t counting minutes,” he said finally, voice low and even. “But I didn’t sleep either.”

Not a denial. Not a surrender. Just truth, left bare between you.

“So you were thinking of me.”

“You left me little choice in that. Not after a hard day. Not once the noise died down and the hall emptied out. Not when night falls and it’s late. And it is late, Domina.”

Maybe that’s why you’d summoned him again. Not in the daylight, not for show. But now, with the fire low and no one else around.

You didn’t want a good man.

He paused. Just long enough to let it sink in.

“Tell me,” quieter now. “Were you thinking of me, too?”

You didn’t answer.

Not right away.

Just moved, slowly, soundlessly, rising from the couch with the lazy grace of something wild and certain of its strength. The silk slid down your arm, baring your shoulder. You didn’t fix it. You didn’t look away.

One step. Then another.

He didn’t move. Couldn’t. Something about the way you came toward him, calm, unhurried, eyes locked on his, made the air tighten in his lungs.

You stopped in front of him. Close enough he could count your eyelashes. Close enough to smell the faint trace of oil and iron still clinging to his skin.

Your hand came up, fingers brushing just beneath the collar at his throat. Just a touch. Barely.

Then you voiced, low, like something you hadn’t meant to say aloud.

“I couldn’t sleep. I just wanted…”

You trailed off, your eyes distracted by his pulse.

His hand twitched at his side. That little slip of honesty had sunk its teeth into him.

He gave a slow, wolfish smile, lips parted just enough to show the sharp edge of his teeth. “You’re the one who holds the chain, Domina.”

Your eyes flickered up to his. Was that a smile behind your gold mask? He couldn’t tell, but the air between you thickened.

“And you’re the one pulling on it like a hound.”

There it was, that snap, that clash. Heat spiked beneath his skin. He didn’t flinch from it. He reveled in it.

“You like it when I pull,” he said, voice low and rough, daring you to deny it.

Without breaking eye contact, your fingers twisted and grabbed the collar at his throat. With a sharp pull, the cold iron bit hard into his skin, making him flinch, a sting that set his blood racing. And fuck, he liked it. The bite, the burn, the way you looked at him when you did it.

— ❖ —

Your fingers stayed curled in the collar.

You didn’t let go.

You held it tight, letting the iron bite just a moment longer, watching his throat work around a swallow. You could feel it, the pulse fluttering beneath his skin. Fast. Hungry.

Good.

Slowly, you loosened your grip. Not in mercy, but to drag it out. The pads of your fingers brushed along the inside rim of the collar as you moved, slow enough to make it clear you were exploring, not retreating.

Your other hand came up, resting flat against his chest.

Warm.

Unarmored.

You felt the rise and fall of his breath, the steady thud of his heart under your palm. Faster than it should’ve been for a man who hadn’t moved a muscle. Faster still as you slid your hand higher, fingers grazing the base of his throat, soft skin, so vulnerable.

He didn’t flinch.

Didn’t move.

Didn’t dare.

“Did you think about this?” you asked softly, gaze pinned to his. “About me… touching you like this?”

Your fingers dragged all over his chest, not gentle, not soft. They caught on the old scars that split his skin like warnings, ridges and pale seams from a life of being torn open and stitched shut again. You traced one slowly, letting your nail catch the edge. He didn’t flinch. He offered it. Eyes locked, body still, like a wolf daring you to see how close you could get to its teeth.

“Yes.”

That single word, rough and raw, made the space between you narrow.

“About my hands?” Your voice dropped as your fingers glided higher. “My mouth?”

“All of it.” His breath caught, not from shame, but from how badly he still wanted. “Every sound you made.”

The heat in his voice struck you low, sharp, and sudden. The way he gave it up like it was nothing, like he'd choke on it if he held it in any longer. It made your blood heat, your own want twisting sharp beneath your ribs. Your thumb reached the hollow of his throat, hovered, then pressed down, not to silence, just to feel him there, just enough to remind him who was touching whom.

“Every night,” you said.

He gave a faint, bitter breath of a laugh. “Every fucking night.”

That pleased you. Deeply.

“Couldn’t help it?” you asked, low and cruel. “You touched yourself.”

His gaze flicked down, not in shame, but with that sharp, challenging tilt of his head.

“So did you.”

That halted you. Just for a moment. The honesty of it. The audacity.

He took your pause and pushed.

“You thought of me,” he said, voice lower now, dangerous.

You turned your head slightly, eyes dragging down his body like a brand. Your fingers followed, slow, deliberate, over his chest, his ribs, down the hard line of his stomach. “I watched you,” like that was all the explanation he needed. Like you hadn’t had a choice.

He exhaled, jaw flexing. A groan tried to claw its way out of his throat and died there. Held back.

You scraped your fingers down his chest, over hard flesh and battle-worn skin, slow and unforgiving, the way a blade licks before it cuts, savoring the way the muscle jumped beneath your touch.

“My voice in your head,” you murmured. “That’s what you needed?” Your eyes dragged over him, your mouth hovering where it would do the most damage. “My voice calling you good, my hand wrapped around you while you begged for more?”

He swallowed hard, the sound thick in his throat.

“You came,” you whispered. “Alone.”

A shiver rolled through him, like he was holding himself back with iron will alone.

“You like this,” he rasped. “Cutting me open like this. With your mouth, with your fucking voice.”

You smiled, sharp as broken glass.

“Say it.”

The sound he made was low. “You. On top of me. That look in your eyes like you’d fuck me or kill me, and I wouldn’t even care which.”

Then, a twisted smile, dangerous and hungry.

“This. Just like this.”

Your own smile was all teeth and threat and promise hidden behind a golden visage.

“I knew it.”

And still, he didn’t flinch.

He just looked at you like he wanted to bite and bleed for the privilege.

You stepped in closer, so close your chest nearly brushed his, close enough to feel the heat rolling off him like a furnace just barely contained. But instead of taking what you knew he’d give, you moved behind him. He turned his head slightly, tracking you with the sharp awareness of something half-feral, half-tamed. But he didn’t move. Not yet.

You let the silence stretch, dragging your fingers in a slow, circling path just above his waistband. Your palm hovered, not touching at first, taunting, until finally, finally, you laid your hands flat.

He didn’t breathe.

“You’ve been good,” you said quietly, fingers continuing their path higher, up his side. “Keeping still. Not reaching.”

A pause as your hands flattened again, skimming across the broad stretch of muscle just over his ribs.

“I didn’t even have to tell you.”

Another shiver rippled through him. His hands twitched at his sides like he was suddenly reminded of the option. Then he stilled again.

Your nails dragged again, harder this time, catching along old scar tissue that crisscrossed the plane of his back. Some long healed, some jagged. None untouched. You traced them all. You made sure of it.

He was enormous up close. Wide and brutal across the back, all muscles and tension, like a warhorse trying not to charge. You let your gaze drink him in, and your hands followed, slow, unhurried, like a whisper meant to be heard only skin-deep.

The muscles there weren’t just strong. They were sculpted, forged by weight and war and years of never letting his guard down. He was built to bear armor and carry bodies, to take damage and come back worse for it. His shoulders alone could hold the world, and from the tight coil of them now, it looked like he was, straining against himself to obey you, to stay still when all he wanted to do was reach.

You touched him like you owned him.

The base of his neck, where the tendons flexed and twitched with tension. You let your thumb slide down the ridge of his spine, feeling each dip like a secret made for your hand. Lower, across the stretch of his shoulders, thick muscle, knotting tighter with every breath he took. Your fingers grazed the upper curve of his back, then curled into a light rake just beneath his shoulder blades.

He exhaled hard, almost a growl.

You dragged your hand lower, wanting to know the hard-earned muscle down either side of his spine, the precise taper of his waist where strength met agility, all power wrapped in skin that bore a thousand old struggles.

There were scars everywhere. Long ones, straight and clean. Others jagged, like he’d been clawed by something not quite human. Thin, silver ones that made your bones ache at the thought of some bastard whipping him. You followed the path of one that ran from the back of his ribs toward his spine, pressing your nail into the seam.

Still, he didn’t move.

“You’re trying so hard,” you murmured, letting your hand drift back up.

His shoulders hunched tighter.

You scraped your nails down again, slow and sharp, until the muscle beneath your hand jumped. His breath hitched loud enough to make you grin.

“You’re burning,” you said. “Aren’t you?”

No answer. Just the rise and fall of his chest, heavy now. The subtle tremor in his arms where they hung at his sides.

You stepped in closer, close enough for the heat rolling off him to catch your breath, to let your hands flatten at the blades of his shoulders and just stay there for a moment.

“You’re magnificent like this,” you whispered, hands gliding slowly over his shoulders, down the thick curves of his biceps. “Even more than I remembered.”

A faint tremble caught your voice. Not from fear, but from something far deeper. The weight of his stillness. The quiet hum of violence banked just beneath his skin. It made your head light, your thighs wet. You knew what he looked like wild, chained, fighting. But this —

This was worship.

You squeezed down over his forearms, following every coiled line of power beneath his skin. Your palms smoothed over old bruises, long scars, ridges carved by violence. And there, your fingers reached the iron cuffs biting into his wrists. You hated them suddenly. Not for what they were, but because they interfered. You wanted his skin bare. You wanted to feel the grind of tendon and bone beneath your own grip. To know the shape of his strength by touch alone.

Your breath caught as the thought twisted darker.

What if you pushed him? What if you made him break?

The idea made something in you burn.

Your hands slid over the back of his, fingers brushing his knuckles, and you felt it. The spasm. A lightning flicker of motion. Like his hands were starving to move, to grab, to pin and pull and hold. You wanted them on you. You wanted to deny them a little longer.

“You could snap me in half,” you murmured against his shoulder blade.

His shoulders flexed at the sound of your voice, hips twitching forward with an unconscious jerk. You couldn’t see his cock, but you imagined it, thick and flushed, straining hard and helpless against the drapes of his linen, neglected, every beat of his pulse throbbing through it.

You clenched at the thought, aching and empty between your thighs.

Your hands moved again. You trailed down his sides, over the sculpted terrain of his ribs, feeling the shifting muscle beneath his skin. He was breathing deep, slow and heavy, as if to anchor himself in the moment. To draw you into him. Your touch became his breath.

You lingered there, palms curving over his ribs, holding him like a lover would hold something precious. Your silks brushed his back and raised goosebumps across every inch of exposed skin. He could feel you, just the press of your breast against his back, the teasing flicker of your hip, and each contact lit him up like a fuse. You heard the hitch in his throat, the bitten-back groan swallowed behind gritted teeth.

He was unraveling.

And your hands kept moving.

You pressed over the firm plane of his abdomen, nails grazing lower with each pass. You could feel the way he tensed under your palm, his control fraying, need vibrating through every taut muscle. You framed the soft dip of his navel, drawing a line there, dangerous and close, but never slipping lower.

Your voice was barely audible now.

“Still so good for me…” You let your lips shape the words against the heat of his back, not able to touch. Just cold metal. Just promise.

And he shuddered like a man being broken open from the inside out.

Your fingers move to the knot at his hip.

It was barely anything, just a simple wrap to cover him. But even that felt too much. You wanted him exposed, desperately. You wanted to peel him bare like something exquisite, something you conquered.

Your fingers worked slowly, deliberately, brushing the backs of your knuckles against the firm line of his waist as you untied the wrap.

The fabric fell.

You stepped closer, the press of your body flush against his back now, your robe brushing his skin, your breasts pressing against him with every breath.

Your hands slid lower again. Over his stomach, down his sides, fingertips pressing into the heat of him. And there, you paused, fingers framing just above his groin.

He sucked in a breath. Looked down.

His cock, thick, flushed, already wet with need, jerked against his belly at just the suggestion of your touch. A curse ripped out of his chest, low and raw, helpless.

Your fingertips hovered on either side of him, barely brushing, the restraint in your touch more punishing than any chain.

He was trembling now. His muscles flexing so hard beneath your touch, it made his cock twitch again, precum dripping down the shaft in a maddening slide.

Then, he watched your hand move.

Your fingertip traced the underside of him, slow and reverent, following the gleam of wetness from base to head.

He groaned, no, panted, body tight, neck bowed, eyes fixed on your hand like it was the only thing that existed.

Your hand was so small.

And he was so hard.

You touched him like he was sacred. Like he might vanish. Like you were memorizing every vein, every pulse, every inch of him. The drag of your fingertip was maddening, too gentle, too slow. And when you reached the ridge of his head, his hips snapped again, more precum slicking over your finger.

You didn’t stop.

You didn’t flinch.

You gathered the wetness with your fingertips, spreading it over him, feeling the contrast of silk-slick skin stretched tight over brutal hardness. He was swollen, trembling, flushed deep with blood, and so hot to the touch. When your touch passed over his slit, just the faintest press, he moaned, from the chest, from somewhere deeper, like the sound had to be torn out of him.

You felt him throb, desperate and aching.

He thought he might die if you touched him properly.

And he might die if you didn’t.

You should have stopped.

You knew that. You should have stepped back before you fell too far, before the ache between your legs turned blinding, before you forgot your own games and let yourself beg.

But he whimpered.

You didn’t even know how he managed it, with all that power, all that bulk, all that lethal tension wound through every inch of him, but the sound slipped out when your palm finally wrapped around him. It was wounded. It was desperate. His back bowed hard enough that the chain at his neck rattled, and his hand, his hand, snapped down over yours like he might fucking die if you let go.

You froze, breath caught, your heart slamming in your ribs as his grip tightened over your fist and he held.

He was squeezing so hard it should have hurt. You weren’t even sure whose hand was doing what anymore; you only felt the heat of him, the pulse, the madness of his restraint crackling through his body like a taut wire about to snap.

His head dropped forward, breath coming in ragged gasps. And still… he didn’t let go.

Not because you’d commanded him not to finish. You hadn’t said a word. You didn’t need to.

It was him.

He was the one holding back. He was the one refusing the edge, clinging to the moment like it might be the last. You realized, with a quiet jolt, what he was really afraid of.

He wasn’t ready for it to end.

He didn’t want you to call for his removal.

You whispered to him, barely able to catch your breath. “You are unreal… gods, look at you. Look what you were doing to me.”

Your voice cracked, and his body jerked like he felt it in his spine.

“You’re holding back so well,” you murmured against the sweat-slick skin, your forehead pressed against it, just trying to breathe him in. “For me. Just for me.”

Your hand tightened around his cock, and the choked sound he made was shattering.

“Don’t fucking move,” he growled through gritted teeth, voice wrecked, torn apart by effort.

“I didn’t know you could be that good,” you whispered, awed and vicious and delirious. “Didn’t know a beast like you could beg without words. Could tremble like that just from my hands. You’re so hard… You’re dripping.”

His hand, still over yours, tensed and released, squeezing around his cock so tight your palm felt the way his heartbeat jumped. It was wild. Thudding. So damn loud it drowned out everything else. You didn’t dare breathe.

He held it.

Then let go.

Then grabbed again, as if the mere sight of your hand still wrapped around him was enough to tip him over the brink.

His hips twitched forward, helpless. His thighs were quivering. His shoulders bunched and strained. His mouth hung open and his whole body shuddered with the force of his control, like he was trying to wrestle his own orgasm into submission.

Your other hand was still braced on his hip, fingers digging deep into the solid muscle. You didn’t realize how tight you were holding until your nails sank into hot flesh and he flinched. Until he gasped.

You didn’t let go.

You dug in harder.

You could have made him bleed.

The thought turned your breath into a moan. He was so sensitive. Every breath, every twitch, every pulse of his cock against your palm, it was like his body had been built to be unraveled, yours to take apart.

“You were divine like this. All power and violence, built to fight, and still, still you let me do this to you.”

When his hand finally released yours, no longer crushing it in a desperate grip, you let go too. The sound he made in protest was immediate, low, rough, almost pained. You ignored it.

Instead, you braced both hands against his hips and pushed.

“Move.”

He stumbled forward towards the couch, just half a step, before the chain snapped taut, yanking him short and almost striking you. The collar bit deep into his neck. He grunted, surprised, like he’d forgotten about it entirely in the haze of your touch.

“Going to be good for me now?” you asked, voice suddenly going sharp.

It was a question, an order, a warning. It was a plea, too, buried somewhere beneath the thrum of your pulse and the heat pooling in your stomach. You didn’t know what you’d do if he made you put him down.

You had a blade tucked at the small of your back. Just in case.

He had to behave. He had to be good.

Because it would be a tragedy to waste him, to slit that vein at his throat, or drive your dagger into the soft inside of his thigh. His blood would stain everything. It would be over too fast. And you’d have to be quick, faster than him, faster than instinct. And you weren’t sure you could be.

The thought made your chest rise and fall in uneven rhythm. The image of fighting him, really fighting him, thrilled and terrified you in equal measure.

“Yes, Domina,” he said at last.

Your fingers brushed behind you, finding the hilt of the dagger, the soft leather reassuring against your palm. Just a touch. Just in case.

Then you drew out the key.

It hung from the delicate gold chain between your breasts, almost ornamental, almost forgotten until now. You stepped close enough to press the key into the lock at the base of his iron collar, your other hand still poised at your blade.

With a twist, the lock clicked. The collar fell away from his neck and clattered onto the marble floor, the sound far too loud in the charged silence.

The leash was gone. The chain was no more.

And still, you stood behind him, heart hammering, blade within reach.

The air between you was thick with it — that oppressive anticipation. Your hand hovered near your blade. His breath was fast and ragged.

Then he moved.

He didn't turn. Didn't lunge. Didn't bolt. He just stepped forward, the last few feet to the couch. One hand reached back, found your elbow, and wrapped around it with enough certainty to leave no room for hesitation, dragging you with him.

Only when he reached the couch did he let you go. He turned, sat back against the cushions in a slow, deliberate motion, legs spread and spine stiff, and left you standing there in front of him, flushed from neck to navel, heart pounding so hard it felt like your body might come apart.

A mirror of that first time.

He looked at you like a starving man. Like you were the only thing keeping him alive. His chest rose and fell in shallow bursts. Behind the mask, his eyes were blown wide, glazed and dark with need. His lips were red, parted, slick with spit, and the thought of him holding your name in his mouth was more intoxicating than the wine.

He didn't say a word.

He didn't have to.

His expression was nothing short of a plea.

I’m being good.

But whatever he saw in your face wasn’t enough.

Because he reached for you all at once. No warning. Just the rough clink of the chain still between his wrists and his hands locking hard around your hips, dragging you forward. You barely stayed upright, caught off-balance by his strength. One hand slid lower, gripping your thigh and hauling your leg up and over him.

You sank into his lap, landed hard, knees bracketing his hips, hands slamming into his chest to catch yourself. He was burning under your palms. Slick with sweat. Breathing like a beast. And you were right there, right over him. Your cunt poised just above the thick, hot line of his cock. Only your robe kept you from full contact.

And then he let go.

Like he’d touched something forbidden.

His hands dropped to the cushions beside him. Palms up. Open. Harmless. He tilted his head back, exposing his throat, the long line of it flushed and vulnerable. His breath came shallow and fast, his mask catching the light just so. A show of obedience so sharp it made your mouth go dry.

You looked at him and thought he might beg for it.

You wished he would. Imagined him undone beneath you. His want, barely contained. The ache of it so honest, so open it nearly undid you.

The image tore through your spine like lightning. Your hips moved before your mind caught up, grinding down in one slow, aching roll.

He arched beneath you with a broken sound. His hands clenched in velvet, desperate to stay where he put them. Your robe was soaked now, silk sticking to your folds, pressing your heat into his cock like it belonged there.

He was shaking.

And you were drunk on it.

But when you moved again, when you rolled your hips with more intention, chasing the pleasure that had come so easily a moment ago, it wasn’t the same. Your movement faltered. Rougher. Off-kilter. A messy grind instead of that fluid, seductive roll. You cursed under your breath and tried again.

Up until now, it had all been heat and hunger. Touch and words. All your talk. All your games. All the fantasy you’d spun so easily from the safety of distance. It had never reached here.

You’d never imagined this part, this raw, grinding intimacy. You knew what sex was. What it meant for a man to take a woman, to mount her, use her. But this, riding a man’s cock through your clothes, pressing your cunt to him until silk clung to your slick heat, this wasn’t in any of those stories.

You hadn’t thought it would feel like this, awkward and primal and frighteningly real.

Your thighs shook from the tension of holding yourself above him. Your robe was bunched around your hips, your cunt soaked and pressed into his heat, and still it wasn’t enough.

And he noticed.

Of course he did.

His eyes were locked on your face, wide and disbelieving behind the mask, drinking in every stuttered breath, every broken movement. You didn’t have to say a word. He saw it in you.

His chest hitched, his mouth parted.

“Fuck,” he cursed, voice low and ragged, sounding drunk on something you didn’t understand, words spilling out of him without restraint. “You’ve never done this before.”

Never ground yourself against anyone like this. Never let anyone feel your slick heat through thin silk, never let your hips chase after pleasure like an animal. Never sat above a man with the power to take what you wanted.

And now you were here.

With him.

He looked wrecked. Awed. Something crumbled in his restraint, his hips shifted beneath you, just enough to press his cock firmer into the cradle of your body.

“Take what you want,” he rasped.

Your gaze locked with his, startled.

His voice dropped, hoarse and thick with hunger. “Ride me like a horse.”

You blinked, stunned at the audacity. The imagery. The implication.

“Use me. Move your hips. Like this —”

He lifted his own just enough to show you, a subtle roll upward that made your breath stutter. His cock pressed up against your folds with maddening precision.

“Again,” he said, softer now. “Feel that?”

You swallowed hard and mimicked the motion, your thighs tightening, hips rocking forward. A rush of sensation shot up your spine, molten and aching.

He groaned like you’d torn the sound from his lungs.

“That’s it,” he whispered. “Again.”

You did.

Slower this time. Pressing forward with more purpose, letting the soaked silk drag along his length. He felt all of it. You could tell by the way his mouth fell open and his fingers dug deeper into the cushions, still trying to obey, still trying not to touch.

“Good,” he gritted. “Again. Don’t stop.”

There was a weight behind his voice now. That low growl, praise and plea wrapped into one.

Your hips moved as instructed, chasing that sweet friction. Each grind sent a spark through your belly, lighting your nerves from the inside. His cock was heavy and solid beneath you, and even through the silk, the pressure was maddening. It dragged against your clit just enough to keep you wanting.

“Harder,” he said. “Faster, if you can. Let yourself have it.”

You moaned, more from the sound of his wrecked voice than your own pleasure.

Your thighs began to burn with the effort, your pace faltering for a second. He must have felt it, because his voice came again, softer now. “Lean into me. Let me carry some of it.”

You did, letting your hands slide up his chest and your weight settle forward. His breath hitched.

“There you go,” he rasped. “That’s it. Just like that.”

And when your hips found a rhythm, clumsy but desperate, a hungry rocking that sent waves of heat crawling up your spine, he let out a sound that was almost a whimper.

You didn’t think it was possible to feel this warm.

Every nerve lit, skin buzzing with feverish heat. You braced your hands on his shoulders, dug your nails into the slick muscle there, half for balance, half because you needed to feel him. His breath caught at the sting, but he didn’t pull away. He moaned for it.

When your hips snapped down particularly hard, you felt it shoot through both of you. You grabbed at his throat next, to choke, to hold. Just to anchor yourself to that long column of heat pulsing beneath your palm. Then moved higher, to the bottom of his jaw, felt it flex under your grip, felt him growl in your palm.

You wanted to bite him. Hard. Wanted his mouth on yours, wanted to tear off your mask and feel his lips crushed to yours, messy and wet. But you didn’t stop. Couldn’t.

The burn low in your core was climbing now, hot and tight, curling with every grind of your hips. Still riding him through soaked silk, still chasing something just out of reach. You needed more.

Your hand dipped between your bodies. Slipped down your belly, over the rumpled fabric. Your fingers found your clit, slick and swollen, and you gasped at the contact. The wet silk dragged exquisitely across sensitive flesh. You circled slowly, then faster, messy, ungraceful, panting into the air. Your hips shuddered in their movement, losing their rhythm to chaos.

He made a sound beneath you, ragged and wrecked.

“Oh, fuck,” he hissed through clenched teeth, through your fingers.. “Yes. Yes…”

You didn’t stop to think. Didn’t hold back.

Your movements were desperate now, fevered, nothing like before. Not composed. Not teasing. No more elegance, no pretense of control. You were consumed.

And he watched it all like a man starving.

You moaned, loud and open-mouthed. Your back arched. Sweat beaded at the base of your spine. Your fingers slid faster, messier, hips jerking forward, barely touching his cock anymore. You were close — so close — your breath catching on every thrust, every glide of soaked silk against him. Your thighs trembled. Your fingers were frantic.

You hadn’t even realized your hips had slowed to a gentle roll until he made a sound, high and desperate, and snapped his hips up beneath you, fucking against nothing.

His arms were still at his sides, trembling now, every muscle locked tight. His chest rose and fell in quick, gasped breaths. His eyes, wild, burning, devoured you. The way he looked at you nearly tore you apart.

“Touch me,” he whined. A command. A plea.

“Fuck. Just anything.”

Your heart felt like it might explode out of your chest.

You looked down, and his gaze followed yours. The sight stole the breath from your lungs.

The folds of your slick cunt were pressed against the soaked fabric of your robe, wet and clinging, leaving nothing to the imagination. Your clit was swollen, flushed dark, pinned beneath your fingertips as you rubbed. And beneath you, gods, his cock.

Hard and flushed, leaking with every twitch of his hips. A steady drip of precum stained your robe, mixing with your own slick where you rode him. He looked furious with need. Thick and unyielding and perfect. It made your teeth ache to bite him. Made your cunt throb at the thought of him splitting you open.

It was that thought, blazing and vivid, that tipped you over the edge.

Your whole body went rigid. Your thighs clamped around his hips. Your fingers ground down against your clit until sparks exploded behind your eyes. You cried out, shaking, the pleasure crashing over you like a wave breaking ashore.

Your other hand clawed at his chest, carving red lines into flushed, damp skin, until suddenly, it was yanked away.

His arms wrapped around you. One locked tight at the small of your back, dragging you down, holding you there. The other grabbed your hand, pulling it lower, down to his cock.

His fist closed around yours. Big and shaking. He stroked himself using your hand, his breath breaking in your ear.

It only took a few brutal strokes.

He grunted, choked, helpless, and then he was coming. His cock pulsed in your joined grip, spilling hot and thick over his stomach, over your fingers. Shot after shot, painting the space between you.

His arm stayed tight around you, but his body gave out, slumping back into the cushions like he’d been gutted. And you, still straddling him, still trembling with the echo of your climax, followed. The movement was slow, lazy with the weight of satisfaction. He sank, and you went with him, your bodies collapsing into one heat-hazed, sweat-slick sprawl.

His hand settled low on your back. Flat and heavy. Right over the hilt of your dagger.

You felt the shape of it there, the curve of the grip pressing between you. He had to feel it too. Had to know how easy it would be to grab. How close you’d brought it.

He didn’t reach for it.

Didn’t even twitch.

Just breathed, ragged and uneven. His other hand flexed around your thigh once, then stilled.

“You’re either stupid,” he murmured, voice shredded from effort, “or brave.”

You didn’t answer.

“Or just fucking crazy,” he added, softer now. Almost like admiration. “Coming in here, putting a blade right where I could take it. Where I could use it.”

You lifted your head then, from where your breath settled against his throat.

Met his eyes.

Watched the gold in them flicker like a flame starved for air.

He was right. You had brought a weapon close enough for him to take. One move and he could’ve plunged it between your ribs. Or slit your throat. Or held it to your heart and demanded anything he pleased of you.

But he hadn’t.

And you didn’t care what name he gave your choice; you didn’t want to hear his lecture.

So you brought your hand up. Slow. Loose-limbed and unhurried.

Slick fingers. Coated with the mess of your orgasm, your pleasure. You pressed them to his mouth, smeared the wetness over his lips.

He inhaled sharply but didn’t pull away.

Didn’t even hesitate.

His lips parted, and his tongue curled around your fingertips, sucking them into the heat of his mouth with a hunger that was no longer frantic, but reverent. Deep and slow, like he wanted to memorize the taste.

Your breath caught.

He didn’t look away as he sucked. Didn’t blink. His eyes stayed pinned to yours, and the warmth that pooled in your belly was no less intense than what had come before.

Just different.

He released your fingers with a soft, wet pop. His tongue chased the last of you from the pad of your palm, and then he spoke again, quieter this time.

“I should’ve taken it,” he said, almost to himself. “That dagger.”

You leaned in, your impassive mask inches from his skull-shaped one, your voice nothing but breath:

Another match. Another pair of desperate men spilling entrails for sport. The crowd cheered and wailed, throwing curses and coins with equal fervor. You followed them, eyes sharp.

And then he stepped onto the sand.

Your breath caught before you knew why.

He was massive. Larger than the others, towering, pale, brutal-looking even from this distance. A wall of muscle, imposing in scale, like a beast dragged from the wilderness and forced into iron. Made of marble, veined with violence. Scarred arms, a chest broad enough to block the sun, corded legs that moved with heavy grace. He wore only the essentials: a leather belt studded with iron, gladiator's sandals strapped to thick calves, and bracers that looked scavenged from dead men. Across his shoulders, a pitted iron pauldron marked with old, dried blood. No tunic. No armor to hide behind. Just skin and power.

And that helmet. Rough-forged, streaked with red, and painted in defiance with a crude white skull across the face. It turned his silence into menace, his gaze into death.

“The Ghost!” the crowd began to chant, at first a murmur, then a thunder. “Ghost! Ghost! Ghost!” They knew him. Even before he moved.

You leaned forward so suddenly your goblet nearly tipped. Your heart beat a little faster. You hadn't thought it could.

You gripped the carved edge of the balcony, every nerve in your body focused on the way he prowled forward. His opponent, a tall, sinewy man armed with a trident and net, circled like a jackal. But Ghost didn’t flinch. Didn’t taunt. He only watched. Waited. Measured.

You saw the shift in his stance a breath before the kill. The weight transfer. The flex of one massive thigh. And then—

It almost happened too fast for the eye to follow.

Ghost closed the space between them like a storm. The trident glanced off his bracer, sunk into the sand, and his short gladius tore through the man’s chest in a brutal upward slash. You saw the ribs part, the spray of blood, thick and red and glorious, painting Ghost’s bare skin.

The body dropped twitching at his feet.

The arena erupted.

“Brutal,” said the noblewoman beside you, adjusting her veil.

“Efficient,” you murmured, gaze fixed on the killer below.

She gave you a wary glance. “Don’t be foolish. The wild ones are the most dangerous. No matter how loud the crowd screams. Not even the respect to entertain his patron.”

“What is he?” you asked aloud, voice light, casual. A steward heard you and stepped closer.

“Briton, Domina. Taken in the northern campaigns. Refuses a name.”

“Then why do they call him Ghost?”

“Because he doesn’t make a sound when he kills.”

Your smile deepened.

He didn’t wipe his face. Instead, he took a moment to clean the blood from his blade with a slow, practiced motion. The gladius gleamed under the sun. But it was his hands that caught your attention, broad and scarred, thick-fingered and strong. The kind of hands that had broken men. The kind of hands that could ruin.

Your pulse fluttered like a trapped bird.

“I want him,” you said.

The older woman beside you sputtered. “You’ve never requested one before.”

You drained your goblet and held it to the side to be refiled.

“Have him sent to me tomorrow.”

The woman’s expression darkened. “They’re not men, not anymore. They remember the feel of killing even in chains.”

You laughed, light and unbothered. “Then I’ll see what such a thing looks like up close.”

The words left your mouth with a thrill you couldn’t contain. It shimmered beneath your skin, a feverish anticipation that curled low and hot in your stomach. You imagined the sound of shackles clinking, the weight of him in the dark, the heat that would rise from him.

Bellow you, the crowd chanted his name like a prayer made of blood.

— ❖ —

They woke him before dawn.

Not with words, never with words, but with the sharp slap of a wet cloth and the scrape of chains being dragged over the stone. Around him, the cells stirred. Other gladiators grunted and groaned, muttered curses in half a dozen tongues. They should’ve been left to sleep, lick their wounds, and be carted away latter in the afternoon. The games had ended yesterday.

He sat up slowly, back peeling from the damp stone, and looked down the row. Guards moved with purpose, not gathering all of them, just a few. Only a few.

He recognized their faces. Not the strongest. Not the bloodletters or the brawlers. These were the pretty ones. Fine-boned. Glossy-haired. The ones who’d been sent to noble villas and senators' feasts. He’d heard them brag about it. Displayed like statues. Made to pour wine, feed fruit, stage pretend-fights when ordered. Flesh, dressed up and passed around like dessert.

He swung his feet to the floor.

Shackles scraped over stone.

A pair of guards appeared at his gate.

“You. Up.”

He rose without a word. He didn’t need to speak. His silence unsettled them more than any threat.

He stood out among them like a wolf among dogs. Their skin was golden and sun-kissed, lean muscles elegant like dancers or courtesans. Most had dark, gleaming hair, oiled and neatly bound. One of them bore intricate blue geometric designs inked into his skin, clean, artful lines that whispered of ritual and heritage. Nothing like Ghost's crude tattoos, symbols he barely remembered being carved, black scars of a world lost.

They led him and the others down the narrow corridor, toward the baths hidden beneath the arena.

Steam hit him first. Then oil. Then the scent of citrus and herbs meant to disguise what this truly was.

Not preparation for battle.

Preparation for something else entirely.

The room was warm and echoing, arched in pale stone, flickering torchlight dancing over wet tile. Pools steamed gently. Attendants moved silently, practiced and precise, like part of the architecture itself. There were no orders. Only hands.

Hands on his shoulders, brushing away grime and dried blood. Hands pouring water down his back in warm streams. Fingers in his hair. Cloth sliding along scars and scabs. Ghost’s jaw locked and resisted the urge to flinch.

Water rolled in rivulets down his chest and stomach, trailing through the deep cuts of muscle like rain over carved stone. The filth of the arena slipped from him in shades of brown and red.

He had never been bathed by another before. Every nerve was alert. He watched each movement with suspicion, half a breath from violence.

He was ready to shove someone, bare teeth, snarl like a beast cornered—

But a presence leaned in beside him.

The blue-marked gladiator. And a damp cloth was dropped in his hand.

“Don’t worry,” the man said, voice low and teasing. “We’re as surprised as ya’re.”

He dismissed the slaves with a charming smile and the confidence of someone who’s done this numerous times before. “Make sure ya’re thorough with that. Ya don't want to be displeasing.”

Ghost said nothing. His hands flexed under the water, rewetting the cloth.

“Been a while since they sent up someone like ya,” the blue-marked man continued, eyeing Ghost with an amused sort of detachment. “She must have asked for ya by name. Or… by myth. Either way, someone upstairs is curious. Ya’ll be her little mystery for a night.”

Ghost glanced at him from beneath wet lashes, expression hidden but sharp. “How many of these baths have you had, then?”

The other man grinned. “More than I can count. Why?”

“Sounds like you know their ways too well.”

The man laughed, loud and easy. “Ya mock, but it’s kept me alive.”

Ghost didn’t smile, but something shifted in his posture. Not relaxed, never that, but less coiled.

“Don’t go around biting hands. And do address her as Domina at all times.” The man patted him on the back and left him be.

He expected the worst. An aging senator’s bored wife. A fragile Roman crone with nothing but coin and command. Another weakling behind perfume and veils.

He considered scaring her. Maybe hurting her. Maybe he wouldn’t have to do anything, they’d be scared of him on sight.

They always were.

— ❖ —

Your chambers were in chaos.

Silks lay draped over couches, perfumes clouded the air, and half a dozen attendants moved around you like petals in a storm. Bracelets clinked on wrists. Pins glinted in the light. Someone whispered about scent layering. Another fretted about your hair. Your skin was still pink and warm after returning from the bath, tender and smooth, prickling with a strange, electric awareness.

You had chosen a robe the color of old blood, soft as breath, split high at the thighs, plunging deep to your belly. Not subtle. Not demure. You didn’t want to be. Gold chains draped down the slope of your collarbones, between the valley of your breasts, and wrapped around the flare of your waist making you feel intoxicatingly feminal. There was pleasure in the ritual of it, in the dressing, in the transformation, but this wasn’t only for you.

You wanted him to see.

It shouldn’t matter. He was a slave. A fighter. A beast in a gilded cage. And yet the thought of his eyes dragging over your body, heavy and assessing, and thinking woman and it thrilled you.

A velvet-lined box waited on a low table beside your chaise, the lid already cracked open. Inside, the gold skull mask gleamed, its hollow eyes catching in the lamplight. Your gift. Your claim. You had commissioned it in a rush after seeing the one he wore in the arena. This would be finer. This would be yours. A version of him remade for you.

He would wear it tonight.

You would wear one too, as you were advised to do, more delicate, shaped to the face of a goddess, your eyes lined in kohl behind it. A matched set.

They said he would be ugly. Scarred. Twisted from battle and bone-healing wrong. Better to see him adorned, they told you. Better not to look too closely at what war leaves behind. But you didn’t want distance.

A flicker of nerves rose, uninvited. You smothered it.

You ran your fingers over the edge of the mask, then stood. The robe whispered against your skin, and the perfume rose with your movement—amber, myrrh, and something sharper beneath. You caught your own reflection in the bronze mirror and studied it like a stranger might. Flushed. Bright-eyed. A little too eager.

Let them talk.

Let them warn you.

You weren’t afraid of wild things. There was something wild within yourself. — ❖ — The cart rattled over the stone road, wheels creaking with every bump, the last light of the sun dragging long shadows over the hills. It painted the world in hues of burnt orange and deep violet. The others talked quietly, stretched out or lounging, used to the journey. Ghost sat at the back, shackled, alone.

He was the only one wearing chains.

The iron cuffs were tight, his wrists resting on his knees as he watched the other gladiators from beneath his brow. They looked like bronzed statues in the golden hour, slim, beautiful, elegant in their poise. Hair dark and curled, bodies lean, skin clean. Some had jewelry on. One of them even smelled faintly of rose oil. The painted one caught Ghost watching and gave him a wink.

It was all wrong. Ghost was muscle and scars, rough edges and old wounds. He didn’t belong among them. He wasn’t made to be looked at. He was made to end things.

The cart slowed.

The stop was a sprawling villa on the edge of the city, lit with torchlight and alive with sound. Laughter spilled into the night air, along with the thrum of lyres and the clatter of plates. The courtyard swarmed with activity, carts and horses, guards and servants. The smell of spiced meat and roasting figs thickened the air. Smoke coiled up into the twilight sky.

A man called out, and the cart came to a full stop.

“You. Out.”

The other gladiators began to move, stretching like cats after a nap, adjusting their robes or tugging at the clasps of their sandals. One by one they dropped to the ground and were greeted by handlers and attendants. But when Ghost stepped forward to follow, a firm hand on his shoulder stopped him.

“Not you,” came the voice.

He stiffened.

The others glanced back at him as they were led away, laughing, striding into the fray. The painted one turned with a smile and blew him a kiss before disappearing through the grand gates.

Ghost sat back down. The cart creaked into motion once more.

Their second stop was different.

Smaller. Quieter.

The villa was set apart from the others, further up a hill, where the air cooled after the sun was gone. Light flickered through some of the archways, lamplight, soft and golden, but most of the house lay dark. A few guards loitered near the entrance, not enough to be a threat. Not enough to stop him, if he wanted out. No music. No voices. Just the distant rustling of wind in the vines.

He was led through the open courtyard, feet crunching softly against the gravel. The smell of lilac was everywhere. It pressed into his senses, cloying, thick, sweet. Flowering vines trailed along the walls, blooming in the twilight.

It was quiet.

Unsettlingly so.

The eerie buzz of insects filled the air.

They walked past shadowed rooms and empty benches, deeper into the secluded wing. He could feel the pulse of it now. This was private.

Before the door, the guards stopped. One stepped forward to check his chains, tightening a link, adjusting the clasp. Ghost bared his teeth but didn’t resist.

Then came the box.

It was velvet-lined, simple. The guard opened it without ceremony, revealing a golden skull mask. Finer than he’d ever seen. Too fine. He knew what this was.

“Put it on,” the man ordered.

Ghost stared at the thing. Hollow eyes. His likeness, remade in gold.

He nearly laughed. A bitter, hollow sound that didn’t quite make it past his throat.

He thought about refusing. About knocking the box out of the man’s hand, shattering it against the stone. About tearing through the house and finding her and demanding to know what she thought this was. He wasn’t a bauble. He wasn’t a toy for some noble’s lonely night.

He was a weapon.

He was a fighter.

But in the end, he reached out and took the mask.

The metal was cool against his skin. It settled into place and tied behind his head, fitting too well.

He straightened, exhaled, and stepped through the door.

— ❖ —

It was not you bedchamber.

This room was quieter. Secluded. Set apart from the rest of the villa, tucked behind thick stone walls and veiled archways. The floor was cool marble, veined with deep, smoky gray. Incense curled from a brazier in the corner, heady and sweet, clinging to the air like a secret. Velvet drapes hung heavy, muffling sound, swallowing the last of the light. A fire crackled in the hearth. Nearby, a low fountain gurgled gently, feeding a small soaking pool.

You were already there, stretched languidly along a carved wooden sofa covered in pillows, half reclining, gold mask resting on your face. A goblet of wine dangled from your fingers, nearly empty. The carafe beside it was half gone. A bowl of fruit, cheese, and honeyed nuts sat ignored. A bell rested within reach.

You waited.

Your mouth was dry. Your pulse fluttered like a bird’s. There was already a throb between your legs, low and urgent. The anticipation had grown unbearable. You had imagined this, fantasized, but nothing had prepared you for the reality.

The curtain parted.

He stepped inside.

Bound. Masked. Draped in white.

Chains gleamed at his ankles, at his wrists, a thick collar around his neck. The metal clinked softly as he entered. Behind him, a guard lingered long enough to loop the end of his chain around a carved column and secure it. The man gave a shallow bow and departed in silence. You weren’t alone, not really. You knew there were ears behind the wall, men with blades waiting just out of sight. But the illusion of privacy was heady.

He stood, still and silent.

You devoured him with your eyes.

This close, you could finally see what the arena kept distant. You had expected something brutish. Still filthy. Not this. He was tall. Towering. Breathtakingly imposing. This close, he was overwhelming. Broad shoulders, roped with muscle. Skin pale like ivory, a map of old battles: long-healed scars, silvered and ridged, proof of a thousand survived wounds, others still scabbed and angry. His chest rose and fell slowly, revealing the hard cut of his torso, bare but for the linen wrapped loosely around his waist. His arms were thick with muscle, corded and taut, veins visible like in the marble beneath your feet, crude lines of black ink wrapping around them, marks of another life. His thighs, partially revealed beneath the loose folds of linen, were thick and solid, shaped by years of brutality. He looked like he could crush a man’s skull between them.

The mask was exquisite on him. Your mask. The gold caught the light, burnished and regal. And above it: his hair. You hadn’t expected the color. Pale. Almost flaxen. Cropped short, close to the skull, like fur. Rare. Unusual. It gleamed like gold in the firelight.

His eyes were unreadable through the mask, but you felt them on you. Heavy. Assessing. Not cowed. Not grateful.

"Do you know why you're here?” you asked, your voice too soft, too breathless.

He tilted his head slightly. "You paid for me…” he held onto a breath like it didn’t want to leave his chest. “Domina.”

A note of disapproval slipped from your throat behind the mask.

"I requested you," you corrected. "That’s different."

He said nothing.

The silence stretched. The fire cracked.

You leaned forward, wine-warmed, full of nerve. Your voice a purr.

“Approach.”

He finally took a step, just before a reproach was on your lips. He moved with the caution of a predator, one aware of his strength, forced into stillness by circumstance, not submission. The chain pulled taut just a few feet from you. Close enough to drink in every detail. Far enough to have to raise to touch him. Far enough to be out of his grasp.

“They say your kind fights like wolves,” you murmured, your fingers brushing the rim of your goblet like you might trace the line of his mouth.

He didn’t flinch. “Wolves bite.”

A pause.

“Do they obey?”

Something sparked behind the gold. A glint like the edge of a blade.

“Only when they choose to.”

He watched you.

And you were nothing like he expected.

He’d imagined some perfumed matron, half-swaddled in years and power, leaning on the crutch of servants and ceremony. Someone soft in the way cruelty sometimes was—lazy, dulled by privilege, distracted.

But not you.

You were sharp. Vibrant. Young, yes, but in the way of a blade just pulled from the forge. That was the first surprise. You were younger than any Domina who looked down at him from the tall balcony of the arena, distain in their eyes. Your beauty was wild, not ornamental. Not in the way Roman matrons were supposed to be. Not tame. Not painted and powdered into a doll. Your hair was pinned but coming loose. Your silk clung where it pleased, chain glinting where flesh dipped and curved, not to bind, but to adorn, made of delicate gold, a mockery of his own iron. Every inch of you deliberately offered and utterly in control. You weren’t made of shadows and incense like this room, you were heat. Fire wrapped in gold. Hungry. Ready to consume. To immolate.

There was no mistaking it, not in the way you lounged on the couch, not in the way your eyes dragged over him like possession. You had the look of someone drunk on their own power, and no intention of sobering.

You were everything he had not prepared for.

And it made something in him stir.

He was a fighter. A weapon. A beast kept for the roar of the crowd.

But in that moment, he remembered he was also a man.

His eyes dropped, just for a second, to the delicate chain around your throat. How easily he could wrap his own chain there. How quickly he could make you gasp, not with fear, but something deeper. Rougher.

He flexed his hands, as if to remind himself of their purpose.

You saw it immediately.

The shift.

Your eyes dropped to his hands the moment he moved them, the way one might follow the flick of a blade in the dark. You couldn't help it.

Gods, those hands.

Scarred. Calloused. Thick-fingered and brutal. They looked like they were made for strangling. For gripping a sword until the hilt cracked. For pounding flesh into blood and dust. There were nicks across the knuckles, a deep old cut at the base of his thumb. You wanted to see those hands wrapped around something living. You wanted to see them drip red in the arena. You wanted to feel them inside you. Or wrapped around something throbbing.

Your thighs tensed. Heat pooled, molten.

He saw.

You didn’t speak. Instead, you reached for your wine, shifted your goblet in your hand like it was a weapon. Carefully, languidly, you drew your mask just enough to the side to reveal your lips. Glossy and red. You took a slow sip, savoring it, letting it slide down your throat while his gaze followed every motion. Tongue darting out to catch a drop before it spilled.

You didn’t ask him to refill your cup.

He noticed that, too.

The air between you thickened, took on weight. Your gaze flicked downward, and heat rushed straight to your core.

The linen wrap at his hips was beginning to betray him.

It shifted with the slow, tense rise of his breath. The outline visible now, growing. The shape of him. His cock swelling beneath the thin fabric, undeniable. It should have felt obscene. It didn’t. It felt right.

Your mouth went dry again. Your thighs pressed together without thinking. Your fingers tightened on the stem of your goblet.

You wanted to see all of him.

He didn’t flinch or look away. He stood exactly where you placed him, almost within reach. The chain taut. His chin lifted slightly, as if to ask: Now what, Domina?

The fire cracked behind you. The fountain bubbled on. But the only sound that mattered was his breathing, and your own.

You tilted your chin, voice low but clear.

“Undress.”

A beat of silence. Then, he moved.

Not rushed. Not hesitant. But measured. Like he was listening to your pulse, to your breath.

He lifted one arm, unwrapping the white linen from his waist. Each motion revealed more of him, inch by devastating inch. Muscle shifted beneath scarred skin. The lines of his abdomen, hard and clean as carved stone, flexed as he worked the knot free. The wrap loosened, slid down over his hips. Fell.

Your breath caught.

Fuck.

You had imagined it, but imagination failed. He was thick. Heavy. Already half hard, and rising. His cock was full, flushed and veined, a perfect match to the rest of him, massive, brutal, beautiful.

You couldn’t look away. Heat rushed through you, settling between your legs like flame. You ground your hips against the velvet cushion beneath you.

He watched you. And you realized, he was studying you now. Measuring your reactions. The way your chest rose too fast. The way your fingers clenched in the silk that draped over your thigh.

Still, you held his gaze.

Still, you kept your voice steady.

“Show me.”

His cock twitched.

“Touch yourself.”

He didn’t ask you to repeat it.

One scarred hand closed around the base of him, thick fingers curling over hot skin. He stroked once, slow, and your breath hitched.

Your whole body pulsed with want.

You’d never seen this. Not in life. Not like this. Not a man laid bare and made to perform at your whim. It was so crude.

He kept his eyes on you, every movement slow, controlled. His muscles flexed. His jaw tensed behind the mask. The gold gleamed in the firelight. You could hear the sound of him now, his hand working over the head.

Your hips shifted again. Your breath came faster. The urge to close the space between you, to taste him, to take; it burned through your spine.

But you didn’t move.

You stayed stretched across the sofa, trembling with power and hunger.

He was obeying. Because you commanded it. Because you wanted to see what a man looked like when stripped of armor and ego.

And he was showing you.

His hand moved again, slower now, crueler. He was teasing you as much as himself. You watched a bead of wetness glisten at the tip before his thumb smeared it over the head with a practiced motion.

He knew exactly what he was doing.

And then — his voice.

Rough. Quiet. Like gravel.

“Is this what you wanted, Domina?”

The title was heavy on his tongue. Not mocking. Not submissive. Something in between.

You didn’t answer. Not with words.

Instead, you leaned back further, one leg folding up, towards you, spreading your thighs. The silk of your robe slipped between them, brushing your core. You set your goblet on the table without refilling it. Then, slowly, deliberately, pulled your mask aside, not fully, just enough to let him glimpse the shape of your mouth again. Your lips parted, red from the wine, and you raised two fingers to drag them across your tongue. Wet. Obscene.

His cock jerked in his hand.

You smiled, letting the mask fall back in place.

Then, your hand slipped beneath your robe.

He grunted, barely audible. His chest rose faster.

You didn’t reveal anything. You didn’t need to. The shape of you, your posture, the lazy confidence of your wrist, everything spoke of what you were doing. The silk shifted, clinging to the inside of your thighs. You touched yourself with the same slow intent you used to command him. An indulgence. And a weapon. You watched him while you did it.

His hand moved harder now, forearm thick and flexing. Veins stood out across the muscle, straining. The chain at his wrist clinked with each stroke, metal brushing metal, harsh and rhythmic. A reminder of his restraint. A cruel, perfect sound.

He was close. You could feel it in the way he gritted his teeth. In the tightness of his jaw. The heat rolling off of him, the twitch of his cock. The tension built in him like a bowstring pulled too tight.

He hadn’t thought himself so desperate. But now, with you spread out before him, flushed and golden and unashamed, touching yourself while he stood chained and hard and exposed, he was unraveling.

He wanted.

He wanted like a man starved.

Like a man who hadn’t been a man in far too long.

The sounds he was making were low, more breath than voice, drawn from somewhere deep in his chest.

The silent Ghost, no more.

You watched, entranced. Mesmerized. The sight of him stroking himself for you, because you ordered it, was like a spell.

You let him linger there.

Right at the edge.

Trembling.

His muscles were tight with restraint, every breath drawn through gritted teeth, every movement soaked in heat. The sound of the chain at his wrist had become part of the rhythm now, soft and metallic, whispering yes, yes, yes with every stroke.

Those sounds were yours. Dragged from him. Claimed.

He looked like something sacred and ruined, flushed from neck to navel, cock straining in his fist, eyes locked to your parted thighs, where your fingers moved slow and cruel, still hidden beneath silk. Not enough to give him anything. Just enough to drive him mad.

You could see it happening, his body betraying him. His spine arching, that ragged desperation sharpening at the edges.

You leaned forward slightly.

“Don’t,” you ordered.

His whole body jerked at the word. His hand froze mid-stroke, gripping so tightly the head of his cock looked angry and red. He inhaled sharply through his nose, muscles twitching with restraint. The need in him was visible, raw, throbbing. You saw his throat bob. His jaw clenched.

He was shaking, right on the edge. You had brought him there. And you held him there.

“You don’t come until I say so,” you said.

The words settled over the room like smoke.

His breathing was ragged now. His cock, swollen and wet, twitched helplessly in his grip.

“Understood?” you added, voice low, dangerous.

He nodded once.

And then, hoarsely:

“Yes.”

“Yes what?”

“Yes. Domina.”

You smiled, wine-slow and wicked. “Again.”

“Yes, Domina,” he growled, voice rasping over the edge of restraint.

His fist started moving again, from the base of his cock all the way to the head, his grip harsh and fast. Droplets of sweat shimmered on his skin like jewels, dripping down the valleys of his muscles.

You didn’t touch him. You didn’t need to.

You leaned back once more and let your fingers return to that aching throb between your thighs, hidden still beneath silk, wet with want. But it was for you now. For your pleasure. Not his.

He watched.

He couldn’t not.

His jaw was locked. His breathing harsh.

And you wanted to see what else his mouth might say.

“What else have you done with those hands?” you asked, casual as a knife slipped under ribs. “Have you choked a man to death?”

A twitch in his forearm. “Yes, Domina.”

“Have you done it to a woman?” you asked, voice a lazy purr. “While fucking her?”

His eyes flashed wild. “…Yes, Domina.”

You hummed, delighted. The scent of incense and sex made the air thick and suffocating. Your fingers moved harder now, more deliberate, stroking heat into yourself while he watched, crazed and yearning.

“Would you drop to your knees for me?” you whispered. “Would you put your face between my thighs and forget the air in your lungs?”

He swallowed hard. His breath caught. His knees buckled on command, the whole mass of him came down. It didn’t bring him beneath you. No. You were now face to face.

“Yes,” he said again, mouth agape, the collar on his neck biting into the skin as he leaned forward. “Yes, Domina.”

You bit your lip and squeezed your thighs together, barely suppressing a moan. He looked ready to break apart again, veins bulging, cock flushed red and glistening, leaking steadily down his knuckles. His whole body ached with the need to be used.

You circled your clit with cruel, precise pressure. Your heartbeat thundered in your ears. You were too close. You both were.

And still—

“Don’t you dare,” you said, trembling yourself now. “You wait.”

He groaned, half agony, half worship, and obeyed. But just barely. His hand trembled. His balls were drawn tight. His whole body cried for release.

You saw it all and didn’t let up.

“Have you ever fucked someone you hated?”

A pause. He barely nodded.

“Did she cry?”

Another pause. A twitch. His mouth opened, but nothing came.

“How many men have you killed with your bare hands?”

“Too many to count.” That made something flicker in his eyes. “Domina.”

You leaned forward like it was a kiss.

“Did you enjoy it? Do you get hard when you fight?”

A ragged sound came from his throat.

The silk of your robe rustled as you rocked your hips slightly, fingers slow and warm, just enough for your breath to catch.

He watched like a starving animal.

“Domina.”

It wasn’t an answer. It didn’t matter. It told you what you wanted to know.

His body convulsed, his hand clenched too tight, the head of his cock flushed and weeping. You saw the exact moment he started to lose the edge.

“You’re going to spill without permission,” you murmured, tilting your head. “Aren’t you?”

His groan was wordless, wounded. His head bowed like he might break apart.

He was shaking violently now, his cock dark and dripping in his grip, whole body locked in the act of restraint. Every breath was a gasp, every muscle drawn taut. The chain at his wrist trembled with his every movement, the sound of it, metal on stone, metal on itself, rhythmic and maddening.

“Still holding?” you asked softly, almost sweet.

His throat worked to answer, but all that came was a hoarse sound, barely human. He nodded once, shaky, his eyes wild behind the mask.

You let him hover there, let him burn for a moment longer.

And that was when you pushed past the edge of restraint.

“Would you kill for me?” you asked, your voice barely a breath.

You saw the exact moment it hit him, when it tore through him like fire, his body locking up, his mouth falling open. He made a sound like a wounded animal, somewhere between a gasp and a growl, and came violently, spilling over his hand and stomach, his hips jerking once, twice, helplessly, the sound of the chain lost beneath his ragged groans.

The moment he broke, so did you. Your entire body clenched. Muscles taut. Your thighs shook as you bit down on your tongue to keep quiet, to stay in control, but it barely held. You didn’t cry out, didn’t moan, but your breath caught sharp and trembling, and your fingers pressed so hard between your legs it was almost painful.

He watched you. Head dropped forward, chest rising and falling in ragged shudders, the gold mask gleaming with sweat and firelight.

Even through it, through the haze and the wreckage of his own release, he saw.

Saw the heat flood your eyes. Saw the way your body trembled with the force of your orgasm.

He knew.

And something in him hunger for it.

He was panting, drained, ruined. But his eyes stayed locked on you, heavy and starving. Still kneeling. Still bound. But aware now, you had undone him, but he had taken hold of something in you, too.

You swallowed, chest rising and falling. Held his gaze.

Then, slowly, deliberately, you pulled your hand out from beneath your robe. Your fingers shimmered with your slick, the firelight catching every glistening strand. You didn’t hide it. Didn’t rush. You let him see.

His eyes followed the motion like an animal.

— ❖ —

It had gone well.

Exceptionally well.

You’d spent months undercover in a compound on the outskirts of a city, dry, sun-bleached, walled off, and crawling with guards. A place built to vanish into the desert, to bury secrets and the men who made them. Civvies and arms dealers, fanatic bastards and specters of war. You found the target, made contact, played him until he was right where he needed to be — then Ghost did what he did best.

You remembered the moment clearly. The sun just starting to dip below the horizon, casting gold over the dust. You’d walked the bastard all the way to the back gate, behind the storage depot, the spot he liked, the very edge of his safety, where you’d painstakingly scouted the camera angles and the guards changed late. You played him with compliments and timid laughter, fingers brushing his sleeve as if you were soft on him. As if you were his. He didn’t even see Ghost. One moment, the world was small and close and full of your tempting eyes. The next, Ghost was there, silent and brutal.

His arm hooked around the man’s throat, dragging him back into the shadows. The move was fast, the glint of steel flashing, but something was off. The angle was wrong. His other arm half-second too late to tilt the head down. The blade went deep. The man’s body jerked, and a pulse of blood sprayed wide.

It caught your face. Your chest.

You didn’t move. Didn’t flinch.

The target hit the dirt with a broken gasp, bleeding into the sand.

Ghost didn’t speak. Not to you. Not to the corpse.

But you saw it, his eyes flicking to yours as the body crumpled. And something in his face cracked. Just for a moment.

You’d seen him kill before. Clean, precise, silent. But this one? It had edge. Emotion. A flare of something ugly beneath the execution. Not at the target. Not even at the mission.

It left you giddy even when you couldn’t name it.

But he could.

He’d seen you smile at the target. Let him close. Heard you laugh in that voice you never used around anyone else. He knew it was a role. Knew it was a job. But that didn’t stop the twist in his gut, the heat in his chest. His covered face tilted just slightly, toward you. Toward the blood on your skin.

The kill had been too personal.

And he knew it.

Pulling out a small DNA kit, he went through the motions needed to confirm the ID later. He didn’t even wipe the blade clean before putting it away.

He was looking back at you.

Not the way he was supposed to. Not the way a handler looks at an operative, or a soldier looks at a comrade.

You hadn’t seen each other in person in so long. The mission had demanded it, radio silence, relayed orders, every contact filtered through layers of misdirection and indirect messages. When he did hear your voice, it was clipped, coded. And never for long.

But now you were right in front of him. Real. Close enough to touch.

And covered in blood.

He hated that it had hit you. That his slip, small as it was, had painted your skin.

And beneath that hate, something else surged. Sharp and quiet and all-consuming.

He loved that you didn’t even flinch. You were used to this. To him. He could tell you were wishing the knife was in your hands.

Studently, the weight of the months you’ve spent behind these walls washed over him. The things he knew you had to do. What you had to endure.

He hadn’t realized how much it would burn.

That was the worst part.

Not the kill. Not the mistake. But the way his pulse still hadn’t leveled. The way his eyes kept drifting back to yours, searching for the echo of that teasing glint and only finding the faded dusting of a bruise.

The words wouldn’t come. Not here. Not with the body cooling between you and the job still unfinished.

So he turned away instead.

No words needed to express the time-sensitive nature of your extraction.

The storm coiled tighter in his chest — and on the horizon.

— ❖ —

The city pulsed just beyond the compound walls, streets choked with bodies and smoke, voices rising in a dozen familiar dialects, the metallic hiss of street grills mixing with the bleat of horns and animals. Heat radiated off the pavement in shimmering waves. Crowds moved in currents. The perfect place to vanish.

Ghost stopped you at the mouth of an alley just past the rear checkpoint. He didn’t speak, didn’t nod. Just stepped into your path, close enough for a collision.

Then his hand slid to your side, under the fold of your robe, and pressed something small and cold into your palm.

The pistol was compact. Familiar weight. Safety off.

You didn’t look at it. Didn’t look at him.

He stepped in closer. Breath brushing your ear over the hood of your veil.

"Look like you belong to me."

His voice was low. Steady. But it hit you like a trigger pull.

You moved without replying.

Even as you did, you felt the shift in the air. The streets were thinning. Merchants began folding up their stands, muttering to each other as they packed goods into crates and shuttered doors. Bright cloth awnings were yanked down and tied tight. The air carried a new weight now, thicker, grittier, as the wind began to pick up in short, stuttering gusts.

Children were called inside. Doors locked. Smoke faded as fires burned low.

The light had changed, sun sinking lower, shadows deepening, the horizon blurred by a slow-moving wall of dust. The kind of storm that closed roads, grounded aircraft, swallowed whole towns if they let it. Your extraction window, already tight, just slammed shut.

Plan B.

The safehouse.

You didn’t have to say it out loud. Ghost’s slight shift in gait told you he knew. Already recalculating, already leading you into the maze of narrow alleys that would take you out of the city without drawing attention. No chatter, no hesitation.

Only forward.

His hand found your waist when a man brushed too close. When you were slowed by the edge of a crowd, he pulled you forward, fingers splayed, thumb anchored in the dip of your spine.

It burned. Every touch.

You didn’t dare meet his eyes. Not when your body was already humming from the nearness, the shift in mission, the taste of adrenaline still clinging to the back of your throat.

But you felt the difference.

The way he scanned each face. The way his free hand hovered close to his weapon. The way he moved you through the world, even though you were more than capable of keeping up.

The tension beneath his calm.

You were both playing roles.

But Ghost, always so controlled, so silent, was fraying at the edges. You could feel it in every touch. Every pause. Every time his hand lingered just a beat too long.

He wasn’t pretending nearly as well as he used to.

— ❖ —

Now you were here.

The safehouse that sat half-buried at the base of a slope, invisible until you were right on it. The door nearly tore from your grip when you shoved it closed behind you. Inside, it was dim and hot and still.

You both stood there for a moment. Listening. Breathing.

The storm slammed against the walls, a solid wall of sound outside. The air inside was thick with dust, the heat clinging to your backs. But it was quiet. No voices. No footsteps. No eyes on you.

Just the two of you and the hum of aftermath.

You lowered yourself onto the floor, back against the nearest wall, legs stretched out in front of you. He followed, settling on the other side of the small space with a soft grunt as he dropped his weight against the wall. Your feet would have been tangled together if he had sat right across from you. For a long stretch of time, neither of you moved.

You felt the silence before you heard it. The kind that bloomed behind your ears after too much noise, too many heartbeats. The kind that comes after a kill, after an escape, as the illusion of safety clicks into place.

He had gear. Not all of it, he only carried the bare minimum for the infiltration. But he still looked like a soldier: tac vest bulging across his middle, combat pants, boots. Holster hidden heavy at his hip. No mask. Just a black balaclava peeking under the loose scarf he wore wrapped around his head, the edge damp with sweat and dust. Even stripped down, the lines of discipline stayed etched into his posture. Functional. Armed. Dangerous.

You, on the other hand, looked like a shadow of the role you'd played. Loose robes clung to your frame, layered and sweat-stained and dusty. No armor. No shield. The only weapon in reach was the pistol he'd handed you during the retreat. Blood you hadn’t cleaned off crusted along the bridge of your nose like freckles.

He watched you like he was still waiting for something to slip, like the mask you wore in the field hadn’t fully come off. There was something about your stillness that unsettled him now. The way you sat without flinching, blood on your robes and eyes too calm. You still seemed ready to go for the kill.

Yet, neither of you spoke.

But, eventually, he moved.

He reached up, unwound the scarf with slow, deliberate hands. The sand fell from the fabric in a soft whisper. Then he peeled off the loose desert tunic he wore over his gear, sweat-darkened and faded with heat. He was down to the balaclava, the armored vest that wrapped around his wide chest, and a black undershirt that clung to his shoulders.

It wasn’t a provocation. But it shook something loose in you.

You moved next. Unfastened the veil at your throat. Peeled off the outer robe. You set the pistol beside you and shrugged off the next layer until you were left in a sad excuse of a dress that was supposed to be your undergarments. You were not afforded the luxury of underwear.

It felt like molting. Shedding the last skin of the woman you’d had to be for the past months.

He didn’t say anything. But his eyes lingered.

You felt it more than saw it.

He wanted to say something.

Maybe your name. Maybe “You did well.”

But he didn’t.

And neither did you.

You cleared your throat instead. Voice dry and rough.

“You have any gear for me?”

He looked over, blinked once. Said nothing.

“If you don’t,” you added, quieter now, “I’m taking your shirt.”

You weren’t smiling when you said it, but he could hear it in your voice.

Something shifted in his eyes anyway.

He held your gaze for a breath longer.

Then he reached for the buckles of his tac vest, unfastened them with methodical care, and set the whole thing aside, placed it, not dropped. Always deliberate. Always ready to grab it again if he needed to.

Only then did he reach for the hem of his shirt.

He pulled it over his head in one clean motion. The black fabric came away damp and warm, the collar stretched from wear. He didn’t hesitate.

No jokes. No questions.

Just the scrape of his knuckles against your fingers when you took it.

You didn’t thank him. Didn’t need to. The gesture said enough.

The shirt in your hands was warm. Faintly damp from his skin. Heavy in the way only lived-in things are. A wild part of you wanted to bury your face in it.

You didn’t look at him as you moved.

You didn’t turn around, either.

You pulled it over your head first, felt the fabric drag across your face, the scent of him already soaked into it. You didn’t put your arms through the sleeves. Not yet. Just pulled it low over your shoulders, over the thin dress slip.

Then, slowly, you began to peel the dress away.

He watched you, not because he meant to, but because he couldn’t not.

The fabric clung, rough with dried sweat. You rolled it down your hips, careful not to disturb the hem of the shirt. Careful not to bare more than you meant to. One step out, then the other.

You let the dress crumple in a pile.

He didn’t see anything. Not really.

But he saw enough.

The line of your collarbone under fabric that had been his only moments ago. The shift of your ribs with each breath. The soft brush of your thighs.

The shirt fell lower. Long enough to cover. His build made it possible. Just enough fabric for modesty if you were careful.

And you were always careful.

Your hands found the sleeves. You slid your arms through slowly, adjusting the fabric across your chest, smoothing it down.

Then, finally, you reached back, pulled your hair free from the collar. It fell down your shoulders in a dull, heavy sweep.

His shirt on you was wrong. Intimate. Possessive. A brand he hadn’t meant to give but couldn’t take back.

You didn’t speak. Didn’t explain.

Just sat back down like nothing had happened.

But your pulse hadn’t steadied.

Not yet.

And Ghost still hadn’t moved.

He watched you in that silence, eyes fixed, jaw clenched, hands braced on his knees like he could hold something in place through sheer pressure. But it wasn’t working. The control he’d clung to through every phase of the mission was splintering now, piece by piece.

His shirt on you had done something to him. The way it draped across your thighs, loose in all the wrong places. The way your shoulders moved beneath the fabric, his fabric. How you didn’t flinch. Didn’t hesitate. Like he wasn’t dangerous. Like he wasn’t watching you come undone in quiet, measured layers.

And he was watching. Had watched. Couldn’t stop.

His body was catching up to what his mind had refused to acknowledge.

The sweat cooling on his neck. The heat that pooled low in his gut, thick and crawling. His cock stiffening, slow and insistent, behind the tight line of his waistband. He shifted once, subtly, knees angling wider, but it only made it worse, awareness sharpening everywhere skin touched fabric.

The air between you had weight now. Dense, pressing. Every breath tasted of dust, sweat, tension.

You just existed in the same space, and somehow that was unbearable.

He hadn’t felt this before.

Not like this.

Not so full-body. Not like something primal had slipped past the leash.

Not just desire, but the shame threaded through it, because this wasn’t a stray thought he could shut down. He hated it. Hated that it was happening now, here, after everything. This wasn’t fleeting.

It was you.

Sitting there like nothing had changed.

But everything had.

His head dipped forward, shoulders rounding, hands locking tighter against his knees. He breathed slow through his nose. Held it. Released it. Did it again. Tried to ground himself.

Didn’t work.

He could feel the thud of his heartbeat now, not in his chest, but lower. In his cock. His spine. His tongue. He swore the damn thing echoed in the soles of his boots. Every muscle in him tense and fraying.

You just sat in his shirt, quiet and alive and close, and it undid him.

Outside, the storm screamed louder. Inside, something inside Ghost started to match it.

You didn’t look at him, but you felt something shift.

It was in the air between you, thicker than it had been before. Not the storm. Not exactly.

Something else.

He was still seated across from you, hunched forward just slightly, forearms braced against his knees. You couldn’t see his face, but something in the angle of his body was… wrong.

You didn’t ask.

Didn’t say anything.

Instead, you stood.

Abruptly. Not with purpose. Just… moved, otherwise you might have been tempted to do something stupid.

There were two black crates tucked in the corner. You knelt by them, unlatched the lids, and began to sift through the contents.

It was something he would normally do, inventory, assessment, planning. You didn’t care right now. You just needed something else to focus on. Something that didn’t make you feel like your pulse was still skipping in your throat.

Inside, there was mostly water.

You took a bottle, the plastic creaked slightly as you unscrewed the cap. You drank slowly, long enough to cool your mouth, to feel it trickle down your throat like relief.

Then you turned, and rolled one over to Ghost, the bottle hitting his hip softly.

He didn’t hesitate. Just reached down and took it.

You didn’t stand to watch him lift the balaclava or tilt his head back to drink. You just turned back to the crates and kept going.

Food. Field packs, sealed tight. Not appetizing, but edible.

A blanket. Wool, scratchy, but clean. You set it aside.

More water.

A med kit — gauze, tape, antiseptic. Nothing new.

But then you saw the scissors.

Small. Functional.

You picked them up, turned them over once in your fingers, then set them gently down on the edge of the crate.

Behind you, the storm let out a low growl against the walls. The wind kicked up again, and for a moment, it sounded almost like breathing.

— ❖ —

You stared at the scissors again.

They weren’t meant for much. The kind you’d find in any field kit. Small, blunt-nosed, slightly sticky with old adhesive. But something about their presence lodged itself in your chest.

You reached up and touched your hair.

The strands were tangled from the wind, heavy with sweat and grit. Dust clung to the ends. You could feel it on your scalp, tight and uncomfortable.

It didn’t feel like yours anymore.

Without ceremony, you took the scissors.

You moved to the floor, sitting cross-legged with the same quiet control you’d had all day, and gathered a thick handful of your hair.

The metal snipped. Dull, but decisive.

Strands fell across your thighs like shed skin.

You didn’t stop.

Halfway through the second cut, you heard the shift. Not from outside, but behind you.

A breath. A footstep.

Then nothing.

Ghost crossed the room without a word.

You didn’t turn to see. You just felt the weight of him settle behind you, kneeling, close enough for your skin to register the heat of his body. The safehouse seemed smaller with him that near.

You raised the scissors again.

But a hand came forward, light, brushing yours aside.

You didn’t stop him.

Didn’t flinch when his hand brushed yours, when he gently closed his fingers around the scissors and took them from you without a word.

You pulled your legs under you to sit on your heels, to let him be closer, and just sat there, still and waiting.

Behind you, Ghost moved slowly. Deliberate.

He removed his gloves — one, then the other — setting them aside with care.

Then his hands were on you.

Not rough. Not unsure. Warm and dry and callused.

His fingers touched your hair first, combing lightly through the tangles, sifting through sweat-stiffened strands to find the cleanest cut. It wasn’t clinical. It was… something else. Something heavy.

The first section he lifted away from your scalp made your breath catch. Just the contact. His knuckles grazing your nape. The way he moved like this mattered.

Ghost didn’t breathe right the whole time.

The scissors clicked softly. Not sharp. Not fast. He didn’t rush.

Each cut was deliberate. Small tufts of hair slid past your collarbones, landed in your lap like dead petals. You could feel the uneven tension as he gathered another section, smoothed it between his fingers, measured it against your skin.

He told himself it was just hair. That he was helping. That this was practical. Necessary.

But the truth throbbed beneath every movement. His hands didn’t feel kind. They felt starved. Every time his fingers slid through your hair, every pass of his thumb to gather the strands just right, it twisted deeper. Your warmth, the soft give of your skin beneath the line of your scalp, the way your back curved slightly toward him without even meaning to. The sound of your breath, steady, trusting.

It made him want things he couldn’t name.

His throat burned with it.

He leaned in to reach another angle and caught the scent of you, dust and sweat and something softer underneath. It hit him like a punch. His jaw locked. His pulse thudded painfully behind his teeth. You sat almost between his legs, body so close to his.

He tried to keep the rhythm of the scissors steady. Tried to focus on the cut. But his hands faltered more than once. Not enough for you to notice. But he noticed.

Because every brush of skin jolted through him.

Because he was too aware of how you shifted when his fingers swept behind your ear, how your shoulders tensed for a breath then softened.

Because he wasn’t thinking straight anymore.

He was thinking about your throat, exposed and vulnerable. About how the fabric of his shirt — his fucking shirt — clung to the damp line of your spine. About what you might feel like if he moved his hand just a few inches lower. About the way you hadn’t looked at him once during this, as if giving him your back was the most natural thing in the world.

And that trust, that silent, intimate trust, undid him more than anything.

It was too much.

It was everything.

And it was eating him alive.

The hunger hit like a body blow.

A fresh wave of heat flushed up his spine, sick and sudden. Not clean. Not respectful. Not right.

Because it wasn’t just want anymore.

It was need.

Crushing, unrelenting, maddening.

He’d been hard before. Plenty of times. Alone, with thoughts he shouldn’t have had. After ops. After hearing your voice on the comms, too tired and too wired. He could usually shut it down.

This? He couldn’t shut it down.

His cock throbbed in his pants, straining, every heartbeat a curse. The friction of fabric made it worse, not better. There was no relief, just the vision of how you sat between his thighs, trusting him, soft and silent while he touched you, trimmed pieces of you away with trembling hands.

He hadn't even seen anything.

That was the sick part.

That your skin was mostly covered. His shirt draped low on your back, over the soft curve of your thighs. He hadn’t seen you naked, hadn’t heard your breath catch with pleasure, hadn’t touched anywhere he shouldn’t. But his imagination filled in what his eyes couldn’t.

And still he felt like a man gone feral.

The scissors wavered.

He tightened his grip.

His hands shook. Just a little. But it was enough to make him ashamed.

Because all he wanted was to press his mouth to your spine, to drag his hands up under that shirt and feel the warmth he knew was waiting beneath. He wanted to pin you to the floor, legs still bare, thighs parted around his waist, his shirt half-off, bunched at your ribs, and hear you gasp his name, to bite the tension out of his own jaw against the curve of your throat, to bury himself in something real.

He swallowed hard and leaned back slightly, trying to breathe. His cock ached so hard it hurt, pressed uncomfortably against the inside of his pants. There was no room to shift, no angle to relieve it. Not without you noticing.

For a split second, the fantasy overwhelmed the moment. He could see it too clearly — your breath catching when you felt how hard he was. Your head turning. Your mouth parting. The way your eyes would drag over his face, daring him.

The way you wouldn’t stop him.

He could take you like this.

You sat there like a ritual, like a prayer, and he felt like a sinner.

Another lock of hair fell.

It stuck to his wrist. His forearm. He didn’t shake it off.

Ghost gritted his teeth and cut again.

He told himself he was doing this for you.

But his hands betrayed him.

Every breath was heavier. Every pulse beat lower. His heart thudded like it wanted out of his ribs. And all he could see now were your thighs parting to stay balanced. The delicate dip of your collarbone. Your mouth slightly open.

He wanted to taste sweat and salt and skin.

He kept seeing your hair in his fists, not the careful grip of cutting, but the desperate kind. He wanted to bury his hands in the rest of your hair and pull your head back, see your eyes blown wide, mouth open, sweat on your throat, his name on your tongue.

And he hated himself for it.

The final snip of the scissors echoed too loudly in his head.

He braced his hands on his thighs, exhaled once, sharp, and pushed to his feet.

He didn’t expect you to turn at that moment.

But you did.

Slowly, still on your heels, you shifted, glancing back at him like you felt the charge behind you, like you knew something had broken open. And Ghost swore he saw it in your eyes. That knowing. That edge of heat. You didn’t speak. Didn’t smirk. You just looked at him like you’d always known what you did to him. To men like him.

He stood over you, broad and tense, shoulders thrown into sharp relief by the dim light. His boots were braced wide. His thighs just inches from you. The soft fabric of the shirt you wore rode up when you twisted, exposing more of your bare legs, the inside of your thighs still marked with bruises, knees spread slightly from where you'd knelt to be still for him.

You looked up at him.

And he looked down.

It was a mistake to look. He knew that. But he did anyway.

He felt his control snap like a tripwire underfoot.

Heat rolled through him in a wave, blood surging so fast it made his breath hitch. His hands clenched at his sides. He could see your pulse ticking under your jaw. The shift of your chest as you breathed deeper. The hem of the shirt pulling higher when your thighs shifted instinctively together.

If he reached down, he could tilt your chin up. Could drag his thumb across your lips. Could feel them open and press inside.

— ❖ —

You didn’t move at first.

But you felt it, the weight of him behind you, the way the air shifted around his body. Ghost was still. Not calm. Rigid with restraint. You could hear it in his breath. That hitch. That slow, hard exhale like he was trying to burn the feeling out of his lungs.

You didn’t have to look to know.

The way he stood behind you, too close, too tense, you could feel the pressure of his gaze like heat crawling down your spine. You shifted slightly on your knees, your thighs brushing together for balance, and caught the smallest sound behind you.

You imagined the way he looked. The strain in his shoulders. The flex of his jaw. The undeniable press beneath the front of his pants. You dared to imagine.

You let your eyes fall shut for a second. Let your breath ease out slow. You could hear your own pulse thudding in your ears, matched only by the uneven beat of his. Louder now. Rougher.

And you wondered—

What was he thinking, towering over you even like this, fists clenched, cock hard, silence stretching tight like wire between you?

You didn’t expect the sound he made. A rough, low curse, nearly swallowed. And standing back up suddenly. Like he’d barely won something no one else could see.

It wasn’t sudden for you. It washed over you like water. Like the warm heat of the sun. Something you haven’t considered before, but now you realized it was always there.

He wanted you.

Not because you were useful. Not because you were capable. Not even because you were broken in a way he understood.

He wanted you. Kneeling here, in his shirt. Eyes on him. Breathing like you could taste him in the air. You watched the muscles of his abdomen twitch. The clench of his fists. The slight shift of his stance like he needed to move, to breathe, to put distance between himself and the thing he couldn’t control.

The thought took root in your chest and bloomed like fire.

Your skin prickled. Your lips parted slightly, not for him, not yet, but for the sensation of it. The knowledge. The weight of it settling over your shoulders like armor you hadn’t known you were missing.

Ghost wanted you.

And it made you feel drunk on something sharper than power. Like he'd slipped a knife into your hand and offered you his throat.

You could destroy him with this.

And you wanted to.

God, you wanted to drag it out. To stretch this moment until it screamed. To make him watch you move slow and deliberate, your bare legs brushing against the fabric of the shirt riding higher —

— to look him in the eye and see him flinch.

To feel that edge of control swing violently in your direction, for once.

You hadn’t felt this kind of power in months. Years. Ever, maybe.

Not when you killed them. Not when you survived. Not when they bruised you and you didn’t break.

You turned more fully toward him, breath steady now, pulse still racing but not from fear. You could see the way his jaw locked tight, his chest rising like he couldn’t quite breathe right.

Your eyes held his. Unblinking. Unafraid.

You saw the moment it landed for him, that you knew. That you could taste his hunger and chose to stay like this. On your knees. In his shirt. Giving him a view that clearly wrecked him.

This? This was different. Different than all the other times you’ve had such attention directed, imposed, upon you.

He hadn’t touched you.

And somehow, that made you mouth water and your cunt pulse.

Your fingers flexed against your thighs. The storm outside blurred into background noise. Everything narrowed to him, the rise and fall of his chest, the weight of his gaze, the unmistakable strain in his pants.

You lifted your chin, voice quiet, sure.

“Simon,” you said. Soft. Like a finger brushing over a trigger.

He flinched. Just a little. Like the sound of his name from your mouth hit somewhere raw.

Your eyes didn’t leave his. You saw the flicker of panic there, laced with heat. Like he couldn’t decide whether to step back or fall forward.

“You want this,” you said. Not a question. No denial. No apology.

Just truth.

He breathed out hard, like you’d hit him.

Still he didn’t touch you.

So you reached up, slow, giving him time to stop you.

He didn’t.

You brushed your hands along his thigh, up to his waistband. Felt him shiver. Your fingers reached for the front of his pants, and he exhaled like it hurt. The weight of him pressed into your palm, hard, hot, undeniable. You undid his belt. Popped the button. Lowered the zipper one slow inch at a time.

You reached inside, and his whole body jerked like you’d lit a fuse.

“Fuck,” he said, hoarse. “Don’t —”

But it wasn’t a protest. It was a warning.

You pulled him free.

He was already so hard, painfully so. Thick, flushed, straining toward you like it had a mind of its own. And still he stood there.

You let your hand wrap around him, warm and firm and certain.

His breath hitched again. A ragged, bitten sound like he’d been holding it too long. He looked down at you with something feral in his eyes, want and shame and awe, all twisted together.

But he didn’t stop you.

Didn’t dare.

You watched him. Still on your knees, still calm. Steady in the storm of him.

“I want you to stay still.” you told him, voice low, demanding.

His gaze snapped to yours, wild, unsure, glass-edged.

“Don’t move. Keep your hands by your sides. Don’t move.”

His jaw locked. A tremor rippled through his thighs.

The torment in his face was exquisite. A man carved from iron, trying not to melt. His knuckles whitened. You could see every breath he tried to contain, the way his hips twitched like they ached for motion.

You held his gaze as you leaned in, lips parting just enough to taste him, the salt of his skin, the heat of him pulsing against your tongue.

He groaned. A raw sound, torn from somewhere deep. His hips flexed once, then stilled again. Obedient. Barely.

You pulled back, just an inch, just to watch him. “Good,” you murmured. A reward.

He looked like he might collapse.

So you gave him more.

Took him into your mouth slowly, steadily, inch by inch. Felt the tremor in his thighs. Heard the curses that spilled out in a low, choked rhythm.

But he didn’t move.

Didn’t thrust. Didn’t grab.

He let you take.

And you took your time.

Because this — this was yours.

The control. The pace. The power of his body shuddering for you, and only you. Of having a man like him, violent, silent, untouchable, undone by you.

And when his hands finally twitched at his sides, you glanced up and whispered, “Don’t.”

He groaned again, broken, reverent, and clenched his fists tighter.

You smiled.

Let him feel it.

Let him break for you.

— ❖ —

Ghost couldn’t look away.

Not from your eyes, dark with intent. Not from your hands, slow and sure where they touched him like you’d always had the right. Not from your mouth, wet and hot and blasphemous, wrapping around him like salvation come to kill him.

His knees threatened to give. His breath fractured into pieces.

You were still on your knees, but he was the one trembling.

He wanted to touch you so badly it made him ache. Wanted to bury his hands in your hair and pull. Wanted to grip your shoulders and hold. Wanted to beg, if that’s what it would take, but he didn’t move. Didn’t dare.

He’d never felt this helpless without fear before. Never let himself be handled like this, reverent and ruined. Your lips dragged heat and hunger from places in him he thought were long scorched out. His blood pulsed on the rhythm of it, pleasure drowning everything else.

He clenched his fists.

Kept them at his sides like you’d told him.

You whispered, “Don’t,” and he thought he’d die right then from the ache of obedience.

And he was breaking.

He could feel it, the coming apart. Not just his body, that too, yes, hips taut with restraint, thighs quivering with the effort not to move, but deeper. Older. Something inside him folding under the weight of want he’d buried for too long.

He had imagined this—God, had he imagined it. In the dark. In silence. Alone. He’d bitten his knuckles raw to muffle it, to starve it. He’d fucked his own hand like he was trying to punish the want out of himself. Shame always waiting on the other side, cold and constant. He swore he’d never let it show.

But now?

Now your hands were on him like you’d earned them. Like he was yours to unmake. And your mouth —

Christ.

He tilted his head back. Shut his eyes. Breathed through his teeth like he could bleed the tension out with every exhale. You were steady, unhurried. Not teasing, worse. You were methodical. Sure. Like you knew how to build a man to the edge and keep him there.

He could feel your breath between movements. The way your lips dragged against sensitive skin. The faint scrape of your teeth. Every sensation sharpened by the fact that he wasn’t allowed to touch you back. That if he did, if he so much as flexed his hips, you’d stop.

He heard himself make a sound. Low. Helpless.

He was going to fall apart. Right here. Right now.

He’d killed for you.

Not for the mission.

Not for the team.

You.

And now your mouth was on him, warm and devastating, and he couldn’t remember what it felt like not to burn.

— ❖ —

He was trembling now. Not from effort, but the unbearable ache of stillness. You tasted his breaking before you heard it. You could feel it in the pulse at the base of him, in the heat against your tongue, in the silent plea bleeding off him in waves.

And still he obeyed.

His hands were fists at his sides, fingers white and trembling. His jaw locked, chest shuddering as he fought not to move. You could feel the ache in him, thick and furious, that primal edge that wanted, no, needed, to fuck.

But he didn’t.

Not until you let him.

You pulled back slowly, just far enough for your lips to hover against the flushed, twitching tip. You looked up at him, eyes dark, chin lifted, breath wrecked.

And when you spoke, your voice was low, calm. Commanding.

“Yes.”

The sound that tore out of him wasn’t human.

He moved like the chain had finally snapped.

Rough hands dove into your hair, threading through it, clutching like he thought you’d vanish. His hips surged forward, shallow at first, testing the space you gave him, until your fingers tightened around the backs of his thighs and you moaned around him in approval.

That did it.

He broke.

Fucked into your mouth with a force that would’ve scared him if he hadn’t already fallen. His breath tore out in stuttered gasps, his rhythm faltering even as he tried to chase it, hips snapping forward like his body had waited a lifetime for this.

And still you took him.

Throat relaxing, lips slick, hands guiding. You didn’t flinch. Didn’t choke. Didn’t pull away.

You wanted this, his need made wild, his control discarded. The monster, finally unmasked. You wanted his rough grip, the pull of your hair at your scalp, the bruising force of each thrust that drove him deeper. You wanted him wrecked, not with shame, but with surrender.

He was making sounds now—guttural, fractured things between moans and curses. He didn’t try to control it anymore. Couldn’t. You were too much. Too good. Too unyielding in your persistence.

“Fuck, fuck —” he hissed, the words dragging out between clenched teeth. “You don’t — Jesus, I can’t —”

You looked up at him again, eyes full of fire.

This was what you wanted.

His grip in your hair tightened, one hand braced at the back of your skull, the other reached to pull his mask up, just over his mouth, over the bridge of his nose. Like he needed air. As if the pleasure flooding his system, the obscene wet heat of your mouth, the control you wielded over him, was suffocating. He rutted deep and fast, hips snapping in a rhythm that bordered on violent, but you stayed steady, a vice around him, relentless.

He sucked in a breath like it might save him.

It didn’t.

He wasn’t used to this.

Not being allowed.

Not being given.

And now, this? Being wanted, claimed, commanded? It lit something feral in him.

You let him fuck your throat like he’d dreamed of in the dark. Let him use your mouth the way he'd never dared. And when his thighs shook, when he nearly collapsed, when his voice broke on a strangled, “Gonna —”

You hummed around him.

Gave him one last silent order:

Do it.

And Ghost obeyed.

He came undone with a violence that shook him.

His whole body seized, hips jerking forward with a force he couldn’t contain, a sound tearing from deep in his chest like it had been caged for years. His hands clutched at your hair, trying not to hurt, trying and failing, too far gone to be gentle now. You let him. Took every snap of his hips, every pulse of his cock, every shudder as his orgasm wrecked through him like a shot to the spine.

Cum filled your mouth in heavy, staggering bursts. He moaned, low, guttural, broken, and his knees almost gave out. You held steady, letting him empty into you, letting him feel what it meant to lose control in your hands.

When you finally pulled off, slow and merciless, it wasn’t with gentleness. It was with intent. With purpose. You dragged your tongue along the tip on your way back, just to feel him twitch, just to feel the ache you’d left in your wake.

He looked down at you like he’d been gutted. Eyes wide, chest heaving. His hands fell from your hair like he didn’t trust himself to keep holding on.

You rose to your feet.

Less calm.

Still in control.

His release was still slick at the back of your throat.

You looked at him like you'd just taken something sacred.

Ghost looked back like he’d never wanted anything more.

Just you.

Whatever you’d made of him. Whatever you’d taken. Whatever he’d just given.

You stepped close. Placed one hand gently on his chest.

Felt the hammering rhythm of his heart.

And with a tender touch that felt more intimate than the act itself, you tucked him back into his pants. Buttoned him up. Smoothed the waistband over the quiver still in his belly.

Then, just as gently, you reached for his mask.

Drew it down.

Covered the mouth still panting from your ruin.