Page 43 of Villainous Intent

I should have smacked him or shocked him with my cuff the second he touched me. But the only coherent thought I had was a desperate question of if he would touch me exactly that way again.

It’s just acting, I told myself, swallowing hard against the tight knot in my throat. It’s all pretend. It’s an assignment.

Cipher paraded me directly into the teeth of the designated media area. Reporters clustered around the edges of the zone, desperate for a quote.

Cipher was in his element. His hand gripped my hip, his fingers biting into my flesh through the dress. I draped myself against him, resting my hand on his chest, playing the exquisite, silent prize.

Cameras flashed, blindingly bright.

Every touch burned through the fabric of my dress. Every possessive squeeze triggered a response I couldn’t suppress. I was an object to these people. Cipher’s new toy. And the thrill of being owned by him was a drug I hadn’t expected to like.

The night dissolved into a blur of heavy hands. Cipher’s fingers traced my spine, like he was memorizing the vertebrae. His touch lingered just long enough to make my skin prickle. Each time, I told myself to step away. Each time, I didn’t.

By the time he took a break from mingling and stopped at the bar, my skin felt too tight.

“You’re getting better at this,” he murmured.

I didn’t know if he meant the act or the submission.

I leaned against him and his hand immediately slid to my lower back, fingers stroking the bare skin there.

The bartender materialized.

“Whiskey. Neat,” Cipher ordered.

As we waited, I was hyperaware of the eyes crawling over us. Over me. I needed to focus on the room. On the mission. On anything other than the sensitivity between my thighs and the gravity pulling everywhere inside me downward. I swept my gaze across the shifting nebula projections and the sea of designer armor, desperate to categorize the chaos into something manageable.

I noticed we weren’t the only pair at the Opener. Not by a long shot.

To my left, near a booth occupied by three massive brutes, a woman in a glittering diamond collar knelt on a cushion. She held a silver drink tray perfectly level above her head, her spine locked in agonizing stillness. Across the room, another Villain lounged, lazily feeding hors d’oeuvres to a young man wearing nothing but leather straps and a vacant, obedient expression.

Cipher’s drink arrived, the crystal glass clinking against the bar.

He turned us, boxing me in against the bar, his thigh pressing between my legs, pinning me to the spot. His hand settled on my throat, his thumb resting over my racing pulse and I had no choice but to let him, to keep up our charade.

“Open,” he commanded.

I blinked. “What?”

Cipher picked up the glass and took a mouthful of the amber liquid. He didn’t swallow.

His fingers tightened just enough to tilt my head back, then he leaned down and crushed his mouth to mine.

He kissed me, forcing my lips wider, and the warm, smoky fire of the whiskey flooded my mouth. The liquid burned a path over my tongue and I swallowed.

He pulled back slowly. A single drop of the whiskey escaped the corner of my mouth, tracking down my chin. Cipher caught it with his thumb, then dragged the wet pad over my lower lip, pressing the moisture into my skin.

“Good girl.”

The praise dropped straight to my stomach. My knees felt weak, the joints threatening to buckle if not for the solid pressure of his thigh holding me up. I hated that my body responded to him like it was starving for his attention.

And still I wanted more.

“Why did you do that?” I whispered.

I didn’t actually care about his reasoning. I wanted him to force another drink past my lips. I wanted the pressure of his mouth crushing mine. I kept that pathetic reality locked behind my teeth, terrified of the power I would hand him if I admitted it.

“You looked thirsty,” Cipher replied.