I watch the city fade into a stream of twinkling lights, my reflection appearing ghost-like in the glass. The city that never sleeps is oddly calm at 3 a.m., bare of its routine chaos as if it's holding its breath, anticipating something to explode.

Or perhaps it's just me.

I am not even sure who I am anymore.

I want to melt into anonymity right now. I have this urge to go out there and fade into the darkness of the streets and ignore the mighty force that's sitting beside me. Anything that would make me forget the anguish I'm feeling right now.

Areston has been driving in the silence, his expression as aloof as ever. He hasn't said a word since I argued with him in the hospital. I wanted to stay with Selene, and when I couldn't because my traitorous best friend demanded I go home, I declared my wish to go home to my mother's so I could be with Kryslian when she woke up.

I haven't been to The Rothschild Mansion in ten years—not once. So, it makes sense that I've made my husband livid.

He knows I'm trying to come up with any excuse that involves me staying away from home, at least for tonight. He knows that I'm running despite my vow not to.

And honestly? I don't care how he feels about it.

Somehow, I am not prepared to face him alone once we're in the solitude of home—the place that has been so full of our happy memories but which will now serve as a constant reminder of what has fractured between us because of his stubborn refusal to say that he's willing to start trusting me.

Given our situation, it's not just the space I need for tonight. It's not enough—it's the reprieve from the agony of acknowledging the kind of colossal demand I've made—one that might kill me.

Apart from that one time when he'd gone on a business trip he couldn't avoid, we have never stayed a night apart.

We need each other too much. It's an extreme case of a codependent relationship. The loneliness that had crept into me during that one time was too smothering to repeat.
I am dependent on my husband for my existence.

How can I even go a minute without needing him, let alone seeing him? That thought wanted me to surrender to my weak will and announce to him that it's okay if he doesn't trust me. I'm willing to continue without it but not go through the pain of living apart.

But I couldn't do it. I can't.

If I do that today, I might have him, but I'll lose myself forever. That's why I need some time away from him, regardless of my vow.

He hasn't said a word since we got in the car, and I am not sure if that is better or worse. It's making me feel restless and hollow, the weight of it piercing me with every passing second. It's stifling, as if I'm being sucked in an abyss—but that's who he is in his complete element—an abyss—silent, calculative to a fault, always in control, constantly consuming, always impossible to reach.

Those qualities have always drawn me to him and also made me want to scream. I've spent days trying to learn how to reach him, to breach and slide past that cold exterior.

However, tonight, it feels like all my efforts have gone down the drain. It's impossible to reach him and even attempt to understand what's going on in his mind. Every moment feels like he's likely drifting further from me while I'm holding on to the ledge of a void that never gives back, only drains you. It's maddening.

But I don't want to do anything about it—I want some time away from him to think without his proximity affecting my brain.

Perhaps that's what he needs as well to finally see what he has done to me and the kind of toll his actions have taken on me.

A mix of anger, anguish, pain, and a profound, unrelenting yearning twists inside me like a storm I can't control. This isn't how it's supposed to be—none of it. And yet here we are. Me trying to enact a wall between us because it's the only thing that makes sense anymore. I need to be able to breathe, to think, and to reacquaint myself with who I am before he consumes me whole.

"Do you really need to go?" His even-toned, almost frigid voice seems to have crawled from somewhere deep inside him—its sound sliding under my skin cuts through the thick fog of silence between us.

"I need to." My voice is barely above a whisper directed to the window.

I don't look at him. It's easier to focus on the deserted streets than on him, a man who's capable of unravelling me with a single look.

"You are running." Surprisingly, it's a statement rather than an accusation.

Of course, he knows. I sigh, giving in and turning to face him. His focus is on the road, and he appears calm. It's infuriating.

"I don't want to back out of my decision. I can try pretending the problem doesn't exist so we don't have to deal with it, but where would it lead us? My fears steaming from your abandonment issues aren't just going to disappear if I ignore them."

"Abandonment issues. Is that what we're calling it now?"

I bite down hard on the inside of my cheek. "What else is it? First, Althea abandoned you, then I did, and now you don't trust any women. Especially me because while you didn't care enough about her abandoning you, it meant a great deal to you that I left you. That's why you're unwilling to give me a second chance despite getting back together with me. It's not enough for you that I keep proving myself trustworthy to you every damn day, either consciously or unconsciously, and it's not enough that we're married. And that's not all. You want me to share everything with you, but you don't consider me enough to share the same privilege. If I let go this time, it'll just be like putting a bandaid over a deep wound without stitching it. It'll only cause more mess. I don't want that happening to us. I want to fix us. I am getting tired of repeating myself, but you're not willing to understand my grief."

He doesn't answer. He never does when it comes to his flaws—which he doesn't acknowledge he has because he considers himself higher than the God Almighty. It's frustrating, but nothing new. I have known this, and it hasn't kept me from falling in love with him every passing day.

"You asked for space," he says finally after a beat, his tone still cool, remote. "I gave it to you."

"You gave me nothing. You had no other option but to agree because I forced your hand, Ares." I close my eyes, attempting to steady my breathing. "Don't pretend as if you've done me a huge favor."

"Try seeing things from my perspective, and you'll see what a huge favor that is."

"Is it now?"

He. Is. So. Damn. Exhausting. Talking to him is a chore itself. It should require its own energy supply.

"Well, I am being cooperative and compromising as you'd once told me I should learn how to, Belle. How do you think it makes me feel when you reward me for it by running away?"

"The day you start feeling would be the day unicorns start living in our home." I wipe my eyes as tears start coming again despite my best efforts to restrain them.

"Doable. I can create unicorns like I created Gravity and make them live in our home, which you're running away from right now."

His obnoxiousness makes me open my eyes. "You have no right to make me feel guilty about my decision, Ares. Can't you see how much it's hurting me?"

"Not enough, apparently."

Areston De L'Aquila is lethal in more ways than thousands. He isn't just dangerous to my body but to my mind, my soul. I have known it from the beginning, but it didn't stop me.

He has the ability to twist my insides and make me crave him even when I know I shouldn't. He's the man who thrives in control, and I'm caught in the web of it as I struggle to escape that control without wanting to leave—I never want to leave his web, even if it means the end of me. I might not even escape the level of control he exerts on me because that's just who he is, and it's impossible to change it. However, I am definitely going to make him become rational with his approach.

My jaw clenches at his tone. "I love you too much to see you hurting, even if you're not showing it on the surface. Do you think all of this isn't hurting me? The fact that I feel the need to seek temporary asylum at a place where I haven't been for ten fucking years just so I don't have to deal with this—your manipulation. I keep crawling into your arms at the first chance I get and forgetting that you're the man who's causing me all the pain and anguish, and you're not even remorseful about it."

"Is my being remorseful enough to make you stay? Do you suppose I am enjoying my wife threatening me by demanding me to give her space and then running away to her mother just so she can avoid me? How am I supposed to start trusting you at this rate or even try to?" The tension in his body and the tightening of his knuckles as he grips the steering wheel hard is the only clue that he isn't as indifferent as he projects to be.

"How am I supposed to trust you when you'll never trust me, never to abandon you again? Or when it's clear that your apparent need to control me stems not just from love but your damned insecurities?" My voice cracks, raw and dejected, every word spilling out in a torrent of frustration as tears blur my vision faster than I can catch them, but I don't care.

I don't care how vulnerable I'm sounding—I can't hold it back any longer.

I am shattering—right in front of the beast I'm in love with.

He doesn't say a thing. Instead, he yanks the car to a sharp stop in front of The Rothschild Mansion.

The clicking sound of his seatbelt echoes like a warning, and before I can process what's going on, his hands are on me, impatient and aggressive. He unbuckles my seatbelt, and then, with his grip tightening around my waist, he drags me out of my seat.

The shift is sudden—domineering and forceful.

He pulls me across the console and makes my body straddle him, my knees pressing into the seat on either side of his thighs.

My breath hitches, my heart soaring as I come face-to-face with him, our bodies flushing against each other.

His possessive hands remain on my hips, firm as if he's daring me to escape or move without his permission.

The all-too-consuming proximity—his scent, dark and rich, filling my lungs, his heat seeping into my skin, the raw magnetism he wields without effort, and everything about him enveloping me, drawing me into the storm I'm trying so hard to outrun and failing, makes my blood pulse heavier in my veins.

His hand slides to my neck with a menacing slowness, his long masculine fingers grazing my skin, the heat of his skin searing mine as they close gently around my throat, tightening with an intentional, firm pressure that makes my pulse race.

His gaze, deeply penetrative, dark, and dangerous, bears into me with an intensity that makes my breath falter—it's like he's stripping me down with a mere look. There's something savage about him—an untamable quality, a darkness that hums beneath his superior calm superficial layer, and it draws me in, makes me want to lose myself in him, despite how much it terrifies me.

"Am I making it so unbearable for you, tesoro?" He hums with a low and rough voice that encompasses something darker that vibrates through me.

"Yes." My breath hitches, but my answer is immediate.

Unlike him, I am not afraid to strip myself bare so he can see the depths of my hurt and frustration and how his inability to empathize with me feeds into my worst fears, even if it means doing it repeatedly and at every chance I get.

His thumb presses into the hollow of my throat, just enough to remind me who held the reins in our relationship. It tightens beneath his touch. He always controls and measures each touch to make me feel that way and keep me on my toes.

As his hand lingers there, holding me still. At the same time, he studies me in asphyxiating silence—that scrutinizing gaze ripping through the layers of my mind to read what's going on in my hand.

A thought crosses my mind, unbidden and wild—he can snap my neck in one swift month if he wants, and I wouldn't even put up a fight.

He's an overwhelming force—intoxicating and commanding, one that's well and truly capable of crushing me beneath his fingers. His chiseled jawline, rough with stubble, is clenched hard in the dim light of the La Voiture Noire, and his lips are pressed into a tight line. The shadows dancing across the hard planes of his ridiculously handsome face emphasize the brutal beauty of him that has always held me captive.

I know there's a quiet, highly contained wrath simmering behind that calm façade, lethal like a Tsunami waiting to swallow everything in its path. I can feel it—always can, even when he's an expert at masking it. So imagine my surprise when, instead of doing something true to his personality and nature, he lets out a heavy and resigned sigh, showing me a rare moment of his human side. His hand on my throat remains there but loosens slightly as he presses his forehead against mine.

My husband is showing me the part of himself he restrains from coming out—ever.

The world slows down. I let him rest against me, his breath mingling with mine in the asphyxiating silence of our surroundings.

I relax, and my posture sags. We stay like this, my hands around his neck, his own on my throat and my waist, breathing in harmony, the charged air and tension between us toning down to something fragile, something quieter, but only just.

I can feel his restraint, how he's fighting against himself to show me a hint of his vulnerability—it's not acceptable by his standards, but he's doing it for me.

He doesn't want to break, but he's cracking—again, only just, and for me.

"Say something," I whisper, my voice shivering with desperation gnawing at my insides. I need him to speak, need him to fill the chasm that has formed between us.

He doesn't move, just holds me, his forehead still pressed against mine as his thumb on my neck continues to gently stroke me there, a reminder that I'm his.

"What do you want me to say, tesoro?" His voice is low, almost tender, and for a moment, I swear I hear defeat in it. My husband is never this... resigned. Not with me. Never with anyone.

"Something. Anything." It unsettles me. This human side of him forcing itself out of the man I know—ruthless, draining the life out of his prey, and unapologetic about it—terrifies me.

His fingers twitch against my neck, his other hand on my back lowering itself to slide to the small of my back to haul me tighter against him.

I gasp as he remains unflinching as he lifts his head, back in his devilish element—those vivid sapphire eyes that seem to ignite galaxies in their eerie depths darken. The mask of frigid indifference with an impenetrable calm that he wears all the time, like a second skin, snaps back in place after a momentary slip.

"How long do you intend to keep running away from me?"

The question and his condescending tone hit me like a kick to the gut, the agony of it sharp and instant. But I don't react. That's what he wants—for me to react and slowly break down. He had a moment of lapse earlier and has now snapped out of it. Now he'll try to manipulate me, knowing I'm easy to disintegrate, especially now when I am emotional from the side of him he willingly or unwillingly showed, but will use to achieve his means—simply because he's callous like that.

"I'll be home after work tomorrow," I say, slipping my hands off him and tucking them onto my lap. "Though, it shouldn't be of any use to you because we won't be running into each other. We agreed on separate living arrangements. I'll create a time slot and share it with you. I will also place sticky notes in your study so we don't end up seeing each other." The words come out like a defense, even though they feel hollow even to my ears.

His jaw clenches as if he's holding back from killing me. I can almost see the war waging inside him.

"That's what I am talking about. How long will you keep running away from me? I want to be supportive of your decision and bear the consequences of my actions, but the thought of it isn't working like a slow poison in my body," he says in a low, barely controlled voice.

His hand slips from my throat, his fingers trailing down my collarbone, his need to keep touching me evident as if the warmth of my skin penetrating into his tethers him to reality.

"It wasn't enough that you asked for it. Now you're trying to show me that I've fucked up so bad you'd rather stay in a place you've avoided like the plague for ten long years than stay in our home?" His eyes hold me as his prisoner.

If a mere gaze could burn, I'd be ashes by now.

"Tell me what to do, baby. I don't know how the fuck should I deal with this. I could do it my way, but it'll only drive you further away, and I can't risk that. My instinct is to take you home, cage you in our bedroom, keep you tied to our bed, and fuck you brutally raw and not stop even if you bleed or break until you give up the idea of separate living arrangements. Let alone escaping for a night at your mother's—the woman who drove you away from me in the first place and caused the whole fucking abandonment issue as you label it. I can't deal with this... whatever you're subjecting me to unless you guide me how."

His raw admission strikes me like a lightning bolt, stirring something deep within me and causing my heart to clench painfully. Before I can stop myself, soft sob tears out of me, and I throw my arms around me, burying my face in his chest and inhaling his scent—relishing the feel of being at home.

"That's a start, Ares—a good one at that. You're repressing your instinct and understanding it would do to me if you force it upon me—"

"But it's not enough."

"No. Trust me, it isn't a treat for me either," I whisper against his shirt. "We're joined—you're a part of me—a significant part. I feel what you feel—probably more because, in your own words and as witnessed in a million instances before, it's difficult for you to process emotions enough to feel. What hurts you hurts me, too." My fingers dig into his shirt desperately to cling to him.

"You're not the only one with abandonment issues, Areston. I have them, too. I just don't feed them like you do. I have this nagging feeling that bothers me often that someday you'll realize how emotionally demanding and draining I am and leave me." I lift my head to meet his soulless gaze. "But I trust you never to abandon me. You have similar concerns, but unlike me, you don't trust me never to abandon you, and you aren't prepared to either, and it tears me apart. It stirs a gnawing feeling in me that you'll never move past the heartbreak I caused you, and somehow, you'll always end up punishing me for it in one way or another. It's a fear that has ignited in me ever since yesterday."

Those eyes of his flicker with something raw until it vanishes almost immediately as if it never happened in the first place. His fingers trail up on my throat again, his thumb once again back to stroking the side of my neck as he grounds himself in me.

He once told me he needs my constant touch—it's vital to him that I let him access my skin because touching it reminds him I'm real and not an illusion. What he never told me is that what I did back then—breaking up with him, which led to us spending eleven long, chaotic years without each other continues to affect him and make him skeptical of me because he refuses to move past it. Had I known about it earlier, I'd have taken a drastic measure a long time back instead of doing it now when it hurts more than it would have if we had addressed this issue earlier.

"Well, of course, you trust me not to abandon you, tesoro. I'm not the one needing an escape or running off to my controlling mother's home. So cut me the crap about trust, Belle. I am still here, holding on to you, even if it's by your throat."

His fingers dig into my flesh with pressure, just shy of pain—not the sadistic kind, but enough to warn me that he's repressing the inner demons that are gnashing at the periphery of his restraint because of me. He's grounding himself, in a way, relying on my touch to suppress his darker, more catastrophic instincts from taking over.

"We have always faced everything together, tesoro. We can fix this together, too, without separate living arrangements. Without you leaving me to go to your mother and once again choosing her over me."

"Oh, my goodness, Areston! You're making me bang my head against the wall. How is it me choosing her over you? Your mind is stuck in a constant loop and refuses to move out of it. You still think she'd drive me away from you once again despite knowing she's one of our biggest cheerleaders this time and wants us together even if it costs her her massive ego. And we don't face our problems together. We fuck to drown out the real shit, so by the time we're done, I am too exhausted to focus, and you've achieved your aim and made me subdue to your demands unfailingly every time. Like a fool, I let you know, thinking that it might help you trust me better. That hasn't helped now, has it? You see, this is why we need distance. There hasn't been a day you've lived without seeing me, so when you do now, you'll have time to contemplate things. You have never done that to have time to reflect on my actions, and that has only spiraled things for worse. I want us to work."

I am panting as I plant a soft kiss on his chest despite being incandescent with rage, my lips lingering there, hoping it'll soothe some tension beneath.

"Think about it, baby. Since the night we met again, there hasn't been a time you haven't manipulated me into doing things your way. I've always been guilt-ridden because of my past actions, so I've allowed it. You even rushed to marry me, not just because you couldn't wait but because your trust issues made you bind me to you officially. Now, even that's not enough for you. Not addressing all of this will only cause irreparable damage to us, and I don't want that. You need to let me disappear so that you can see it for yourself and trust me that I'll always come back. I know you would never lie, so I need you to take some time to contemplate and decide whether you can trust me. If you honestly give it a try and still can't, then I'll understand, and we'll take some couples therapy or whatever crap it needs to fix it or perhaps even ignore it because it wouldn't hurt as much as it does now to me knowing you aren't even willing to try."

He buries his face in my hair, circling me in his arms and drawing me closer to him so my heart is beating against his. "You decided on separate living arrangements, and I allowed you. It doesn't matter if I am against it right now. Doesn't it mean the same thing you want me to do? Trust in you to come back to me soon?"

I draw my head back so I can face him. My fingers reach out to his face, and I let my fingers trace the sharp line of his jaw. "If you trusted me, then you wouldn't be against it now, Ares. You wouldn't be manipulating me right now to change my decision if you trusted me. And most of all, you wouldn't be asking me if it means the same thing I want you to do."

"My life has always been a dark abyss, Belle. You filled it with light and made me get used to it to the point I cannot think of spending a second without it. I don't want to live without you. I just want to wake up with my wife in my arms every morning and go to sleep with her every night. You ask me to contemplate things when you're not around, and I might be okay with it had you given me a duration, but you're not even giving me that. How the fuck is that fair to me? It's not my fucking fault I'm wired not to be able to empathize with you regardless of my tries or trust you due to my past and, in fact, present experiences, and yet you're conveniently dumping all the blame on me. You might as well ask me to survive without oxygen because that is what it is for me to even think about living without you. You're pushing it too hard without thinking about the repercussions it'll have on me, especially when you know the kind of issues I have. Not being able to touch you is the biggest punishment you can ever give me, and it has nothing to do with my abandonment issues. Don't punish me more. Give me a span, at least."

Instead of becoming angry, a soft smile forms on my face as I listen to him. He's letting the walls he has always kept so firmly around his heart crumble for me.

I cup his face. "I already told you, Ares. You come to me tomorrow and tell me you trust me, or you'll start trying, and I'll be back with you. Had you done it now, we won't be even having this discussion. You can manipulate me, but you'll never lie to me, so I know that no matter how worse the situation gets, you'll never lie that you trust me just to get me back. So, that's the time span. As long as it takes. You wanted me to guide you? Well, this is me guiding you. How about we start with this? You spend a night without me, and trust me that I'll be home tomorrow." Tears well up in my eyes.

"What if I am never able to?"

"You will."

"What if I am never able to? Does it mean we'll continue living separately? I won't allow that."

My heart clenches at the possibility of him never being able to trust me. "I told you already. If that's how you'd feel even after contemplating, then I'll understand. At least, I'd know you tried. I can't force you to do something you don't want to do, but the fact that you took the initiative and tried hard would mean the world to me. I love you that much, Areston. I just want you to try it for me. The knowledge that you don't trust me was always a concern for me, but I never let it be big enough to bother me. I was living with hope. Last night, you crushed that hope, so I need something to survive on. I've been so addicted to you that I've kept suppressing my concerns regarding your severe lack of trust in me, thinking that voicing it out loud would jeopardize our relationship, and I can't bear to have distance that might come between us. It has only spiraled things for the worse. I want us to work."

"You want to be at your mother's tonight instead of our home, and I am letting you. Doesn't it mean the same thing? Trusting you to return to me? Because believe me, had it been up to me, it'd be my cock talking to your cunt right now and manipulating you to change your mind, Belle. You know that already. You know the extraordinary levels of patience I'm exercising so as not to mess things up further. That's what trust must be like."

"It's not trust. It's fear. You wouldn't be so hell-bent on making me change my mind about our living arrangements if you trusted me, Ares. It's not because of trust that you're letting me go to Mama's. You know not obliging to that would only push me further away, and you're not willing to risk that." I brush my thumbs against his jawline as I speak.

"Belle, you're asking for the most difficult thing. I'm being lenient enough by agreeing to this decision of yours that I know for sure is going to bite me in the ass. Don't ask for more." His extreme vulnerability, blended with rage, shocks me and disturbs me a little. I am pushing him too hard. "Let's just agree that you'll stay in front of my eyes. I want you to change your mind about not seeing each other condition. That's the least you can do if you don't want to change your mind on separate living arrangements. Even a couple of hours without seeing you are unbearable for me, Belle. Don't subject me to the worst kind of torture."

I shake my head and place it against his forehead. "We have to. That's the least you can do for me, given our situation. Please stop trying to change my mind, Areston. It's hurting me that you won't agree to my one simple request."

"Alright."

"Did you just agree?" I cock a brow at him.

He traces my face, his fingers sliding down my throat, wrapping around it as his hand that has been on the small of my back travels down my thighs and slips lower.

"Yes," he murmurs darkly after a beat, his pupils dilating as his fingers begin to work their way up my thigh.

I inhale sharply, my body stiffening, and my eyes go wide.

"Ares, no—" I try to pull back, but his fingers on my neck keep me still.

They tighten slightly, his thumb pressing into the hollow of my throat, his eyes warning me not to do anything stupid like fighting back right now.

He leans forward to brush the shell of my ear, his breath warming my skin, shooting a shiver through me. "You don't get to leave me just like that."

The car feels stifling, like all the oxygen has been pulled from it and my lungs, and all that's left is him—his touch, his overwhelming presence.

"I am not leaving you." My body tenses, the heat between us intensifying as his fingers push the fabric inside me while his mouth finds the sensitive skin of my neck, making my resistance—or even the thoughts of it crumble.

I try to push him away, but my legs instinctively part for him without even him demanding it as his fingers slip past my panties.

"You are for the next couple of hours and then when you live under our roof without allowing me to touch you." He presses a kiss on my earlobe, tender at first, his tongue licking me there before he sinks his teeth into my flesh. "I want you to feel the aching, lingering emptiness in your cunt after being fucked by my fingers but not my cock when you walk inside your mother's mansion. You'll feel that ache every yoctosecond of the time you're away from me just like I'd be aching without you."

He sounds bitter. Spiteful even. Oh, god. "Areston, you're not playing fair."

"I've never played fair, and I never will. You don't get to walk away from me without a constant lingering reminder of who owns this delectable body of yours, Belle."

I close my eyes as my fingers curl around his strands. "I already know you own my body and soul."

"And yet you're ruthless enough to force me to part with what's mine," he trails kisses down my neck, his voice dark and oppressive as he nips at my skin. "While you're pretending to need the so-called space from me, your body will be torturing you to crawl back to me."

No, no, no. I can't let him do this.

His thumb brushes over my clit, teasing it with slow, measured pressure he's expert at while his fingers stroke my entrance.

"Ares, stop, please—" I gasp, throwing my head back, my eyes closing as his lips graze to the pulse point beneath my jaw, sinking his teeth into my skin and sucking it like a vampire. It's going to leave a mark, and that's always on his agenda. "Ares, why are you doing this!" I whimper, trying to catch my breath, my mind spinning from the potent mix of my own unraveling need and the degree of his control on my senses.

"Shh," he murmurs, his lips crashing on mine as he pushes two fingers inside me, scissoring them with unhurried purpose. "Let me hear you demand space again. Say it while my fingers are knuckles-deep buried inside you, tesoro. Go on."

His touch is both knowing and rough, and I clench around him, my eyes closed, my tongue dueling with him, and my body writhing with the need to be free of his weight and to be smothered by it at the same time.

"No." I hate myself for how easily my body betrays me. This is another reason I want the distance.

He bites my lower lip, causing a stinging pain to explode along with blood. "Of course, you won't. Just look at the way your body is clinging to my fingers and grinding against them. I could've stopped right now if it weren't begging me to ruin it when I haven't even started properly yet.

I glower at him, but he remains calm. The pace of his fingers remains teasing and taunting. "It's not... ah!"

"Shut up and stop squirming," he squeezes my neck, and my skin flares with goosebumps as a rush of pleasure shoots straight into my thighs. "Take every goddamn inch of my finger like a good wife. fuck. So fucking tight. Feel how I'm stretching you out? I am not letting you go anywhere until your orgasms are coating my fingers and palm. This cunt is mine, Belle." His eyes are dark. Darker than a stormy night's.

"Ares, this is not—fuck!" My words are cut short, and my head lulls back when he shoves a third finger inside me, and they start collectively hitting my G-spot. The pressure of his fingers on my throat grows, causing me to start feeling dizzy.

"Good girl. Keep taking it all, baby, just like that. Your body was made to be filled by me in every manner possible. This body is mine. You have no right to take even a sliver of it away from me, and yet I am allowing it because I fucking love you." His thumb circles my clit in deliberate, torturous movements, and my hips buck involuntarily, my body failing to keep up the resistance I'm trying to hold onto.

My fingers find the collar of his shirt, and I grip it tightly as a helpless moan escapes me. He's doing this purposely—the bastard. I have no doubt his agenda is to manipulate me despite all my begging and explaining. It irks me that I'm unable to fight him.

"I hate you, Ares," I whisper-sob.

"No, you don't," he murmurs against my mouth as he kisses me hard, swallowing all my moans.

"Maybe I don't."

"Yes, you don't." His fingers move harder, faster, hitting my G-spot with savage precision while his hand on my throat tightens, keeping me on the edge of breathlessness, while his mouth devours mine biting and sucking my lower lip like he can't get enough of me.

"Siren." The safeword is out of my mouth for the very first time, even before I can control it.

He freezes—for the very first time.

The immovable force I've grown to know, understand, and anticipate turns instantly paralyzed. That livid sapphire gaze, like a violent and barely leashed storm, cold and unforgiving, lethal in its intensity, pierces me like an ice blade cutting into flesh. His hand remains unyielding on my neck, but it now weighs with the weight of the word that has detonated something raw and primitive in him.

I watch, breathless, as an invisible shard splinters through the kind of extreme control he has never relinquished until yesterday. The way his fingers flex against my throat, I have no doubt I'd be choked to death if I weren't his significant half he cannot live without.

I have never needed to use the safeword, regardless of the severity of the situation, until today. So, it's only now that I realize the importance of the word. And more than that, I finally understand what it's capable of and the power it yields—something I've never even tried to experience before, even for the sake of it, despite having the full rights to.

He has become undone. Even if not on the surface.

It has jolted him to the core in a way nothing ever has—not even my leaving him eleven years back, perhaps.

Without a word, he fixes my hair and my dress with one hand, and using the same hand, he returns me to my seat as if I'm not a human with some weight but a small object.

The thumb of his hand on my neck skims my throat like a predator assessing its prey's fragility, setting a chill seeping into my skin.

He leans closer, but not much. Using his grip on my throat, he yanks me forward so his mouth is touching my ear.

"Run before I change my mind and chain you to me, wife."

How was the chapter?

What was your favorite part?

What are your thoughts on Juliette's stance here?

What are your thoughts on Areston's?