Chapter 2: The tshirt and nothing else
The city glittered, a bed of cold diamonds a thousand feet below. Up here, in the penthouse, the silence felt expensive. A week. Seven days of strained breakfasts, of her mother’s cheerful chatter, of Sage fleeing rooms the moment he entered them. She’d taken to eating in her studio, claiming a deadline for a portfolio piece. It wasn’t entirely a lie. The canvas on her easel was a chaotic smear of burgundy and shadow, a mess she couldn’t explain.
Tonight, the apartment was hers. Her mother was in Aspen for a long weekend with friends. A reprieve. A terror.
Sage wandered the vast living room, a ghost in her own life. She’d showered, washing away the day, and pulled on the only thing that felt like armor: an old, soft t-shirt of her father’s. It swallowed her, the hem brushing mid-thigh, the cotton worn thin. She was curled in the corner of a massive white sofa, a sketchbook open but blank on her lap, when she felt the shift in the air.
Not a sound. A pressure change.
He stood in the doorway to his wing, backlit by the hall light. He wasn’t in a suit. Dark jeans, a grey henley stretched across his chest, sleeves pushed up. He looked like a man in his own home, which he was. He looked like a predator who’d finally scented prey alone.
“Hiding,” he said. His voice wasn’t loud. It didn’t need to be.
“I’m not,” she said, too quickly. She closed the sketchbook.
He moved into the room with a quiet, predatory grace, his footsteps silent on the cream rug. He didn’t come straight for her. He went to the wall of glass, looking out at his kingdom, his hands in his pockets. The city lights painted his profile in blue and white.
“You left your phone in the kitchen,” he said.
“I know.”
“You’ve been jumping at shadows all week.” He turned his head, just slightly, his eyes catching the ambient light. “My shadow.”
She didn’t answer. She couldn’t. The memory was a physical thing in her mouth, a phantom salt and musk that made her stomach clench.
He finally turned from the window and walked toward her. Not aggressively. Casually. As if he were coming to ask for the remote. Her body locked, a small animal in the open field. She stood up, the sketchbook tumbling to the floor.
“I should go to bed,” she whispered, taking a step backward.
He kept advancing, a slow, inexorable tide. “It’s only nine.”
Another step back. Her calf hit the low glass coffee table. No more retreat.
He was in front of her now, close enough that she could smell the clean, sharp scent of his soap, see the faint stubble along his jaw. The sheer size of him blocked out the room. Her heart was a frantic bird against her ribs.
“You’ve been avoiding me,” he said. It wasn’t an accusation. It was a fact, stated with a hint of dark amusement.
“I haven’t.”
“Liar.” His hand came up, not fast, but deliberate. His fingers slid into the hair at her temple, his thumb finding the exact, specific spot at the back of her skull where his grip had anchored her a week ago. A jolt, white-hot and electric, shot down her spine. Her breath hitched audibly.
“See?” he murmured, his voice dropping to a growl that vibrated in her bones. “Your body remembers.”
His other hand lifted, palm skimming down her arm, over the curve of her hip. She shuddered. His touch was fire through the thin cotton. His hand continued, sliding up the outside of her thigh, under the loose hem of the shirt.
She froze.
His fingers paused. His eyes, locked on hers, darkened with instant, blazing comprehension. He pushed the fabric up a fraction, his knuckles brushing bare skin. All the way up.
There was nothing. Just her skin, warm and smooth.
A slow, dangerous smile touched his lips, though his eyes remained fiercely intent. “Nothing underneath,” he stated, his voice thick with a hunger he didn’t bother to conceal. “Were you hoping I’d find you like this, Sage? Sitting in the dark, dressed in a whisper, waiting?”
“No,” she gasped, but it was weak. A denial that convinced neither of them. The truth was a confused, shameful knot in her chest. Had she? The thought had flitted, unacknowledged, in the steamy bathroom mirror.
His exploring hand slid higher, his thumb stroking the sensitive skin of her inner thigh. “Liar again.” He leaned in, his mouth close to her ear. His breath was hot. “Your body remembers its master. It’s been waiting for me. Admit it.”
Tears of shame and unwanted, piercing arousal pricked her eyes. She shook her head, a tiny, desperate movement.
He used the grip in her hair to tilt her face up, forcing her to meet his gaze. “You can lie to yourself. You can’t lie to this.” His hand between her thighs pressed inward, a firm, undeniable pressure against her core, through the cotton of his shirt that she wore. A broken sound escaped her. “See? It weeps for me. It remembers the taste.”
The crude, devastating truth of it shattered her. Her knees buckled. He held her up, the hand in her hair and the hand between her legs the only things keeping her from melting to the floor.
“Please,” she whimpered, not knowing what she was asking for. Stop. Don’t stop.
“Please, what?” he demanded, his own control seeming to fray at the edges. His thumb moved in a slow, circular stroke, and she cried out, her hips jerking involuntarily against his hand. “Tell me what you want. Use your words.”
But she had no words. Only a yearning so vast it felt like drowning. She reached up, her hands clutching at the fabric of his henley, holding on as the world spun.
He looked at her face, at the tears tracking through her lashes, at the parted, trembling lips. The fight left his expression, replaced by something more primal, more absolute. “You’re mine,” he breathed, the words a final verdict. “You have been since you walked into that study. You just didn’t know it.”
He withdrew his hand from under her shirt, and she almost sobbed at the loss. But he wasn’t done. In one swift, effortless motion, he bent and hooked an arm behind her knees, lifting her against his chest. The sketchbook was left forgotten on the floor.
“Zaden—” she gasped, startled.
“Quiet.” He carried her across the vast living room, away from the wall of windows, away from the pretend normalcy. He shouldered through the door to his private wing, down a dimly lit hallway she’d never seen.
His bedroom was a study in monochrome and power. A massive bed on a raised platform dominated the space. He didn’t lay her on it. He stood her beside it, her bare feet on the cool hardwood. He kept his hands on her shoulders, holding her at arm’s length, his gaze raking over her—the oversized shirt, her bare legs, the blatant vulnerability.
“Take it off,” he said, his voice rough.
She stared at him, frozen.
“The shirt. Take it off. I want to see what’s mine.”
Her fingers felt numb. She fumbled with the hem, then pulled the soft cotton up and over her head. It fell soundlessly to the floor. The city light filtered through his blinds, painting her skin in stripes of silver and shadow. She stood before him, completely exposed, her arms instinctively crossing over her chest.
He didn’t move. He just looked, his eyes devouring every detail—the rapid flutter of her pulse in her throat, the gentle curve of her waist, the apex of her thighs. His scrutiny was more intimate than any touch.
“Uncross your arms,” he commanded softly.
A final, fragile defiance made her hesitate.
“Now.”
She let her arms fall to her sides, her hands curling into fists at her thighs. She was trembling.
He closed the distance then. His hands came up to cradle her face, his thumbs wiping the tears from her cheeks. The gentleness was more disorienting than the force.
“You’re so beautiful it hurts,” he whispered, and for a moment, he sounded almost lost. Then his mouth was on hers.
It wasn’t like before. This was not a taking, but a claiming. Deep, possessive, overwhelming. His tongue swept into her mouth, and she tasted Scotch and him, and a week of desperate avoidance melted into a surge of pure, answering need. Her fists uncurled, her hands flattening against the hard plane of his chest, then sliding up to clutch at his shoulders.
He walked her backward until her legs hit the edge of the mattress. He broke the kiss, his breathing harsh. “Lie down.”
She obeyed, scooting back onto the cool, dark sheets. He stood at the foot of the bed, pulling his henley over his head, revealing the sculpted torso of a man who owned everything, including himself. He watched her watch him, a flicker of satisfaction in his eyes.
He joined her on the bed, not covering her body with his, but lying beside her, propped on an elbow. His hand resumed its journey, mapping her skin with a shocking reverence. Over her collarbone, down the slope of her breast, circling a peaked nipple until she arched off the bed with a gasp. Down the flat of her stomach.
“Have you ever been touched here?” he asked, his fingers tracing the delicate bone of her hip. “By anyone? Even yourself?”
She shook her head, her face burning.
“Good.” The word was a dark gift. His hand slid lower, through the soft auburn curls, and found her wet, hot core. She jerked, a cry tearing from her throat. “Shhh,” he soothed, kissing her shoulder. “I’ll be gentle. This first time.”
His touch was not gentle. It was precise. Educated. He stroked and parted and explored, his eyes on her face, reading every flinch, every gasp, every silent plea. He found a spot that made her see white light, his fingers moving in a relentless, focused rhythm that built a terrifying pressure inside her. She was fracturing, coming apart under his hands, her hips moving helplessly against him.
“That’s it,” he murmured, his own breath coming faster. “Let go. Come for me. Show me.”
The command broke her. A wave crashed over her, violent and shocking, wringing a raw, sobbing cry from her throat. He held her through it, his fingers working her until the last tremor subsided, leaving her boneless and gasping.
As she lay there, shattered, he moved over her, settling his weight between her thighs. She felt him, hard and insistent against her. The fear returned, cold and sharp.
He saw it. He paused, brushing the hair from her damp forehead. “Look at me.”
Her glazed eyes found his.
“This,” he said, pressing himself against her entrance, “is where you belong. This is the truth we’ve been circling.” He lowered his head, his lips against her ear. “It will hurt. And then it won’t. And you will never be anyone else’s.”
He pushed in.
The pain was a bright, searing line. She cried out, her nails digging into his back. He stopped, buried deep, his body rigid with the effort of holding still. Sweat gleamed on his temples.
“Breathe,” he gritted out. “Just breathe.”
She tried. The sharpness slowly faded, replaced by a deep, stretching fullness. He began to move, slow, deep strokes that filled her completely. The pain receded, replaced by something else, a gathering heat, an impossible sense of fitting. His rhythm built, driving her back into the mattress, each thrust punctuated by his ragged breath, by her soft, involuntary sounds.
He was everywhere. In her, around her, his scent in her lungs, his name a silent scream in her mind. She wrapped her legs around his waist, pulling him deeper, and a groan ripped from his chest. His control shattered.
The pace became frantic, possessive. He was claiming her in the most fundamental way, and she was yielding, giving, taking everything he offered. His mouth found hers again, a messy, desperate kiss.
When his release came, it was with a guttural sound against her neck, his whole body shuddering as he spilled into her. He collapsed, his weight a heavy, anchoring comfort, before quickly rolling to his side, taking her with him, keeping them joined.
They lay in the dark, the only sound their labored breathing. The city lights still glittered, indifferent. But everything had changed.
He shifted, pulling the sheet over them. His arm was a steel band around her waist, holding her flush against him. He said nothing. He just held her, his breath slowly evening out against her hair.
Sage stared at the stripes of light on the far wall. The girl in the oversized t-shirt was gone. Something new, something irrevocable, lay in her place. The fear was still there, a cold thread in her veins. But beneath it, warmer and more terrifying, was a sense of devastating rightness.
Her body, exhausted and humming, remembered its master. And now, so did her soul.
His fingers traced a slow, absent circle on her hip. A silent brand in the dark. The night stretched on, holding them both in its new, permanent silence.
The night stretched on, holding them both in its new, permanent silence. He never fully let go, his body a cage of heat and muscle around hers. She drifted in and out of a thin, startled sleep, each time waking to the solid reality of his chest against her back, his arm locked around her ribs. The faint ache between her thighs was a brand. A receipt.
Dawn came as a slow seep of grey light around the blinds. Sage opened her eyes to the unfamiliar room, to the feel of expensive linen, to him. Zaden was awake. She could tell by his breathing, by the absolute stillness that wasn’t sleep. His hand rested over her lower belly, possessive even in stillness.
She didn’t move. She replayed the fracture of her body under his hands, the searing fullness, the way he’d said ‘mine’ like it was the only truth left. A flush of heat followed by a chill of dread chased through her. What was she now?
“Thinking will ruin it,” his voice rasped, raw from sleep and use, directly against her ear.
“I can’t help it.”
“I know.” His hand flexed slightly, fingers splaying. “Your mind is always racing. I can hear it.”
He shifted then, rolling her onto her back to look at her. The morning light was unforgiving, showing the shadows under her eyes, the faint pink mark on her shoulder. His gaze cataloged it all. He looked... settled. The frantic hunger from the night before was banked, replaced by a deep, unnerving certainty.
“Does it hurt?” he asked, his thumb brushing her hip bone.
She nodded, a quick, small movement.
“Good.” He said it not with cruelty, but with a stark satisfaction. “You should feel it. You should remember.”
He pushed back the sheet and got out of bed, moving naked and unselfconscious across the room. She watched the powerful play of muscle in his back, the dark ink of a tattoo she hadn’t seen last night curling over his shoulder blade. He returned with a glass of water and two small pills.
“For the ache,” he said, handing them to her.
She took them, sipping the water. The care was more confusing than the possession. He sat on the edge of the bed, his eyes tracing the line of her body under the sheet. The silence stretched, thick with everything unsaid.
Her mouth was dry. The words felt like shards of glass in her throat, but they’d been forming all night, born from the dark paintings, from his grip in her hair, from the way he’d commanded her apart.
“Can we… explore things?” Sage asked him, her voice barely audible.
He went very still. His blue eyes sharpened, focusing on her with an intensity that made her want to hide. “Like what?”
She swallowed, her fingers twisting in the sheet. She looked at his hands, remembering their precise, devastating control. “...BDSM?” she whispered quietly.
The air evacuated the room. Zaden didn’t blink. He studied her face for a long, terrifying moment, searching for a joke, for fear, for ignorance. He found only a tremulous, deadly seriousness.
A slow breath left him. He reached out, hooking a finger under her chin, forcing her to hold his gaze. “That word,” he said, his voice low and measured. “Do you have any idea what you’re asking for? What it actually means?”
“I know what I felt,” she whispered, defiance flickering. “Last night. In the study before that. It wasn’t just… sex. It was the way you looked at me. The way you held me down. The way you told me what to do.” Her cheeks burned, but she didn’t look away. “It was in your paintings. That’s what they’re about, isn’t it? Control.”
A muscle ticked in his jaw. For the first time, he looked… challenged. Not by an outsider, but by her. By this nascent understanding glowing in her green eyes.
“It’s about surrender,” he corrected, his thumb stroking her lower lip. “Informed, consensual, explicit surrender. It’s about trust so absolute it becomes a physical language.” His eyes darkened. “It’s about me deciding how much you can take, and you begging me to take you right to the edge of it.”
Her breath hitched. A fresh, liquid heat pooled low in her belly, contradicting the soreness. “Yes.”
“It’s not a game, Sage. It’s not a fantasy from one of your books.” His voice hardened. “If I do this with you, if I teach you this, there is no walking it back. You will be giving me a key to parts of you even you don’t know. And I will use it.”
The warning was clear, icy, and it thrilled her. It made the danger tangible. It made the choice real.
“I want the key,” she heard herself say.
His gaze dropped to her mouth, then back to her eyes. A storm brewed in his. Conflict, desire, a predatory gleam. He stood up abruptly, pacing away from the bed, running a hand through his hair. He was a man who commanded boardrooms, cities, futures, now thrown by the quiet request of an eighteen-year-old virgin.
He stopped at the window, staring out at the waking city. “Your mother returns tomorrow.”
“I know.”
“This stays between us. It is ours. You breathe a word of it, to anyone, and it ends. Everything ends.” His tone was absolute, final.
“I understand.”
He turned. The decision was made; she saw it solidify in his posture, in the resolved chill of his expression. The lover was gone, replaced by the strategist. The Dominant.
“We start with rules,” he said, his voice now pure, clean authority. “You will address me as ‘Sir’ in private. When I give an instruction, you will obey it immediately, or you will use your safe word. We will establish one today. You will keep a journal. I will read it. Your body, your time, your orgasms belong to me. Do you comprehend?”
The list was clinical, devastating. It should have frightened her. It did. But beneath the fear was a dizzying sense of relief, of structure. Of being claimed completely.
“Yes,” she said.
“Yes, what?”
She hesitated, the word foreign on her tongue. “Yes, Sir.”
He nodded, once. A pact sealed. “Get up. Shower. I have a meeting at ten.” He walked toward the bathroom, then paused, glancing back at her still form. “The exploration begins tonight. Be ready.”
He left her there, naked in the tangled sheets, the morning light now feeling like a spotlight. She touched the place on her scalp where his grip had anchored her. A key. He had taken a key and she had handed him a whole locksmith shop.
Her body ached. Her mind reeled. And a treacherous, eager pulse beat low in her core, already waiting for the night.