Chapter 3: Public Scandal, Private Control
The smell of coffee was the first anchor to the morning. V stood at the sleek granite counter, watching the dark liquid stream into a mug. Her mug. One of Victoria’s things, now sitting beside Alex’s industrial-grade machine. The blending of their lives was in these small, daily violations. The fridge magnets held images of Alex hoisting the Stanley Cup, his smile blinding, juxtaposed with a new photo—a selfie of the two of them from a few nights prior, a simulacrum of a happy couple. She’d been told to take it.
He entered the kitchen, the scent of her own shampoo—now his—trailing behind him. He wore one of Alex’s old team hoodies and nothing else, the hem brushing mid-thigh on Victoria’s long, perfect legs. He moved to the fridge, his ass a ripe curve beneath the fabric, and pulled out the carton of eggs.
“Scrambled. Four. With the chives,” he said, not looking at her. It was a command, not a request.
V didn’t argue. The ritual of cooking was a form of meditation, a task where her hands could work without her mind screaming. She cracked the eggs into a bowl, the shells snapping with a clean finality. The chives were already washed and chopped in a glass container, prepped by a grocery delivery she’d accepted yesterday. Don’t fuck it up.
He leaned against the counter beside her, scrolling through his phone—her old phone—with a focused intensity. The silence was comfortable for him, oppressive for her.
Then he made a soft, interested sound. “Ah.”
“What?” V asked, whisking the eggs.
“We’ve made the gossip sites.” He turned the screen toward her. There, in glaring high-definition, was a paparazzi shot taken two nights ago. They were standing under the awning of their building. In the photo, Alex—V—had her back to the wall, and Victoria—him—was pressed close, one hand cradling her jaw, the other possessively on her hip. Their lips were locked in a deep, seemingly passionate kiss. The lighting was dramatic, the rain-slicked street reflecting neon. The headline read: KONGSGARD’S MYSTERY WOMAN: Has the NHL’s Most Notorious Bachelor Finally Been Tamed?
V stopped whisking. The image was a lie. That kiss hadn’t been passion. It had been another lesson. ‘They need to see you want me,’ he’d said, his mouth against hers, his tongue a ruthless instructor. ‘They need to believe this is real. Now fucking kiss me back like you mean it.’ And she had, because the alternative was his cold displeasure and another punishing ‘calibration’ session.
“The narrative writes itself,” he said, a sly smile touching her lips. He set the phone down and slid onto a stool at the vintage wooden table. “We play this smart.” He beckoned her over with a curl of her finger.
V brought the bowl and a pan to the stove, pouring the eggs in. The sizzle was loud in the quiet room. “Play what?”
“The game. The public game.” His voice was a low purr. She felt him come up behind her before she saw him, his presence a shift in the air. His hands—her hands—slid around Alex’s waist, settling on the hard plane of his stomach. He rested his chin on her shoulder, watching the eggs congeal. “Let the world think the great Alex Kongsgard, the man who fucked a different model every week, has finally been captured. By a beautiful, unknown woman. Let them think I gave up my harem for you.” His right hand drifted lower, palming the growing bulge in Alex’s sweatpants with a familiar, proprietorial squeeze. “It’s perfect. It explains my focus. It explains your… improved performance. It gives us cover.”
V stiffened, her knuckles white on the spatula. The eggs were starting to overcook at the edges. “But you didn’t,” she whispered, the words escaping like a guilty secret. “Give it up.”
He turned her around, his grip firm. The morning sun streamed through the windows, catching the gold in her stolen hair, haloing the face that was her birthright. His expression was unreadable for a moment, those blue eyes searching the eyes he used to own.
“I would,” he said, his voice dropping, losing its calculated edge for a fraction of a second. The admission hung between them, stark and unexpectedly raw. Then he kissed her.
It was different. Not the performative, brutal kiss from the photo. This was slower. Softer. His lips moved against hers with a tentative exploration that felt more like Victoria than the entity inside her. His tongue traced the seam of her lips, and she opened for him with a shuddering sigh. The taste of coffee and him was dizzying. One of his hands came up to cup the back of Alex’s neck, fingers tangling in the short blond hair there. The other hand remained on her cock, stroking her gently through the fabric, a maddening counterpoint to the sudden tenderness.
He broke the kiss, his forehead resting against hers. “I have everything I ever wanted in this body,” he breathed, the words a hot confession against her mouth. “But it’s wrapped in a world that expects things from you. From us. This… us… simplifies that. Protects it.”
He pushed the loose robe she wore completely open, letting it fall from her shoulders to pool on the tile floor. The cool air pebbled Alex’s skin. He was already fully hard, straining against the waistband of his sweats. Not-Victoria sank to her knees, her eyes locked on his as she hooked her fingers in the elastic and pulled them down, freeing him.
“So let’s give them what they want,” she murmured, her breath warm on the tip. “And take what we need.”
She didn’t tease. She took him deep, her mouth a wet, slick vise, her head bobbing with a ruthless, perfect rhythm. V cried out, her hands flying to her own head, her fingers gripping blond strands. The duality was shattering: the blissful pressure of a perfect blowjob, and the intimate knowledge of exactly how she was doing it, the flutter of the tongue, the hollowing of the cheeks, the controlled use of the throat.
“Fuck, yes, just like that,” V groaned, her hips starting to pump. He encouraged it, his hands on her ass, pulling her deeper onto her own mouth. Gagging sounds echoed, raw and vulgar. Spit slicked her length. He pulled off with a wet pop, gasping.
“Not yet,” he panted, standing up. He turned her, bending her over the rustic wooden table. The cool surface shocked her belly. He kicked her legs wider. “They want a love story? Fine. But this is the reality.”
He positioned himself at her entrance, still slick from her mouth. He didn’t ask. He drove into her with one long, deep stroke, burying himself to the hilt.
A guttural, broken moan was ripped from both of them. He set a pace that was less about passion and more about possession, each thrust a blunt, powerful claim. The table rocked slightly with their force. V gripped the opposite edge, the wood grain biting into her palms. The sounds were animalistic: the slap of flesh, the creak of the table, their ragged, rhythmic grunts.
“This is what tames me?” he snarled, his voice tight with strain, her body bouncing with each impactful drive. “This fucking cunt? This is all it took?” His words were filthy, degrading, and they sent a perverse bolt of lightning through her.
“Yes,” V gasped, pushing back against him, meeting him thrust for thrust. The power in Alex’s body sang, a symphony of pure physicality. “Fucking yes.”
One of his hands fisted in her hair, yanking her head back. The other reached around, his fingers finding her clit, rubbing rough, desperate circles. The double stimulation tore a scream from her throat. The pleasure was a riptide, pulling her under. She was close, so close, the tension coiling impossibly tight.
“Cum,” he demanded, his own breathing a ragged saw. “Cum for the cameras. Cum for the story.”
It was the permission, the profane theatrics of it, that broke her. The orgasm detonated, a white-hot nova that erased thought, erased identity, erased everything but the violent, pulsing release wracking Alex’s body. She convulsed around him, milking him, and with a final, shuddering cry, he followed her over, spilling into her with a hot, flooding rush.
He collapsed over her, his weight pinning her to the table. Their sweat mingled on the wood. For long minutes, the only sound was their heaving breaths and the hum of the refrigerator.
Slowly, he pushed himself up and pulled out. V stayed where she was, boneless, staring at a knot in the wood grain. He walked to the sink, wet a cloth, and came back. The gesture was startling in its mundane care. He cleaned her thighs with a few practical swipes, then tossed the cloth toward the laundry room.
He looked at the scorched, forgotten eggs in the pan on the stove. “You fucked up the eggs,” he said, but there was no real anger in it.
V finally pushed herself upright. Her legs felt liquid. “I’ll make more.”
“Don’t bother.” He pulled the hoodie back on. “We have that sponsor luncheon at one. You need to be ‘charmed and in love.’ Can you manage that?”
V looked at him—at herself—standing in the wreckage of their morning. The entity was still there, in the set of her shoulders, the calculating gleam in her eye. But the kiss, the unexpected confession… something had shifted. A crack in the façade.
“I can manage,” V said, her voice steadier than she felt.
“Good.” He picked up his phone, already typing a response to the viral photo, no doubt crafting the perfect, coy non-denial. “Wear the navy suit. The one that makes your eyes look like a glacier. It’s intimidating and approachable. Perfect for the narrative.”
The narrative. Their narrative. A love story built on a foundation of mutual possession and psychological warfare. As V walked toward the shower, the ghost of him still inside her, she realized the most dangerous thing. Part of her was starting to believe it. Part of her wanted the cover, the simplicity, the explosive connection that came with the madness. The world thought he’d been tamed. The truth was, they were both being remade, twisted together in a way that felt less like a prison and more like a terrifying, new kind of symbiosis.
Her phone, Alex’s phone, buzzed on the counter. A notification from Landeskog. Saw the pic. About time you settled down. She must be hell in bed to shut you up. See you at the arena at four. Don’t be late.
V didn’t reply. She stepped into the shower, the water washing away the physical evidence but sealing the pact. The game had new rules now, and the whole world was watching.
The game had new rules now, and the whole world was watching. The drive to the team dinner was a silent procession through Denver’s glittering arteries. V stared out the passenger window of the black SUV, Alex’s large hands resting inert on his thighs. The entity that was Victoria drove with a relaxed precision, one hand on the wheel, the other lying casually on the gearshift. Her red dress was a slash of violence against the dark leather seat.
“Your PhD starts in a week,” he said, the statement slicing through the low hum of the engine.
V turned her head slowly. “What do you mean?”
“I saw the email. The final invoice from the university. The one you’d been deferring.” He kept his eyes on the road, his profile serene in the dashboard’s glow. “I found out why you worked two jobs. The late shifts, the shitty coffee shop. It was for that.”
He paused, letting the comprehension dawn on her. “I paid it. All of it. It’s the least I could do.”
Her breath caught, a sharp, painful hitch in Alex’s broad chest. The money was a tangible thread back to her old life, a struggle she had owned. He’d severed it. “But… you can’t. That was mine. My debt. My work.”
“Don’t worry,” he said, and his voice softened into a tone she’d never heard him use. He reached over, his hand—her small, fine-boned hand—covering one of Alex’s. He gave it a squeeze. The touch was disarmingly gentle.
He had put her body in a red dress for tonight. A designer piece that clung and flared, a weapon of soft fabric. In the elevator down, she had looked at their reflection—the giant hockey player and the stunning blonde in crimson. “I look nice, yes?” he’d asked, a curious, almost childlike note in her voice.
“You look beautiful,” V had answered, the truth of it an ache.
He had grinned then, Alex’s face mirroring the expression. “You too.” He’d leaned in and kissed her, a chaste, public kiss. It felt like a brand.
At the dinner, in the private back room of a steakhouse thrumming with masculine energy and cigar smoke, the narrative took hold. Teammates clapped Alex on the shoulder, their eyes lingering on Victoria with open appreciation. “Who is this sorceress?” one of the defensemen boomed, his grin wide. “How did you finally catch Kongsgard? He’s been uncatchable since juniors.”
V felt the entity’s hand tighten on her knee under the table, a silent prompt.
“She’s doing a PhD,” V said, her voice carrying just enough across the linen-covered table. “In media studies. We met when she tried to interview me for her dissertation.” She forced a self-deprecating laugh. “I was surprised someone wanted to talk to me about something other than… well, you know.”
The table erupted in good-natured jeers. “Smart and stunning! You hit the jackpot, you bastard!”
V smiled, playing her part. She saw him watching her from across the table, those blue eyes missing nothing. He sipped his wine, the picture of serene possession.
It was the truth, that story. A sanitized, palatable version of it. She had messaged Alex Kongsgard’s publicist over a year ago, a desperate grad student seeking a unique case study on the media construction of the modern athlete. He’d been drunk, bored, and had replied directly to her email with a time and a hotel room, clearly thinking it was a different kind of proposition. She’d been offended, ignored it. That was the last she’d thought of him until she woke up as him.
She saw it then, a fractional shift in the entity’s posture. A stillness so complete it was like watching a lake freeze over in an instant. The casual laughter around them faded into a muffled roar. His eyes, her eyes, locked onto V’s from across the table.
The dinner ended in a blur of handshakes and promises to meet at practice. The car ride back was a void. He was silent, a contained storm in a red dress. Once inside the condo, the heavy door clicking shut to absolute silence, he turned. The serene mask was gone, replaced by something raw and frighteningly sharp.
“You didn’t tell me,” he said, his voice low and dangerous.
“What?” V asked, her heart beginning a slow, hard pound against her ribs.
He walked toward her, not with the prowl of before, but with a deadly, deliberate grace. He didn’t stop until he was directly in front of her. Then, holding her gaze with an unbreakable intensity, he sank to his knees on the hardwood floor.
He reached for the buckle of Alex’s belt, his fingers deft and sure. The metallic click was deafening in the quiet.
“What are you doing?” V whispered, her voice trembling.
He didn’t answer. He undid the button of the trousers, pulled down the zipper with a slow, rasping hiss. He looked up at her, his face a beautiful, furious mask. “Listen to me.”
His hands pulled her free from the confines of her boxer briefs. She was already hardening under his gaze, a traitorous response to the tension, the dominance of his posture, the shocking vulnerability of his position.
“You contacted me,” he said, his breath hot against her skin. “You. Not some random groupie. You wanted to talk to me. To know me.” There was a bewildered, angry pain in his words. He leaned forward, his lips a breath away. “And I… I was just another drunken asshole trying to get his dick wet.”
Before she could form a reply, he took her into his mouth.
It wasn’t like the calculated, brutal calibration sessions. This was different. It was deep, consuming, and fraught with a terrifying emotion. He swallowed her length, his throat working around her, his eyes screwed shut as if in pain. A ragged groan tore from V’s throat. Her hands flew to his head, her fingers tangling in her own golden hair, gripping tight.
He moved on her with a desperate, hungry rhythm, his tongue pressing flat against the underside of her shaft on every upstroke. Saliva dripped down his chin, wet and obscene. The sounds were raw, sloppy, and profoundly intimate. He was worshiping and punishing her, and himself, in the same act.
“You saw me,” he moaned around her, the vibration shooting through her core. “And I was too fucking stupid to see you.”
The words, muffled and strained, unlocked something in V. A wave of fierce, possessive tenderness crashed over the confusion and fear. This wasn’t the entity. This was a ghost of Alex, a fragment of the man he’d been, screaming through the wrong mouth. He was trying to connect the dots of his own erased existence, and the only bridge was this, the most basic, filthy communion.
She looked down at the exquisite sight of her own head bobbing in her lap, her lips stretched obscenely around Alex’s thick cock. The cognitive dissonance should have shattered her. Instead, it fused her to the moment. Her hips pushed forward, seeking more of the wet, sucking heat.
“Yes,” she hissed, her voice a guttural command she didn’t recognize. “Just like that. Take it.”
He redoubled his efforts, his nose pressing into the coarse hair at her base. He was taking all of her, claiming his own instrument with a furious, reverent abandon. The pressure built, a coiling, electric tension in her balls, at the base of her spine. His hands gripped her ass, fingers digging into the muscle, pulling her deeper.
“I’m gonna come,” she warned, her thighs tightening.
He didn’t pull away. He looked up, her blue eyes wide and streaming, and nodded, a frantic, pleading gesture. He took her deeper, his throat relaxing completely.
It was the permission, and the profound submission in his gaze, that threw the switch. Her orgasm erupted, a scalding, blinding rush that felt like it was tearing his soul through her cock. She pulsed into his mouth, into her own throat, a violent, endless release. He swallowed convulsively, taking every drop, his body shuddering as she emptied herself into him.
When it was over, she was panting, leaning back against the wall for support. He stayed on his knees, her softening length slipping from his bruised lips. He rested his forehead against her thigh, his own shoulders heaving.
The silence was absolute, layered with the smell of sex and salt and a new, devastating understanding. He had not just fucked her. He had knelt. He had consumed a piece of his own past through her. The power dynamic, so brutally established, had just fractured and reconfigured itself into something far more complex and dangerous.
He looked up, her face streaked with tears and spit. “You saw me,” he repeated, his voice wrecked. “And I didn’t see a goddamn thing.”
He stayed there, forehead pressed against her thigh, for a long time. The only sound was their ragged breathing slowing into an uneasy synchrony. His confession hung in the air between them, a truth so sharp it seemed to cut the very light in the room.
V looked down at the crown of her own blond head, at the vulnerable curve of his neck. The entity, the ghost, the man—he was laid bare in a way that transcended the physical nakedness. A complex, aching pity welled up in her, threaded through with a terrifying strand of connection. Her hand, of its own accord, moved from the wall and came to rest gently on his head.
His shoulders tensed under her touch. Then, he turned his face slightly, pressing a kiss to the inside of her thigh. It was soft. Apologetic.
Without a word, he shifted. He guided her down, her back against the cool hardwood floor. He moved over her, but not with dominance. With a purpose that was slow, deliberate. His eyes, her own blue eyes, were dark pools of something she couldn’t name—regret, hunger, a desperate need for absolution.
He kissed his way down Alex’s stomach, his lips leaving a trail of fire. He nuzzled the coarse hair at the base of her cock, which was softening now, spent. He moved lower, past it, his hands pushing her thighs apart with a reverence that hadn’t been there before.
He buried his face between her legs.
His tongue was not a weapon this time. It was an explorer, a penitent. He licked her with a slow, focused intensity, rediscovering the geography of her own body from the outside. He found her entrance, still slick from their earlier joining, and traced the swollen lips with a feather-light touch that made her gasp. He circled her clit, not with the brutal efficiency of before, but with a building, rhythmic pressure that felt like a question.
V cried out, her hands flying back to grip her own hair again, but this time to hold on, not to control. Sensation, bright and coiling, began to spread from her core. He ate her with a singular devotion, his mouth sealing over her, his tongue plunging deep and then retreating to flick and tease. The wet, intimate sounds were loud in the silent condo. She could feel his nose pressed against her, could feel the earnest desperation in every lap, every suck.
“Oh, god,” she moaned, her hips lifting off the floor to meet his mouth. “Right there. Don’t stop.”
He didn’t. He built the pleasure carefully, expertly, as only someone who had once inhabited this body could. He knew the exact spot, the precise rhythm. He pinned her hips to the floor with strong hands, holding her still for his ministrations. The orgasm, when it came, wasn’t the violent, seismic rupture from before. It was a deep, rolling wave that began in her toes and crashed through her entire being, wringing a long, shuddering cry from her throat. Her back arched, her heels digging into the floorboards as she pulsed against his relentless tongue.
He didn’t stop until the very last tremor subsided, until she was a boneless, gasping wreck on the floor. Then he crawled up her body, his face glistening with her. He loomed over her, looking down into Alex’s eyes. His own face was streaked with tears again, or sweat, or both.
“I think I love you,” he whispered, the words raw and shattered. “And I am so fucking sorry.”
He collapsed beside her, curling into her side, his head on her shoulder. They lay on the hard floor, tangled together, drifting into an exhausted, dreamless sleep as the city lights watched through the windows.
V woke to the feel of cool cotton sheets, not hardwood. Morning light, soft and grey, filtered through unfamiliar gauzy curtains. Her body felt… different. Lighter. The familiar ache of Alex’s powerful muscles was gone, replaced by a deep, sensual tenderness between her thighs. She stretched, and her hand brushed the curve of her own hip.
She sat bolt upright.
She looked down. Small, feminine hands. Long, dark blond hair fell over her shoulders. The swell of her own breasts beneath a thin camisole. She was in her body. Victoria’s body. She was in the guest room of Alex’s condo, in the bed the entity had ordered for himself.
A frantic glance beside her. The other side of the bed was empty, rumpled.
Silence.
A cold, clarifying terror washed over her. She slid out of bed, her legs unsteady. She padded to the attached bathroom and flipped on the light. Her own face stared back, wide-eyed and pale, from the mirror. No sign of him. No trace of the other consciousness in her reflection.
She moved through the condo like a ghost. The living room was empty. The kitchen, clean. Her heartbeat thundered in her ears. She pushed open the door to the primary bedroom. The bed was made, military neat. No one.
Then she saw it. Her old suitcase, the one from her apartment, stood by the elevator doors, packed and zipped. Her purse was on top of it. Her keys.
He was gone. Alex was back in his body. And he had left.
The relief was so profound it felt like nausea. Then, immediately, a yawning, terrifying emptiness swallowed it whole. He was gone. She was alone. Truly alone, in her own skin, for the first time in weeks. The silence was deafening, a physical weight.
She dressed mechanically, pulling on jeans and a sweater from the closet—her clothes, in her size. She walked to the suitcase, her hand closing over the cool handle. The click of the elevator call button was the only sound.
The doors slid open.
He was standing inside.
Alex. The real Alex. Six-foot-five of blond, shocked fury filling the elevator car. He was wearing running gear, sweat dampening his temples, as if he’d just raced back from somewhere. His blue eyes locked onto hers, then the suitcase. The doors began to close and he slapped a hand out, stopping them.
“Where the fuck do you think you’re going?” The voice was his. The real, baritone grit of Alex Kongsgard, not the mimicry performed through her vocal cords.
God, he was beautiful. The raw, masculine shock of him, the sheer physical presence, hit her like a punch. The perfect lines of his face were twisted in anger and something else, something panicked.
“Home,” she said, her voice small and thin in the vast space.
“This is your home,” he said, stepping out of the elevator, forcing her to take a step back. He loomed over her, but the threat was gone, replaced by a desperate intensity.
“No, it’s really not.” She tightened her grip on the suitcase handle. “You got what you wanted. Your body. Your life back. You don’t really need me here anymore.”
“V.” He said her name, the single syllable cracking. He reached for her, but didn’t touch. His hand hung in the air between them. “Please.”
She froze. The raw plea in his voice was a shackle.
“I told you I love you,” he said, the words rushing out, stripped bare of all pretense. “I don’t want you to leave. Don’t go.”
The suitcase handle slipped from her fingers. It hit the floor with a dull thud. He moved then, closing the distance, his hands coming up to frame her face. His palms were warm, calloused from his stick. He looked down at her, searching her eyes, his own blazing with a frantic sincerity.
“You’re here,” she whispered, disbelieving. “You’re really here. In you.”
“And you’re in you,” he murmured, his thumb stroking her cheek. “And I can finally fucking touch you right.”
He kissed her. It was nothing like before. Not a lesson, not a performance, not a desperate act of possession. It was slow, deep, and astonishingly tender. It was a homecoming. She melted into it, her hands coming up to clutch the front of his damp shirt. He walked her backward, away from the elevator, away from the suitcase, into the living room.
They didn’t make it to a bedroom. He lowered her onto the large, soft rug, his mouth never leaving hers. He undressed her with a patient slowness that felt like worship, peeling away the layers until she was bare before him. He shed his own clothes, his powerful body revealed inch by inch. The morning light played over the planes of his chest, the corded muscle of his arms.
He kissed her neck, her collarbone, the swell of her breasts. He took her nipple into his mouth, sucking gently until she arched against him with a soft cry. His hand slid down her stomach, through the curls, and found her wet and ready for him. He stroked her, his fingers learning her anew, without the shared, fractured memory.
“I want to see you,” he breathed against her skin. “All of you. Just you.”
He moved over her, settling between her thighs. He looked into her eyes as he positioned himself, the broad head of his cock nudging at her entrance. He pushed inside, slowly, giving her body time to stretch and accommodate him. The feeling was profoundly different. It was just him, filling her. Just her, receiving him. No ghostly echoes, no dual perspectives. Just this singular, overwhelming connection.
He began to move, a slow, rolling rhythm that built with agonizing sweetness. Each stroke was deep, deliberate, a rediscovery. He braced himself on his elbows, cradling her face, never breaking eye contact.
“This is amazing,” he growled, his voice thick with emotion. “Being in you. Just you. God, V…” His pace increased slightly, the friction intensifying. “I’m going to cum. I can’t… I don’t want to stop.”
She wrapped her legs around his waist, pulling him deeper. “Don’t stop.”
“Sorry, fuck,” he gasped, his control fraying. “It’s too tight. Too wet. You’re perfect.”
His thrusts became shorter, harder, losing their rhythm as his climax gathered. She felt her own coiling tighter, spurred by the look on his face, the raw need in his voice. He drove into her one final, deep time, burying himself to the hilt with a choked cry. As he pulsed inside her, his release triggering hers, she shattered.
The orgasm washed over her in a smooth, deep wave, pulling a sob from her throat. She cried through it, tears streaming into her hairline, as he shuddered above her. They clung to each other, sweaty and spent, as the world settled back into place around them. He was inside her, with her, and for the first time, they were both entirely, wholly themselves. The emptiness was gone. In its place was a terrifying, real, and fragile understanding.