Chapter 16: Preparing for Marco
The permits were on his desk at 8:55 a.m., signed without a single annotation. Julian sat behind his imported teak desk, the picture of strained composure. A subtly tailored suit hid the fading welts. The sharp lines of his face seemed deeper, shadowed by a sleepless night. He didn’t look at her when she collected the folder, just gave a tight, minimal nod towards the leather-bound document.
Isabella smiled, a cool, professional curve of her lips. “Thank you, Julian. I’ll have these filed by noon.”
He finally met her eyes. His were bloodshot, the blue dulled by confusion and a hunger that had been twisted into something supplicant. “Is there anything else you need?” The question was bare, stripped of pretense.
“Not at the moment.” She turned, the whisper of her silk blouse the only sound.
Her own office was a sanctuary of minimalism. She placed the permits in her out tray, a significant piece of her chessboard sliding decisively forward. As she sat, her phone buzzed against the marble desk. A single, unsaved number lit up the screen.
Marco: 8pm. The loft. Dress sexy. I want your ass tonight.
A slow, genuine heat uncoiled low in her belly, so different from the cold fury she’d wielded against Julian. This was anticipation, sharp and clean. She typed a single character: ✓.
The workday passed in a blur of productive efficiency. At 6:30 p.m., she walked into Julian’s penthouse. He was standing by the window, a glass of water in hand, as if he’d been pacing for hours.
“I’m going out,” she announced, dropping her work bag by the door. “Girl’s night. I need to change.”
He set the glass down too carefully. “Here?”
“You’re going to help me get ready.”
She saw the tremor in his fingers before he clenched them. He followed her into the cavernous bedroom, where the city lights were just beginning to ignite against the indigo sky. From her bag, she pulled out a garment bag and laid it on his vast, silk-covered bed. Unzipping it revealed a simple, devastating dress: slip-tight black jersey, backless, with a hem that would stop high on her thighs.
“Take off my clothes,” she said, standing before him.
His hands, when they came to the buttons of her blouse, were steadier than she expected. There was a reverent focus to his movements. He peeled the silk away from her shoulders, let it fall. He unhooked her sensible bra, his breath catching as her breasts spilled free. He knelt to remove her shoes, her stockings, her tailored trousers, until she stood naked in the gloom. The air was cool on her skin.
“Now,” she said, nodding to the bed. “Put the dress on me. Slowly. I don’t want a single wrinkle.”
He lifted the dress as if it were made of cobwebs. She stepped into it, and he drew it up her body, his knuckles skimming her calves, her thighs, her hips, his touch agonizingly light. He settled the thin straps on her shoulders, his fingers lingering there. The jersey clung to every curve, a second skin of pure shadow.
“The underwear is in the side pocket,” she instructed, her voice detached.
He retrieved the small parcel. Unfolding it revealed a scrap of black lace, a thong so minimal it was nearly a suggestion. He held it, staring.
“Put it on me.”
He sank to his knees again before her. She lifted one foot, then the other, as he guided the flimsy lace up her legs. His thumbs hooked into the waistband, pulling it into place, the narrow strip settling deep in the cleft of her ass, a whisper against her sex. He was breathing through his mouth now, his pupils wide and dark.
“It’s not quite ready,” she murmured, looking down at the top of his head. “I need to be… prepared. Lick me. Open me up. Use your tongue until I tell you to stop.”
A ragged groan tore from him. He didn’t hesitate. He pushed her gently back until she braced her hands on the edge of the mattress. He buried his face between her thighs from behind, his tongue finding the strip of lace first, soaking it, before pushing it aside to find her other, tighter hole.
His moan was one of pure, devouring obsession. The taste of her, the intimate musk, seemed to unravel the last of his restraint. His tongue was flat and rough, lapping at her asshole in broad, wet strokes before firming to a point and pressing inside.
Isabella gasped, her knuckles whitening on the silk bedspread. The sensation was brutally intimate, a violation that was also a gift. She let her head fall forward. “Deeper.”
He obeyed, his tongue plunging in as far as it could, fucking her with it in short, desperate strokes. The sound was wet, obscene. She could feel his hot breath, the scratch of his stubble on her tender skin. One of his hands came up to grip her hip, the other to spread her wider for him. He was moaning into her, the vibrations making her clench around nothing.
“Use your finger,” she commanded, her voice thick. “Get me slick. Stretch me.”
He pulled his mouth away with a sob of effort. She heard him spit, wetly, onto his fingers. Then the blunt, slippery pressure of his index finger pressed against her, circling, before pushing in alongside his tongue. The stretch burned beautifully. He worked it in to the knuckle, his tongue still flicking over her clit now, the dual assault making her legs shake.
“Another,” she breathed.
A second finger, dripping with his saliva, joined the first. He scissored them gently, stretching the tight ring of muscle, his mouth a frantic heat on her clit. She was dripping onto his hand, onto his chin. The room filled with the scent of sex and submission.
“That’s enough.” She straightened up, pushing his face away. He knelt back, his lips and chin glistening, his eyes wild. A dark patch of arousal stained the front of his trousers. “Look at you,” she said, smoothing the dress down over her hips. “A mess.”
She walked to the mirror, adjusted a strap, ran her hands through her hair. She was perfectly composed, while he remained on his knees, breathing like he’d run a marathon, painfully hard and utterly used.
“You’ll wait here,” she said, collecting a small clutch. “You won’t call. You won’t text. You’ll just wait.”
“When will you come back?” The question was a raw scrape of sound.
She paused at the bedroom door, a silhouette of elegant sin. She didn’t look back. “I didn’t say I would.”
The elevator carried her down, away from the scent of his desperation. In the reflective doors, she checked her lipstick. A faint, sore tenderness lingered between her cheeks, a reminder of his tongue, a preparation for what was to come. The heat in her core was no longer cold or calculating. It was a live wire, sparking in anticipation of darker hands, a rougher voice, a possession that demanded nothing less than everything.
The town car she’d called was idling at the curb. She gave the address of Marco’s loft. As the city slid by, she replayed the feel of Julian’s broken moans against her skin. They were not echoes of conquest. They were simply fuel. Kindling for a different, hotter fire.
The loft was raw space, all exposed brick and ductwork, smelling of turpentine and male sweat. Marco stood by a massive steel-framed window, a silhouette against the neon bleed of a bar sign across the street. He didn’t turn as the heavy door clanged shut behind her. “You’re late.”
“Traffic,” she said, her voice echoing in the cavernous room.
He finally looked at her. His eyes, dark and assessing, traveled from her heels up the length of the tight black dress. A smirk touched his lips. “You look like a whore who got a bonus. He dress you?”
“He licked me open for you,” she said, the statement flat and challenging.
That got a reaction. A flash of something savage in his gaze. He crossed the space in a few predatory strides, his hand snapping out to cup the back of her neck. His fingers were stained with graphite and oil. He pulled her in, his mouth claiming hers in a kiss that was all teeth and domination, tasting of bitter coffee and unrestrained intent. She met it with equal force, biting his lower lip until she tasted his blood.
“You reek of his desperation,” he growled against her mouth, his other hand groping the dress, finding the hem and hiking it up around her hips. His fingers slipped beneath the lace thong, probing the wetness there, then pushing back to find the other hole, still slick and loosened from Julian’s devoted tongue. “All that work he did. For me.”
He spun her around, pushing her forward until her hands smacked against the cold brick wall. The air from the window chilled her exposed skin. She heard the rasp of his zipper, the rustle of his jeans shoving down. He didn’t bother undressing her further. He just yanked the flimsy lace thong aside, the material tearing with a faint snap.
The broad, swollen head of his cock pressed against her, not where she was wet but where Julian’s saliva had dried to a thin, tacky film. “This what you came for, princess? This what you use that sad fuck to get ready for?”
He didn’t wait for an answer. He shoved forward, a brutal, unyielding invasion that tore a raw scream from her throat. The stretch was immense, a burning fullness that obliterated every other thought. He buried himself to the hilt in one vicious thrust, his pelvis slamming against her ass with a sound like a slap.
“Fucking tight,” he grunted, his body a furnace against her back. “Even after his sloppy seconds.” He pulled out almost all the way and drove back in, setting a punishing rhythm that rocked her entire body against the unyielding brick.
Each thrust was a claim, a correction. His hand fisted in her hair, wrenching her head back. “You think you’re so clever,” he snarled, his breath hot on her ear. “Playing your little puppet master with that rich cuck. You’re just a hole, Isabella. A scheming, greedy little hole.”
The words were gasoline on the fire burning in her core. The humiliation, the visceral truth of them, mixed with the exquisite pain of his penetration. She was being unmade, reduced to nothing but sensation and filthy truth.
“You love this, don’t you?” He slammed into her, his balls slapping against her skin. “You love being used. All that planning, all that control, just to end up here. Getting your ass reamed by a man who doesn’t give a fuck about your plans.”
He was right. God, he was right. The realization detonated through her. Her carefully constructed world of manipulation shattered under the physical weight of him. A sob wrenched from her chest, part agony, part surrender.
“Come on then,” he taunted, his pace becoming erratic, brutal, perfect. “Come for me, you manipulative bitch. Come on his prep work and my cock.”
It shattered her. The orgasm was a convulsive wave, a seizure of pure, annihilating pleasure that ripped through her belly and clenched violently around the invading thickness of him. She screamed, a sound stripped of all elegance, her nails scraping against the brick as her vision whited out. It was deeper, harder, more total than anything she’d ever felt—a collapse of her very architecture.
He fucked her through it, his own groans harsh in her ear. “That’s it. Take it.” He pistoned into her clenching, rippling heat three more times before he stiffened, driving deep, and pouring himself into her with a guttural roar that was more triumph than release.
He stayed there, buried inside her, for a long moment, both of them panting, dripping, anchored only by his grip on her hair and the connection of his flesh locked in hers. The city’ neon glow painted their sweat-slicked skin in streaks of lurid color.
Slowly, he pulled out. The aftermath was a cold, aching emptiness. A trickle of their mixed fluids traced a path down her inner thigh. He stepped back, zipping his jeans with a casual finality.
She slumped against the wall, her forehead pressed to the cool brick, her body humming with a devastating, unfamiliar peace. The kindling had been consumed. The fire had burned her clean.