Q, in his brutality, showed me something taboo… showed I liked to be dominated, and not just light role-playing. No, I needed the real thing.

Light shone through my brain at the realization. I’m not a sweet, innocent girl who wants cotton candy and sonnets. I’m a fighter, a slut, a woman who needed to be taught her own body.

As I stood, tied to a bed with my owner leering with sin in his eyes and promise of hurt on his lips, I changed again. The chrysalis of who I’d been cracked open, letting me fly free. I unfurled newfound wings, becoming more than Tess. I became a twisted, treasured belonging, revelling in her ownership. Who wanted Q to hurt her.

Fire blazed in my belly; I bared my teeth, snarling. “I won’t let you f**k me.”

Everything slammed to a halt.

Q. Me. Time.

The world teetered while Q tried to read me. We glared into each other’s eyes, reflecting the same f**ked-upness, recognizing the same in the other. The bond between us flared tight, reaching with glowing shackles, binding us together. I relished in the binds, accepting my true identity before Q even realized what I offered.

Slowly, Q moved, his entire body predatory, smooth, shark like. “You won’t let me f**k you, esclave?” Delight shimmered in his gaze, etched with black smouldering lust. “I’ve already f**ked you. What makes you think I want to again?”

I thrust my h*ps forward, bumping an overheated core against his straining erection. The moment I slipped into unwilling victim, Q raged with hardness. His c**k verged on iron, hard and unyielding.

“I don’t care if you do or don’t. You won’t because I say you’re not allo—”

He smothered me with his body; the post dug into my back as his mouth captured mine. A tongue speared between my lips.

I whimpered, melted, wanting so badly to kiss him back. But that wasn’t allowed in the role I played. The role I needed to play.

His lips branded, tearing another moan from me, rather than a curse. His tongue possessed my senses, forcing me to duel, to parry, to taste and savour. Was I returning his kiss? No, I wasn’t. I was fighting to breathe, in every sense of the word.

I bucked, breaking the kiss, breathing ragged.

He turned the scissors on me again, hands deathly still as he snipped the waistband of my shorts. He murmured, “You want me to stop?”

God, no. Never.

“Yes, you bastard. I won’t let you do this. It’s sick. Wrong. Let me go.”

His body trembled with some undescribed emotion; keeping eye contact, he cut again.

I squirmed as the metal continued lower and lower, brushing against my core. “You don’t have permission. Stop.”

Eyes sharpened with challenge, and he deliberately cut slower, dragging out suspense, snipping clothes away, one clip at a time.

The moment he cut the crotch, the shorts fell away, puddling to the floor in disgrace. If Q touched me, I’d combust. My damp knickers clung to every part. Pretending to fight stimulated my lust to a forest fire.

No wonder missionary didn’t do it for me. I needed scissors and threats to become drunk on need.

Q slammed to his knees, wrapping strong arms around my thighs, jerking me toward him. I screamed as his mouth connected over my knickers, hot breath radiating like a bomb between my legs. He nibbled my swollen cl*t through the material, dragging more erratic breaths from my lungs.

I wanted to open my legs, to hook them over Q’s shoulder and ride his mouth, but that wasn’t the character of unwilling slave. Instead, I wriggled, trying to run from his probing, mind-melting tongue.

He rumbled in his chest; it vibrated against my legs. With one hand, he grabbed my ankle, purposely bringing attention to the GPS anklet. His silent touch spoke volumes. You’re mine. I track you. You can’t escape.

It was a red flag to my brain, knowing I could be wild and wanton because he wanted it. I could scream and writhe, and it only excited him. Brax would run if I ever screamed in bed.

Q tongued me, pressing with a pointed tip, licking wet cotton. I couldn’t stop my breath turning softer, feathery, needful.

“You don’t want this?” Q murmured again, standing slowly, trailing a finger up my inner thigh, right to my mouth. With a twist of his lips, he forced his finger into my mouth.

The primal instinct to suck consumed, but I forced myself to go against instinct and bite instead.

He jerked, yanking his finger away.

I smiled darkly. “Put anything in my mouth and I swear to God, I’ll bite it off.” My mouth filled with saliva, anticipation making me hungry.

Ever since I belonged to Q, I discovered things I was never strong enough to visit before. This new, dark part wanted to taste his blood. To get real and gritty and deliciously wrong.

Q stepped closer, jeans scraping highly sensitive flesh. A band of release sparked from the contact. I’m so close. I’m never this close. God, Tess, he’s barely touched you.

It was the mind games—my brain made it raw, wonderful.

His eyes glazed with need and he bit my lower lip, dragging soft flesh between his teeth: a warning he’d bite back.

I shuddered as he let me go. I expected him to cut my knickers off, but he paused, turning the scissors on himself.

Arching his neck, he snipped the collar, cutting down the centre of the t-shirt, just like with mine. Once in half, he shrugged it off, letting it join my ruined clothes on the floor.

My world spun and all I could think of was sparrows.

Q glared, daring me to judge him. And judge I did. His entire torso and right side was covered in fluttering birds. The panic in a sparrow’s eyes closed my throat as they flew frantically from brambles, barbwire, and stormy clouds. The clouds roiled on his side, swallowing up unlucky birds, suffocating them to death.

My heart hurt looking at Q’s intricate tattoo. There lurked an evilness, a sadness, reminding me of the mural on the wall of the pedestal room. I wanted to run fingers along perfectly inked feathers. I wanted to lick his nipple where one bird had gotten free, the joy in its eyes blazed with hope.

So much was said by the design, but I didn’t understand it. I looked into his eyes. He held contact for a moment, before looking over my head. His hands curled and he sucked in a breath, outlining perfectly cut stomach muscles.

He vibrated with tension. My heart fluttered like little sparrow wings, and I gave my last sense to Q. My sense of sight. Standing so erect, standoffish, he filled my vision with everything I ever wanted. He owned everything but instincts and heart.

“Tell me. Tell me the story of the birds.”

He clenched his jaw. “It isn’t a story you need to know.”

“But it means so much to you. I see a reoccurring theme, Q… I want to understand.”

His face blackened. “You don’t have the right to call me Q when you’re tied to the bed. I’m your maître. Address me as such.”

Anger at being denied made me argumentative. “I’ll fight you. You’ll have to wrap me up in brambles, same as the sparrows on your chest, if you want to f**k me, maître.”

My taunt worked; he grabbed my chin with hard fingers. “You think you’re so fierce with your threats. My job isn’t to wrap you in shackles, esclave. My job is to unshackle you. And as much as you deny it, I’m doing a damn fine job.”

He ran his nose against mine, murmuring, “So shut the f**k up, stop looking at me like I’m some code to be cracked, and let me do what I f**king want to you.”

Stepping back, he attacked his jeans. Rather than undoing them, he cut them. Sawing through the waist band, slicing down the legs. Each snip revealed hard thighs kissed by little curls, firm quads, and perfect bare feet. “Let’s see how you stick to your threats when I take your body.”

Oh, God. My insides were liquid, heated. Embarrassment at being wet painted my cheeks with red. I couldn’t control my reaction. Q was my master in every sense.

Q stepped from the ruined jeans, closing the small distance between us. I couldn’t look away from his tattoo. I related to it and in a way, I knew what it represented, but the conclusion kept leaping from grabbing distance.

Rolling h*ps into mine, wearing only boxer briefs, Q murmured, “Tell me again you don’t want this, esclave.”

How could I lie when my body screamed the truth? My mind was lust filled, hazy, but I had a part to play. Q wanted me to fight so… I fought.

I leaned forward, snapping my teeth, coming within a hair breadth of his nose. “Go to hell.”

His c**k jumped in his boxer-shorts, scalding me. Out of nowhere, his palm connected with my cheek, sending spasms of heat.

I gasped, glaring with watering eyes. “You f**king hit a woman when she says no? You’re perverted.”

He pursed his lips. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

Taking him up on his offer, I whispered, “You think you’re a monster. You’re not.”

He grabbed my hair, twisting my neck. Agony flared, and I whimpered in real fear. “Would a kind man do this?”

When I didn’t answer, he twisted further until I screamed. “No! Only a monster does that.”

Not pacified, he reached for the scissors, quickly snipping my knickers and his boxers. They fluttered to the floor in pieces. Q weighed the scissors in his hand, before tracing my na**d stomach with the blade. “Would a kind man do this?” With a flick of his wrist, he nicked me. Blood welled in the tiny cut. I shivered, wanting to put my hand over the wound, to hide it, heal it.

Real tears dripped. I was an idiot to think there was something redeemable in this man.

“No, only a monster would do that.” My voice was barely audible.

Q sneered. “Now you know the truth.” He bent and licked the blood off my stomach. His tongue lapped; my core clenched, reacting to the tenderness after inflicting pain. His saliva staunched the bleeding and he straightened, licking his lips.

Everything tightened, my mouth parted, desperate to taste his blood. Tasting him was fair. He cut me—a debt must be paid.

Q narrowed his eyes, our souls screamed at each other, unhindered by human words.

I want to hurt you.

I want to own you.

I want to devour you.

I want to make you mine.

I’m already yours.

Who thought that? Me or him? Whose eyes spoke the truth before we acknowledged it in our minds?

Q reached up, and with a quick slice, nicked below his nipple with the sparrow flying free. A droplet of crimson welled. I watched with crippling need.

Taste. I have to taste.

He stood taller, placing his chest against my mouth. I greedily lapped the droplet, moaning as salty metallic fogged my entire being. Once I cleaned him, he pulled away, murmuring, “Monsters find each other in the dark.”

I couldn’t read his tone, and I didn’t like the implication. Am I a monster? Compared to Brax most definitely, but Q… there were limits he crossed that I never could. Had we found each other in the darkness? I may have black desires, but I loved light, too. I needed tenderness to temper pain and degradation. Was that an option?

Q wrapped a hand around his cock, stroking, looking deep into my eyes. With another hand, he found my centre, easing a finger deep inside.

Even though my body rippled, I never stopped being in character. Q couldn’t know how much I wanted this. I had to fight—I wanted to fight.

I somehow tapped into a kickass actress, coaxing a tear to fall. “I don’t want this.”

His nostrils flared. Unwrapping fingers from his cock, he captured a tear on a fingertip. He stared at it, then me, indecision searing in his gaze. The night reclaimed him, shadowing his face. He licked the salty tear. “You’ll be crying more before I’m finished with you.”

I began a file on what turned my master on. Tears was one, struggles another. What was his ultimate undoing? I wouldn’t stop until I found out.

Tears shed again, forcing myself into the headspace of hating him, just like when I first arrived. Before he saved me, killed for me. Q didn’t want a meek slave. He loved my unbrokenness.

Another puzzle locked into place. Was that what Suzette meant when she said Q didn’t touch her because she was ruined? He touched me, because I fought—I was strong. He couldn’t f**k an injured… yet he wanted… what did he want? To tame me? To parry? Something in him wanted to be accused of being a ra**st, of being sick and twisted, because that’s how he honestly saw himself.

Q flicked a tongue over my cheek, catching tears. I gasped and wriggled, biting my lip as our na**d bodies slid against each other. My ni**les sprang to an all new hardness, budding with excitement.

His head bowed, forehead to forehead. I breathed him in, gluing myself to the post, making sure no part reached for him. That would ruin the game. I couldn’t forget, I didn’t want this.

“Ah, esclave. Tu m'excite au-delà de la croyance.” You excite me beyond belief. Fingers shot between my legs, plunging deep. My knees trembled as his hand rocked, hard.

I whimpered, body reacting—swelling, melting, needing. I was ravenous for whatever Q gave. I wanted him so badly, but I wanted to fight just as much. The act of saying no did strange things to me, turning sex from mediocre to knee-wobbly and carnal. I became a hungry, libido-driven woman; only Q could scratch my erotic itch.

Q murmured in French, dialects swallowed by the silent night-shrouded room. I panted, but it sounded hushed, like a dream.

His finger was the ultimate ownership. Palpitating my core, he sucked in a breath as I thrust, needing more

I couldn’t help it. I moaned.

He pressed his c**k against my hip, smearing glistening pr**cum on me. His erection was hot, hard, and tempting beyond belief. His breathing matched mine in roughness. “You can’t lie. Not now. Not when your body blares the truth.” He moved his fingers, stroking inner parts of me, throbbing with the need to release.