Page 127 of Stalked By Seduction and Shadows

I squealed as the chair toppled backward.

At the sound of familiar laughter and the feeling of being suspended in space, tipping back but no longer falling, my pounding heart took pause.

Rune.

My last moments of consciousness sprung forward. I’d asked to be claimed. Rune had secretly smuggled me back to his castle.

The chair tilted forward, and I became upright once more. I breathed deeply through my nose, attempting to soothe my panicked lungs. I waited for Rune to touch me, to say something to reassure me, or to do anything at all but leave me here, nearly naked, gagged, blindfolded, spread, and bound.

He didn’t say a word. I heard him moving, soft and graceful as all vampires moved. At one point, I heard the unbuckle of a belt, and I could nearly feel the ache of the bruises on my ass that had only just faded.

The longer he was silent, the more wary I became.

I was tied to a chair like a prisoner by an expert in torture and interrogation.

This was still a game, right? I could feel my arousal growing headier, overwhelmed by the lack of sensory input and my brutal helplessness. The space between my thighs ached, wetness gathering.

I jumped out of my skin when leather brushed across my neck, applying faint pressure. Warm breath feathered over my ear. Lips engulfed the shell, and I shuddered. Fangs brushed against my earlobe. An unconscious noise hummed against the fabric stuffed in my mouth.

Rune held the belt around my neck. He could squeeze the life out of me so easily. Not that he would ever kill me that way. No, that would be a waste. If Rune wanted to kill me, he’d make sure he drained every last drop of my blood as I went out.

Or at least, I thought it had been his belt, but then I heard a soft click as the leather closed around my throat. The material was also softer against my skin than I’d expected.

A clinking sound confused me, a slight pull at the center of my neck.

Rune pulled the gag out of my mouth.

I licked my lips and then swallowed, desperate to eradicate the unpleasant dryness the fabric had left behind. I cleared my throat.

Next to disappear was my blindfold, but Rune still didn’t touch me as he removed it.

“Wait,” he said.

The sound of his voice had become the most soothing thing in existence. My ears had never been more alert, waiting for him desperately. He was all I knew, my life in his hands.

“Keep your eyes closed for twenty seconds to let them adjust.”

The light beyond my eyelids did indeed appear oppressive, jarring. I did as I was told, listening to the cutting of rope.

“And if it really needs to be said, don’t you dare move without my express fucking permission.”

I swallowed again.

The same soft clinking sound tickled my ear drums, and the leather around my neck pulled forward, tighter.

“Tell me you understand, pet.”

I slowly opened my eyes, and a tremor rolled through me when Rune’s wrathful, deep brown irises were the first things I saw. He gripped my face roughly, yet even his brutality soothed me, a welcome reprieve from the absence of his touch.

I’d been freed completely, and yet I didn’t move an inch. Mental liberation was a whole different beast.

“I understand.”

His face softened an inch. “Good girl.” He dropped the hand that gripped me.

I bathed in his praise, drank it from him just like I fed off the pulsing, overwhelming desire that flooded the room. His slight waves of hair were nearly black in the dim lighting. His chiseled chest was bare, revealing the beautiful whorls and thorny branches of inky tattoos that thrummed with dark power.

My gaze lowered to the rose gold chain he had wrapped around his broad knuckles. It led to my neck. I wanted to touch what he’d placed there, make sense of it.

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