Page 17 of Rise of Temptation

Shaking myself from the state of shock I’ve fallen into, I run after him and follow him into the kitchen. “I don’t understand why you’re… changing the uniform,” I grit out.

“I don’t want any barriers in my way.” The way he says it makes it sound like that should’ve been obvious.

“Barriers to my body? That you already use whenever you want?” I clarify.

“Yes.”

“So why not just have me be naked?”

“I considered it very seriously, but there are too many people in and out of this fucking house all the time. I don’t want them to see you.”

“Oh, of course. It couldn’t be for any reason other than your own selfishness and insecurity.” I know I’m poking the bear, but he’s clearly gone insane. I can’t just walk around in a dress and nothing else all the time.

“You should be thankful. I’m sure you don’t want everyone who walks through that front door to see you either.”

“Of course I don’t want them to see me!” I’m back to screaming, which he seems to enjoy, if the stupid smirk on his face is any indication.

“Great. So we agree. Go change into your uniform. I’ll let you keep the rest of your clothes but if you leave your room in anything besides a dress, I’ll burn it.”

The urge to turn around and scream when I leave the room is almost too strong to resist, but I manage to hold it in. I don’t want to give him the satisfaction of seeing me act like a disgruntled teenager whose dad just told her she’s grounded on a Friday night.

Back in my room, I throw open the closet door and seriously consider stealing his idea and burning every dress. Instead, I walk in and take stock of everything in there. Some of it was mine already, but the rest was either already here or has been added since I moved in. Now that I’m looking at it, most of the new pieces are dresses.That son of a bitch. I’ve mostly been wearing a combination of my own clothes and the lingerie that Enzo requires me to wear for meetings, so I didn’t notice.

As much as I hate to admit it, I do like most of the clothes in this closet. He—or, more likely, whoever he has doing the shopping for him—has good taste. But it’s the principle of the thing. Being told what to wear and what not to wear is demeaning in a whole new way. I knew what I was getting myself into when I went undercover as an escort, but this makes me feel cheap and dirty.

Those feelings bring me back to the idea of retaliating by burning the dresses, but I talk myself off the ledge again. There will be plenty of things to fight back on. What I do or don’t wear is relatively minor compared to some of the other things that I’m sure will come up.

With that thought at the forefront of my mind, I grab a dress to change into and shut the closet door. I can play along. It’s not like I don’t get anything out of the deal. At least I’m being held hostage by someone who knows how to make a woman come. A lack of orgasms would make this situation completely unbearable.

Enzo

Stealing Elise’s panties wasn’t part of my plan, but it’s working out better than I ever could have imagined. I walked into her room with every intention of getting my dick sucked, but the impulse to snoop through her drawers was stronger. The collection of lace and silk was impossible to resist. Not that I tried very hard. I figured I’d take it, hide it, and give it back once she noticed it was missing.

But her rage is fucking hot, and I couldn’t stop myself from feeding the fire. The idea to force her to only wear dresses came to me as she was screaming at me. It was even more spontaneous than stealing her underwear.

The way I see it, the new uniform only works in my favor. There are no downsides. I’ll be able to access her even more easily than I already can, and she’ll constantly be pissed off about it. Her fire turns me on, which just keeps me going back for more, which will piss her off again. And so on and so forth. A continuous cycle of pleasure and anger and arousal that ultimately benefits both of us, although I’m not sure she’ll see it that way. And I’m not sure I want her to figure it out; the anger is my favorite part.

Chapter 14

Elise

“No.”

I roll my eyes at Enzo’s immediate dismissal of my request. “It’s not really optional. If I don’t go, I’ll either be pulled from the case or fired. Maybe both.”

He glares at me as if this is my fault.

“You could’ve given me more information to feed him, and we wouldn’t be in this situation. But you’ve kept everything locked up.”

“That sounds like a roundabout way of saying you’re not that good at your job. Maybe keeping you here isn’t all that useful to me after all.”

“But then who would you sneak up on to fuck randomly at any point in the day or night?” I point out. My voice is saccharine but my words are dripping with sarcasm.

His deadpan stare makes me a little bit nervous, and his words don’t help. “Anyone I want. Have you forgotten who I am?”

“It’s hard to forget when you bring it up all the time. Can we figure out a plan now? What should I tell my boss?”

Enzo sighs, not-so-subtly letting me know that I’m inconveniencing him, and then starts rattling off the facts that he knows. “Someone—we thought it was the Russians but we’re not sure—is running a trafficking ring through my club. We have a few people on the inside who feed us information, but one of them must be compromised or the Russians are feeling out a possible leak. The shipment we were tracking was supposed to be an ambush, but we managed to figure that out before anyone on our side got hurt.”

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