Page 11 of A Mistake of Identity
“Yes, what?”
Ellis swallowed hard, turning to face Gabriel again. “Yes, sir,” he replied, his voice steadier now, that professional mask making one last desperate attempt to shield him.
Gabriel’s jaw clenched at the sound. He was so close to breaking through, could feel Ellis trembling on the edgeof surrender. He hadn’t brought Ellis here to watch him hide behind years of practiced distance. Gabriel wanted to strip away every defense until nothing remained but raw need.
Gabriel’s lips curved into a smile. “Good boy,” he murmured, sliding his hands up Ellis’ chest. He pressed forward, urging Ellis’ legs wider as he claimed his mouth in a demanding kiss. Gabriel’s fingers wrapped around Ellis’ throat, applying just enough pressure to make his intention clear. The sudden grip pulled a gasp from his lips, giving Gabriel the opening he sought to deepen the kiss. He plunged his tongue into Ellis’ mouth, claiming him with the same possessive intensity he’d used to claim his body. Ellis’ fingers twisted into Gabriel’s shirt, caught between his last shred of resistance and his body’s desperate need to submit.
When Gabriel pulled back, his gaze dropped to those swollen, wet lips, deliberately avoiding the bruise that made his blood boil. Watching that careful control splinter, he increased the pressure against Ellis’ throat. Another sharp slap to the unmarked cheek was all it took—the final push that shattered what remained of his little bird’s carefully constructed walls. The sweetest whimper escaped as tears gathered in his eyes, and there it was: victory.
Ellis melted beneath him, every line of tension dissolving as he yielded completely to Gabriel’s hold. His head fell back, throat bared in instinctive submission, pupils blown so wide the brown was barely visible, gaze glazed with that perfect hazy look of absolute surrender. His true little bird emerged at last, stripped of pretense, of professionalism, of everything but pure, desperate need.
Gabriel’s cock fully hardened at the sight. He eased his grip just long enough to roll on the condom, savoring how Ellis tracked his every movement with naked hunger. Gabriel stroked himself slowly, drinking in his victory as Ellis’ gaze followedeach motion with desperate want. His little bird, already so perfectly trained to look but not touch, even as his fingers twitched against the sheets with the effort to stay still.
“Are you ready, petit oiseau?” Gabriel asked, positioning himself at Ellis’ fluttering hole. “Ready to show me how beautifully you surrender?” He leaned closer, letting his breath ghost over Ellis’ ear. “I’m going to keep you like this—desperate and wanting, existing only for my pleasure. My perfect little toy to play with whenever I desire.”
Ellis shuddered beneath him, cock twitching against his stomach at Gabriel’s words. He started to nod, then caught himself. “Yes, sir,” he whispered, voice rough with need.
Gabriel wrapped his hand back around Ellis’ throat as he slammed his cock home. Ellis’ groan echoed through the room, his spine bowing off the bed as his fingers twisted desperately in Egyptian cotton.
“That’s it,” Gabriel purred, “take what I give you. You were made for this—made to be owned, to be used.” He drove into Ellis ruthlessly, gradually increasing the pressure on Ellis’ neck until his eyes rolled back, tears flowing freely down his flushed cheeks.
Tomorrow, Ellis would wear a necklace of bruises, a visible claim for all to see. The thought of his little bird marked and collared sent fresh heat coursing through Gabriel’s veins. He’d keep him in a gilded cage, pampered and pristine, until Gabriel chose to mark him up again. Always available, always eager to please.
He released Ellis’ throat, drinking in the desperate gasps for air. “Soon you’ll forget there was ever a time you weren’t mine,” Gabriel growled, covering Ellis’ smaller frame with his own as he rutted deep. “Every mark, every bruise, every ache will remind you who you belong to.” His mouth found Ellis’ neck, sucking hard enough to raise a perfect purple bloom. When Ellis’fingers tangled in his hair with a broken moan, Gabriel smiled against the damp skin before sinking his teeth into the tender junction of neck and shoulder.
Ellis cried out, his body clamping down around Gabriel’s cock as he spilled between them without permission.
Naughty boy. But oh, how sweetly he broke.
Gabriel fucked him through his orgasm, drinking in every tremor and whimper while chasing his own pleasure. His second climax of the night crashed through him, and he collapsed onto Ellis, pleased his little bird was sturdy enough to take his full weight, unlike previous bed partners who’d been too delicate for his tastes.
Only when his pulse steadied did Gabriel prop himself up on an elbow. He traced a finger down Ellis’ tear-stained cheek, catching another drop as it fell. “You came before I allowed it.” He felt Ellis tremble beneath him, watched fear and arousal war in those glassy eyes. “We’ll have to try again. This time, you’ll wait. You’ll learn to come only when I permit it, won’t you, petit oiseau?”
Fresh tears spilled from Ellis’ eyes as he nodded. “Yes, sir,” he whispered, voice utterly wrecked.
Gabriel grinned, already imagining all the ways he’d train his little bird. Each lesson would strip away more of that professional veneer until nothing remained but pure submission to Gabriel’s will. Ellis would learn obedience, one exquisite lesson at a time, until he forgot there was ever a time he hadn’t belonged to Gabriel.
Ellis
Ellis snapped awake, years of practice overriding his body’s desperate plea for more sleep. The crystal numbers on the bedside clock read 4:17 AM, and his heart clenched—he’d slept longer than intended. His fingers instinctively curled into the sheets, their thousand-thread count Egyptian cotton a world away from his rough, worn linens back at Heart Court that never quite felt clean no matter how many times they were washed.
Every muscle screamed in protest as he tried to shift away from the warmth radiating from Gabriel’s sleeping form. The silken bedding whispered against his bare skin, a luxury that felt almost wrong against his body, like he was tainting something too fine for someone like him.
The full weight of the night crashed over him as he moved. His throat ached from Gabriel’s grip, his hips and thighs burned with finger-shaped bruises, and the deep ache between his legs sent sparks of remembered pleasure mixed with pain shooting up his spine. But it wasn’t just physical. Something deeper had cracked open inside him, leaving him raw and exposed in ways that had nothing to do with his naked skin.
Gabriel’s words echoed in his head: “My perfect little toy.” “Made to be owned.” “Soon, you’ll forget there was ever a time you weren’t mine.” In the darkness, Ellis allowed himself one moment of weakness, pressing his palm against his chest where an unfamiliar ache had settled. He’d given up everything Gabrielhad demanded, surrendered to him, and for a few precious hours, he’d believed those words.
He turned back, unable to resist one last look. Gabriel lay sprawled across the far side of the bed, all elegant lines and casual dominance even in sleep. Ellis realized he’d spent the night clinging to the edge of the mattress, as if his body had known, even in sleep, that he didn’t belong in that massive bed. His skin ached to crawl back into that warmth, to press against Gabriel’s side and pretend, just for a moment more, that all those possessive words had been real.
But he knew better.
The memory of other morning-afters stopped him cold. Rough hands shoving him away, cruel words spat at him, disgust replacing the tenderness of the night before. He’d learned early that no one wanted to wake up to the escort they paid for, no matter how sweetly they’d talked the previous night. It was better to slip away in the dark while they slept.
So he did what he always did: gathered his clothes quietly and prepared to disappear into the darkness of the cat hours. After dressing carefully in his neatly folded clothes, he hesitated, fingers brushing over the raw marks on his throat that his collar wouldn’t quite hide.
Ellis scanned the room for his underwear, knowing he couldn’t leave that kind of evidence behind—no client actually wanted to keep souvenirs, no matter what the latest erotic novella claimed. His gaze finally landed on the scrap of black lace near what looked like an en-suite bathroom door, clear across the room. The sight triggered another realization that made his chest tight—while his body ached in the most intimate ways, he didn’t feel the usual sticky discomfort that came with these encounters. Gabriel must have cleaned him while he’d been lost in that hazy space after their final round.
That tenderness, beyond what any client had ever shown, made Ellis’ throat close. It was too much—the careful aftercare, the way Gabriel had held him afterward, how he’d whispered those possessive promises against Ellis’ skin.
