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Nyx POV

The red bulb hummed above us like a dying heartbeat.

He hung from the silver chains, chest heaving, sweat and blood tracing the lines of his body. The taste of him still coated my tongue (salt, copper, and something darker that made my wolf pace and snarl behind my eyes). I hated how good it felt. I hated that I had come back down here at all.

I had meant to leave him until morning. Let the silver burn his wrists raw. Let hunger and fear do the work my claws had only started. But the second I’d stepped into my shower upstairs, the water running pink from someone else’s blood, all I could think about was the way he’d looked at me when he came (eyes wide, lips parted, no begging, no pleading). Just raw, shocked surrender.

No man had ever looked at me like that.

So here I was again, barefoot, wearing nothing but a black silk robe that did nothing to hide how hard my nipples were. The air in the dungeon was cold. My skin was on fire.

He lifted his head when the door opened. Those storm-gray eyes tracked me across the room, wary but not afraid. Not anymore.

“You came back,” he rasped. Voice rough from screaming my name down his throat twenty minutes ago.

I didn’t answer. I walked straight to him, grabbed a fistful of his hair, and yanked his head back hard enough to make the chains rattle.

“You do not speak unless I allow it,” I said against his ear. “Tonight you are nothing. Not an assassin. Not a man. Not even the boy who murdered my family. Tonight you are a hole I use until I’m bored.”

I felt him shudder. Felt something thick and hard press against my stomach even before I looked down.

Disgusting. Perfect.

I let the robe slide off my shoulders and pool on the floor. Naked now. Moonlight from the narrow window painted silver across my skin and turned the fresh claw marks on my breasts into delicate white scars.

His breath hitched.

I reached between us, wrapped my fingers around his cock (already fully hard again, traitorously eager), and squeezed until he hissed.

“Still think you can survive me, poison boy?”

He swallowed. “I never thought I’d survive you,” he said, voice low. “I just didn’t expect to want to.”

Something hot and dangerous flared low in my belly. I hated him for it. Hated the way my thighs were already slick.

I released him, turned, and walked to the wall of toys. Selected a thin silver chain with a single clamp on each end. Walked back slowly so he could watch every sway of my hips.

His eyes dropped to my breasts, to the soft curve of my stomach, to the place between my legs that ached for things I refused to name. When he looked up again, the hunger in his gaze was so naked it felt like a blade.

I stopped inches from him.

“Open,” I ordered.

He opened his mouth without hesitation.

I slid two fingers inside, pressing down on his tongue until he gagged softly. Pulled them out wet and shining.

Then I reached up and fastened one clamp to my left nipple.

The bite of pain made me gasp (sharp, bright, perfect). I fastened the other clamp to his right nipple. The chain between us was short. Every breath either of us took tugged the silver tight.

I stepped closer until the chain was taut and our clamped nipples nearly touched.

“Look at me,” I whispered.

He did.

I rose on my toes and kissed him.

Not gentle. Never gentle. Teeth and tongue and punishment. I bit his lower lip until I tasted blood, then licked it away. He groaned into my mouth, hips jerking helplessly, cock sliding against my stomach and leaving wet streaks.

I reached down, guided him to my entrance, and sank onto him in one brutal motion.

We both cried out.

He was thick, burning hot, stretching me exactly the way I hated to need. The clamps pulled with every thrust, pain and pleasure braided so tight I couldn’t tell where one ended and the other began.

I rode him hard, using the chains for leverage, rising and falling until the only sounds were wet flesh, ragged breathing, and the metallic clink of silver links.

His head fell forward, forehead pressed to mine.

“Valeria,” he groaned (my real name, not Queen, not Alpha, just the name I’d buried with my dead sisters).

Something inside my chest cracked. Not the stone (not yet), but something older. Something that terrified me more than death.

I snarled, wrapped my hand around his throat, and slammed him back against the wall. Fucked him harder. Faster. Chasing the feeling I refused to name.

He met every thrust, hips snapping up, taking everything I gave and giving it back twice as vicious.

When I came, it was sudden and devastating (like dying, like living, like forgiveness I didn’t deserve). My vision whited out. My wolf howled so loud the walls shook. I felt myself clench around him, milking him, and he followed me over with a broken cry, pulsing hot inside me, filling me in a way that felt permanent.

For one endless second, the dungeon was silent except for our breathing and the soft drip of blood where the clamps had torn skin.

Then reality slammed back in.

I ripped the clamps off (both of us hissed at the fresh pain), shoved him away so hard the chains jerked his arms, and stepped back.

My legs were shaking. My heart (the part that was still flesh) was trying to claw its way out of my ribs.

I couldn’t look at him.

I grabbed my robe, wrapped it around myself like armor, and walked to the door.

Behind me, his voice (raw, wrecked, and far too gentle):

“You felt it too.”

I didn’t answer.

I couldn’t.

Because if I turned around, if I admitted what had just happened between us was more than hate, more than punishment, more than a way to hurt each other…

The stone in my chest would crack again.

And this time, I wasn’t sure I wanted it to stop.

I slammed the door, locked it, and leaned against the cold iron.

Somewhere inside, my wolf whispered a single word I hadn’t heard in fifteen years.

Mate.

I punched the wall until my knuckles split.

Then I went upstairs to shower his scent off me.

It didn’t work.

It never would again.