Chapter 2: The mysterious man

Chapter 2 — Ofiura's POV

"Why me, beautiful?"

"Because you're the only man in this room not trying to impress anyone."

That got something out of himnot quite a laugh, but close. He studied me for a second too long, like he was deciding whether I was worth the trouble.

"I think you're looking for a distraction, not a drink," he said. "And I'm not someone you want to distract yourself with."

"You don't know what I want."

"I know you're wearing a wedding ring you keep touching like it's a burn."

I hadn't realized I was doing it until he said it. I stopped.

"Take it off if you want," he said. "Or don't. Not my business either way."

I took the glass out of his hand instead and drank what was left of it in one go. It burned going down, and I welcomed it.

"I can pay you," I said. "If that's what this needs to be."

His eyebrows went up. "Now that's a first. Usually I'm the one paying."

"Is that a no?"

He looked at me for a long moment, and something in his expression shifted less amused, more considering, the way a man looks at a decision he already knows he's going to make. "Come upstairs. If you change your mind on the way, walk away and we'll pretend this never happened."

I didn't change my mind.

I don't remember most of the walk to the private suite, only that my heart was going too fast and I welcomed that too, because it meant I wasn't thinking about breakfast, or Helena's calm voice, or my stepfather's flat, patient threats through the phone line. He didn't ask me anything else that night. He didn't need to.

The door clicked shut behind us. For a second we just stood there in the low light of the suite, looking at each other. Then he stepped in, took the glass out of my hand, and set it aside.

“Last chance to walk away,” he said, voice low.

“I’m not walking away.”

His mouth found mine without hesitation, not in a gentle, or careful way , just certain way. I kissed him back the same way, hard enough that my teeth scraped his lip. He made a low sound in his throat and backed me toward the bed.

My dress came off in one pull. His shirt followed. I didn’t look at his face while I worked his belt open; I didn’t want names or stories or anything that would make this real. I just wanted the weight of him, the heat of skin that didn’t belong to anyone I knew.

“Eager,” he murmured against my mouth. “You sure you don’t do this often?”

“Shut up,” I breathed, and he laughed once, quiet and rough, before pushing me down onto the mattress.

I went willingly, legs already parting for him. He didn’t ask if I was sure. He just looked at me for a second that same considering look from downstairs and then he was between my thighs, mouth hot against my neck, one hand sliding down to touch me.

I was already wet. He found that out quickly.

“Fuck,” he said under his breath. “You’re soaked.”

Two fingers pushed inside me without warning and I arched, a sharp breath punching out of my lungs. He worked them in and out while his thumb pressed circles over my clit, steady and ruthless, until my hips were rolling up to meet him.

“That’s it,” he said, voice rougher now. “Take it. You needed this, didn’t you? Came looking for a stranger to fuck the thoughts out of your head.”

I didn’t answer. I couldn’t. The only sounds were the wet slide of his fingers and my uneven breathing.

When he finally pulled his hand away I made a small, frustrated noise. He didn’t tease. He shoved his pants down far enough, lined himself up, and settled over me. The blunt head of his cock pressed against me, bare, hot, nothing between us.

“You good with this?” he asked, eyes locked on mine. “No rubber.”

I nodded once. “Just do it.”

He pushed in.

It was a stretch, thick and sudden, and I bit down on the inside of my cheek to keep from making a sound that felt too much like surrender. He gave me a second, then started moving. Deep, measured thrusts that filled me completely every time.

“Christ, you’re tight,” he groaned. “Taking me so fucking well.”

I wrapped my legs around his waist and met him, chasing the friction, the burn, the pure physical fact of being taken by someone who didn’t know my name or my husband or the way my chest had been aching for weeks.

He fucked me like he had nowhere else to be. One hand braced beside my head, the other gripping my hip hard enough to leave marks. Every time he bottomed out I felt the impact in my stomach.

“Look at you,” he muttered against my ear. “Married woman in a stranger’s bed, legs spread, taking every inch. You like that? Being used like this?”

“Yes,” I whispered, the word scraped raw.

“Say it louder.”

“Yes…fuck…yes.”

Sweat slicked between us. The bedframe knocked softly against the wall. I came first sharp and sudden, thighs locking around him, a broken sound tearing out of my throat that I didn’t recognize as mine. He kept going through it, longer strokes now, chasing his own.

“Gonna come in you,” he warned, voice tight. “You want that?”

I nodded frantically, nails digging into his back. “Do it. Just…don’t stop.”

He buried himself deep with a low, guttural sound and came hard, pulsing inside me, filling me. We stayed locked like that for a long moment, both of us breathing hard.

Eventually he pulled out carefully and dropped onto the bed beside me. Neither of us spoke for a while. After a few minutes his breathing evened out. Mine did too. The last thing I registered before sleep took me was the solid warmth of his arm thrown across my waist and the strange, quiet relief of not being alone in my own head.

Sometime near dawn, his phone lit the ceiling with a call he didn't ignore. He eased out from under the sheets, already talking business before he'd made it to the door, low-voiced and brisk. I told myself I'd wait for him. I kept telling myself that while his voice faded down the hall, while the room went quiet, while the quiet turned into something I didn't want to sit inside of anymore.

I lay in that unfamiliar bed for one more minute after I was already dressed, staring at a ceiling I didn't recognize, and waited to feel something like regret. It came, eventually, small and distant, easy to push down. What I felt more than anything was that my chest didn't hurt the way it had the morning before. That felt like enough of a win to leave on.

My phone told a different story. Fourteen missed calls—six from Damon, four from Helena, the rest from a number I didn't recognize that I assumed belonged to Patricia, calling to gloat or apologize or both. I didn't listen to any of the voicemails. I got dressed, left the room, and drove straight to my parents' house, because it was the one place I was certain Damon wouldn't think to look for me yet.

My mother was in the kitchen when I got there, already dressed, already bracing for something. She had that look she always had the morning after a bad night in this house too composed, moving too carefully, like she'd learned that stillness kept the peace longer than words did.

"You didn't answer your phone."

"I wasn't home."

She looked at me like she wanted to ask where and thought better of it. Her eyes caught on the wrinkled dress, the makeup I hadn't bothered to fix, and something in her face tightened, but she didn't say anything about that either.

"Ofiura….about last night—"

"I want a divorce." I said it plainly, the way you'd announce a decision about paint colors. Saying it a second time, out loud, in daylight, made it feel more real than it had in the car with the phone pressed to my ear. "I'm not doing this anymore. I don't care what it costs."

My mother's hand went still on the counter. For a second I thought she might actually agree with me, might finally say the thing I'd been waiting three years to hear her say. Then the front door opened down the hall, and I watched whatever she'd been about to say disappear from her face entirely.

My stepfather came into the kitchen still in his robe, coffee in hand, and from the look on his face he'd heard enough through the door already.

"You're not divorcing anyone."

"This isn't about you."

"Everything in this house is about me." He set the mug down without looking at it, the calm in his voice somehow worse than if he'd shouted. "Damon is hosting a party this weekend. You'll be there, you'll stand beside your husband, and you'll smile like none of this happened."

"No."

"That wasn't a request." He looked at me the way he looked at a column of numbers that didn't add up the way he wanted them to…like the problem was mine to fix, not his to explain. "We're going to sit down, the three of us, and you're going to understand exactly why you don't get to make that decision on your own.”