6: Desire vs possession

Bella

“Ahh… why are you that way?” Lady Lilian queried the moment I ran past her office to mine. While hers was the first office immediately after the Alpha’s, mine was the second.

“Ma’am,” I replied, my voice barely above a whisper.

She looked down, her eyes dragging over my features, slowly, with deliberate scrutiny.

“That,” she said, pointing.

My eyes followed to my trembling frame.

My feet were visibly shaking, my arms clutched to the hem of my fabric, and my heart was racing faster than normal.

“You know,” she straightened, slightly adjusting her glasses, “you quite amazed me on your first day, and I must give you credit for it.”

There it was again, that faint glint of mischief in her tone.

“Ma’am… why is that?” I forced the words out of my lips, struggling to process every word.

Her smile widened. She shook her head. “Normally, girls your age don’t make it past five seconds under his presence, but you…” she glanced at her wristwatch, “you made it past twenty minutes. Kudos.”

Was that praise? She practically praised me in a situation like this? Her voice held every sense of pride and something else I couldn’t quite place.

I should have been running back to my office, dropping my head on my desk and trying to piece together every single thing that had happened. No, here I was, struck dumb and glaring at this woman who still seemed to hold pride in her eyes.

Those sets of grey eyes beamed behind the lenses, telling me I did just fine.

Was that what this was all about?

I didn’t remember moving, but suddenly I was seated in my office with arms resting on my desk. My thoughts spiraled wildly and I struggled to steady my breathing when the sharp buzz of the office line shattered the silence.

A jolt of dread coiled around my stomach, forming a pit. I nearly leapt from my seat. My arm hovered over the phone, trembling harder with an intensity I never saw coming. But I finally lifted it to my ear.

I sucked in a deep nervous breath when his voice broke through the fog.

“In my office. Now.”

Only a short sentence, but each words was heavy and suffisticating.

Hot sweat beaded on my forehead by the time I was moving back there. Every step felt like a mistake I couldn’t undo.

I held the handle of his office door with shaking arms. I should just leave and run far, forgetting this job, right?

But instead, my grip on the handle tightened slightly, with different painful thoughts creeping in all at once, even those I couldn’t bear to think about.

How do I explain that I messed up on my first day? That the job I desperately needed to sort my uphill bills, I let it slip out of my hands?

“Don’t wait all day,” his voice roared from inside. Cold. Suffocating. Commanding.

My feet dragged invisible holes of their own across the well-furnished tiled floor.

I stood before my cold CEO, only this time, head bowed, my stomach twisted in knots, and my heart… Gosh. Was racing faster than I could have ever imagined, doing a series of frantic flips at once, even though I tried to be Strong. Stable and unyielding.

His gaze lingered. Cold. Dominant. Hard, and something dark… something I couldn’t yet place.

I flinched slightly, holding onto the hem of my clothes, when he burst into a sudden laugh, startling me.

That was when tiny pieces tried to make sense in my head. Maybe… this was a test?

My head buzzed with confusion, curiosity, and something far more intense.

I dared to look up, meeting his gaze. The hardness was still there, sharp as steel. The laughter had vanished, replaced by quiet satisfaction, as though this moment pleased him more than he cared to admit.

I swallowed the thick lump in my throat and dropped my gaze to the floor instead. He said nothing and didn’t move either for a few seconds.

Then suddenly, he stood up from his seat and step forward.

Each step was loud and purposeful, taunting and frightening. I stepped back instinctively, but I could only move a little before his arms wrapped around my waist again. This time, I felt the warmth of his touch against my body, sending an unfamiliar heat spreading through me.

It felt wrong.

But oddly familiar, in ways I couldn’t place. So overwhelming, like a wildfire moving through every fibre of my being, stiffening me in place.

“And you left?” he asked, softly.

It wasn’t just a question, but something else, something that stirred emotions I never knew existed. Every nerve ending reacted to those warm, suffocating breaths that brushed my forehead.

I tried… I really tried to block it out, to sever whatever influence was working on me. To remind myself this wasn't right.

But my body betrayed me. I had no control whatsoever, especially when he knew exactly what effect his presence had on me.

His grip on my waist tightened slightly, adjusting my shirt so his arms settled against the bare skin of my hips. A low moan slipped through my lips before I could stop it.

“I knew it,” he murmured. “I knew there was more beneath that quiet act. You hide it well… too well.”

He leaned closer, his voice lowering near my ear. His breath hot and unyielding.

And I realized, far too late, that this wasn’t just about a mistake.

I tilted my head to give him access, not even realizing when I did, not even having control of my damn actions. His lips nipped at the bare skin of my neck, sucking gently, nipping slowly.

Then his moves heightened, more ravenous, that my core dangerously dripped, a sludge of electricity stirring through me. And he knew.

Because he released a low, satisfied groan, and in the next seconds, his arms shoved my shirt apart, much to my chagrin. The sound of the fabric shredding filled the air.

I didn’t know when I was now standing with his arms holding my legs, guiding me close to the large office desk. His kiss deepened like a strangled beast, a starved beast… or whatever beast best described his ravenous moves.

He lifted me slightly, like I weighed nothing, when my back hit the hard surface of the desk, and placed me onto it, my ass pressing hard against the surface, with one leg slightly raised, secured in place by his other hand.

I was so lost, freaking lost, that I lost track of what was happening around me, even when something banged beside me.

All that mattered, and still lingered, demanding, was the effect of his touch, the way my body responded, having desires of its own. His arms trailed dangerously to my thigh, parting it slightly. His fingers barely slipped into my undergarment when a loud, satisfied growl slipped through his throat.

“You are mine…” he declared sharply and firmly, golden eyes blazing into mine, a sharp contrast from his earlier sky-blue shade.

I winced backward in fear at the realization that his wolf was dangerously coming to the surface. But my movement only made his groan deepen, and his arms gripped my waist from behind, while his golden eyes beaming with something intense.

Was that desire… possession?