Chapter 18

There’s a moment of pause as he just looks at me and I wish I knew what was going on in that sharp head. I think that’s what unnerves me the most. His brain is a closed and locked room while most men are predictable and readable in small ways. Alexi has a poker face that has been honed to expert levels and those eyes tell you nothing at all about the inner workings of his mind. Empty palest grey and completely devoid of human emotion.

‘’I want you down at my office for nine a.m. We start going over the designs and brainstorming over the problem with finding escorts on a permanent basis and working out other fine details. From here on in you can call me Mr Carrero, and you can try opting for longer dresses and keep your tits under wraps when I am around.’’ He yanks my robe closed in front of me harshly and I automatically catch the fabric and pull it tighter in a bid to feel more secure. Scalded, seething and cursing that this went the whole opposite way to how I imagined it would. I thought getting under his skin was going to be a piece of cake, but I underestimated him.

Carrero is a hard brick wall, and I am not even close to knowing him well enough to lever into any weak spots. If I even want to anymore. All my instincts are saying to never poke the bear and leave it well alone.

‘’Yes sir!’’ I grit through my teeth sarcastically, putting my all into those two words and try not to glare at that stubborn deadpan face as he steps away from me with a furrowed brow.

‘’That’s more like it. There might be hope for you yet. I like women who know their place in my world.’’ He smirks devilishly and then brushes past me with a sideways glance, dismissing me and his mood in a spookily fast moment. I swear punching him in the throat would make me feel a whole lot better but instead, I just start counting in my head and try hard not to erupt at him.

‘’I’ve heard … On their knees, gagged and bound while Master has his fun!’’ I slur dryly, unable to just stop that mouth of mine when I ought to know better. It got me many a backhanded slap or punch in the mouth when I was younger and I don’t know for sure that he isn’t a man who won’t stoop to that level of control.

I move to walk to my own room hoping that the padded crap on his walls has an actual purpose for more than aesthetics in his mostly black bedroom. I had thought it weird at first but now I’m thinking it’s more than art. Muffling the screams of his victims nonetheless, and I should be running for my room and locking the bloody door.

‘’Sometimes!’’ He smirks and strolls off casually, like he owns the world before he opens the door to his dark hole and disappears inside to go do whatever to that poor alternative to what he could have had.

If I had a heart I might even feel sorry for her, but instead, I am thanking my lucky stars that he didn’t actually make me his victim for a night. I have seriously underestimated him. Part of me wonders if maybe I did have a lucky escape. I’ve never been into BDSM or bondage, and the thought of letting someone like him tie me up and possess me cruelly makes my blood run cold.

I was eleven years old the first time my mother held me down and let a man use my body for his own dirty need so she could feed her own junkie habit. I cried, screamed and threw up in my own mouth, and yet they never let me loose until he was done with me and the damage was irreversible to my fragile mind.

I became a tool for her to get her fix and my own worth and sanity played second fiddle. I’m glad the stupid bitch overdosed when I was fifteen but it didn’t save me from the hands of her pimp boyfriend for the years that followed or the repeated way he would hold me down, tie me up and force me to take what he could give in any cruel way he wanted.

I don’t intend to ever let myself be put back in a situation where I can’t have some say or some control ever again. I would rather kill myself than endure letting any man ever take me back into a place where I was powerless to save myself. I won’t be a toy to be poked, bruised, whipped, and hurt anymore.

If Carrero is a man that requires that from the women he sleeps with, then maybe I should just focus on work and money and forget this dumb idea about manipulating him for my own ends. He’s hot, sexy, yet dangerous, and that makes an alluring package overall. He’s not like most men and the added little S&M thing is not a turn on for me—it’s a deterrent that changes everything.

Men with kinks and money are used to getting what they want, and I have no longing to become another controlled pussy for hire when they are notorious for pushing the boundaries as far as they can with no fear of consequences.

I spent years trying to run free from that life and I won’t become his piece of abused arse for anyone. Let him beat and gag his cheap sluts. I will stay the hell away from that and do what he wants me to do. Provide fucks, fun, smiles and product, and make a lot of money.