Page 107 of Ruined Vows
30
VUKAN
FOR HER–THE WORLD
The hotel suite delivered the blow I was waiting for. She didn’t melt completely, but shewas close, and I’ll take that as a win. Whenshe saw our suite,the look on her face was priceless.
And my adrenaline rush of moving her to feel something was like no other. I saw that sliver of softness when she stepped into the suite. It was in the way her fingers dragged across the carved wood of the terrace doors. It was the pause when she looked at the ocean view, and she sighed.
Because for half a second, she forgot to be guarded. And in that moment, she wasmineeven if she didn’t say it. Even if she didn’t touch me, and then—click.The lock slid back into place, like a latch on a hatch. Iron-clad.
I knew it was coming. I just didn’t expect tofeel itthis hard.
My euphoria crashed as she brushed past me like nothing had transpired. She threw up that perfect wall of indifference. Her arched brow and voice are dry, and she’s in control—again. And I let her have her tiny victory, because pushing now would be a mistake.
A mistake she’d use against me later, so I stepfarther into the suite after she walks out to the balcony. Her scent lingers—citrus and heat, something sweet, expensive, and dangerous.
She’s the kind of woman you don’t just undress. Youworship.Youconquer.
She’s out there now, leaning on the railing like she doesn’t know I’m still watching. But I am, and she doesn’t disappoint because every inch of her posture is performance. She’s elegant and bent on deflection, or strategic silence.
But I know better. In the sauna, shewasmine.
And now she’s punishing herself for it. For slipping. She knows she wants me. She’s too proud to give in to it. She thinks pulling back puts her back in power. What she doesn’t realize is that I don’t need her to surrender. I just need herengaged.
And she’s never been more focused on me than she is right now.
So I smile to myself because the stakes are upped.
And I work best under pressure.
The car ride is quiet,not uncomfortable. Not tense. Just charged with sexual energy.
She sits beside me like royalty—legs crossed, dress poured onto her like liquid metal this time, silver with a slit so high it borders on criminal. She doesn’t speak. Doesn’t need to. Her silence is the sound of power being held.
And I respect it. Tonight, I’m not asking for submission. I’m honoring the storm.Her.
When we arrive at the restaurant, the sleek glass doors slide open with a soft chime, and the scent of cedar and sea air curls around us.
It’s one of the most exclusive sushi restaurants in Okinawa—ten seats total. And tonight, not one of them is occupied except for ours.
Guests in designer clothes and diamond jewelry loiter outside, their tense shoulders murmuring their unhappiness in clipped Japanese. I don’t have to know their language to feel their disappointment because it cuts through their low voices like smoke.
Bianca steps out of the car, doesn’t look left or right, or flinch at the murmurs. She walks straight through them like they don’t exist. And they don’t, not to us, because tonight is just us.
Every step of her heel across the stone path is poetry in control. Her chin is high, her shoulders pulled back, her hair slicked and gleaming like a crown of obsidian.
And the whispering? The outrage?
Itdies.She doesn’t speak a word. And still—they all yield.Their eyes follow her.
I follow behind, slowly, letting her take the lead and letting herownthis moment because this isn’t about impressing her anymore.
She sees the empty dining room lit in soft golds and deep shadows, floor-to-ceiling glass that frames the Tokyo skyline like a painting. One table in the center—dark native wood, a table set for two with every candle flickering just right. Every curve of this room has been bent to intimacy.
And everything I planned for tonight suddenly feelsinsufficient.
That dress—green silk, high slit, the low back that’s currently begging me to forget how much control I pride myself on. She looks like power incarnate, and I want to wrap her in it and peel it off her in the same breath.
