Page 10 of Feral
Why had she ever thought this was a good idea?
She shut the door and turned toward the rack, heavily laden with dresses and skirts she doubted would meet the after-hours dress code. She slipped out of her uniform and dropped it on the seat in the corner of the fitting room. It was the size of a generous walk-in closet, and the soft white overhead lighting was clearly meant to flatter. Even so, she felt the need to avoid her reflection until she was fully dressed. The modelesque beauties at the Academy had done nothing for her self-esteem, that was for sure.
The first dress she tried on fit surprisingly well, and she found herself wondering just how much Axel had studied her body to know its dimensions so well. The dress was a good deal snugger than anything she would have picked out, and it showed enough cleavage to bebarelysocially appropriate at colony gatherings. Of course, none of the girls she’d seen wearing similar attire had quite as many curves to worry about covering.
She changed out of the dress and cast it aside before searching for something she could actually wear on a daily basis. It became clear to her as she sifted through the clothing that Axel had a taste for three things: leather, lace and jeans so tight they might as well have been painted on.
At least they fit well enough, and when she tried on a matching tan turtleneck that was surprisingly modest, she felt like she might actually be able to attend colony functions without sticking out like a sore thumb. She’d never look as regal and classy as Natalia, but maybe upgrading her wardrobe a little wasn’t such a bad idea, after all.
“It doesn’t take that long to try on a dress,” Axel called impatiently from outside the room.
Ella scowled at him through the door. “I’ve tried on a few things already.”
“Come out and let me see.”
She was reluctant to reward his demands, but shecoulduse a second opinion--and if there was one thing she trusted Axel to be, it was brutally honest. She had already decided on her current outfit, so she quickly changed into the one relatively formal dress she would’ve felt comfortable changing into. It was a breezy Parisian number with loose sleeves and a tapered waist that flattered her curves. The A-line skirt actually fell below the knee, and it was more like something Natalia would wear than Marissa, so Ella was surprised he’d picked it out.
Then again, maybe he’d accidentally grabbed it in his haste.
She finally opened the door, steeling herself for whatever cutting assessment Axel had to make of her appearance. “Well?” she asked, looking down to make sure she hadn’t accidentally tucked the hem of the skirt into her panties when she saw the blank look on Axel’s face. “What do you think?”
He blinked as if coming out of a trance, still leaning against the column on the other side of the dressing room. “It’s...nice.”
Ella stared at him for a few seconds. She had been prepared for him to say she looked ridiculous, or any myriad of unkind things, but that tempered response was somehow far more unsettling.
“Nice?” she echoed. “If it makes me look like a marshmallow, you can just tell me.”
He scoffed a laugh, but it wasn’t half as cocky as his usual. He pushed off the column and sauntered over to lean in the dressing room door. “You look beautiful,” he said, looking at her in a way he never had before. It was almost soft, save for the edge of some indefinable thing that made her legs feel weak and wobbly. Of far more concern was the heat it stirred in her belly, so captivating her in his gaze that she barely even noticed his arm slipping around her waist until he’d edged his way into the dressing room.
“Axel, what are you--?”
Before she could get the rest of the question out, he switched their positions and had her pushed up against the fitting room door. The memory of him doing the same against the bathroom wall, and the way she’d shamelessly returned his kiss, chose the worst time to resurface.
For a moment, he just gazed down at her with that foreign glint in his eyes that she only recognized instinctively as the same thing that sparked within her whenever he was close. She opened her mouth to speak before realizing she didn’t trust herself, even if she could remember how to breathe.
Before she had the chance, he captured her lips in a kiss that was just as passionate as the first, but a good deal gentler. The softness of it took her even more off-guard than his aggression, but she found herself returning this one just the same as his hands tangled in her white tresses and his hard body pushed hers back against the unforgiving plane of the door.
As his tongue swept into her mouth, claiming and overpowering hers, Ella felt the strength of the suppressants running through her bloodstream being tested more each moment that passed. And she was doing nothing to help, her fingers digging through his hair and her leg hitched up over his thigh. He pushed the hem of her dress up and slipped his hand underneath, his skin lighting hers on fire as it traveled up her smooth thigh.
“Axel,” she panted against his lips before he broke away to claim her neck between his teeth. The bite was hard enough to bruise, but not enough to pierce the skin, leaving a permanent mark that would give him the claim to royalty he so brazenly coveted. She knew she would have let him, too. She might have wanted to kill him the moment the ecstasy and lust wore off, but she would have turned her head and moaned in bliss as he bit her neck the way he had so many times in her fantasies, before taking her right there in a public dressing room.
Maybe her classmates were right. Maybe she really was everything they claimed. All she knew was that around Axel, she didn’t know herself. What she was capable of, or what she really felt. All she knew was that she craved his touch the way she craved air to breathe.
His mouth was still on her neck, sucking and nipping, and that alone had her aroused to the point of coming without him ever touching her down there. When he slipped his fingers underneath her panties and touched her, the full-body shudder that overtook her confirmed it.
Before the startled moan could escape her lips, Axel claimed them once more, swallowing down the desperate sound as she ground against his hand. She felt his smug smile against her lips, but it wasn’t enough to break the spell of his seduction, only to amplify it.
Just when her clit reached the point of oversensitivity, he pushed his fingers inside her, curling in until he found her spot. Ella gasped, her head falling back against the dressing room door as he fucked her with his fingers, each thrust perfectly aimed and unrelenting.
She was on the verge of coming a second time when reason won out over passion and she broke the kiss, pushing against his shoulders. “Stop,” she said breathlessly, surprised she’d been able to get the word out at all.
The disappointment on his face was clear, but he obeyed her command, and her body gave another involuntary shiver as he pulled his fingers out of her. His left forearm rested on the door above her, his eyes glazed with the same desire coursing through her even still as he looked down at her.
“What’s the matter?” he taunted knowingly. “Enjoying yourself too much?”
As much irritation burned within her as lust, but she wasn’t going to dignify that with a response. When he brought his fingers to his lips and made a point of drawing them into his mouth, seductively savoring the taste of her on his tongue, she lost all ability to form a coherent sentence.
“You taste good,” he purred, his hand still stroking her thigh. “Innocent.”
