Page 189 of Somno Slave

My body betrays me before my mind can catch it—a tightening low in my stomach, a shift in my breath, every nerve waking at once in a way that feels humiliating. Want sharpened into shame.

I hate it. I hate that he can do nothing at all and still make my body feel like it belongs to him.

His hand lifts and I track it slowly. Every inch of it. And still—I don’t push back. It settles against my jaw like it belongs there.

My breath stutters.

“You’re doing such a good job, Doctor.” The words sink deep.

“What does that mean?” I ask, but my voice has already shifted, softer than I intend, pulled into something I don’t recognise as mine.

His thumb moves slightly against my skin. “You’re starting to see it.”

My eyebrows furrow together. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Not yet.”

He leans in slowly. My lungs forget their rhythm. Every part of me goes painfully still.

His mouth touches mine so lightly I have nothing to fight. That is what ruins me. There is no force to resist, only the terrible softness of him assuming I will stay there. And I do.

My body locks around the feeling of it. Heat rises under my skin, sharp and humiliating, tangled so tightly with anger I can no longer separate one from the other.

The kiss lingers only for a moment, but it settles into me like something permanent. My mouth stays open after he pulls away, useless and warm, as if some obedient part of me is still waiting for him to come back. He watches me quietly, like he already knows exactly what that kiss has ruined.

I should pull away. I should use the space he’s given me and take back whatever small piece of control I still have left.

Instead, I reach for him.

The movement is small, barely there. My hand catches lightly at the front of his shirt, fingers curling into the fabric like I need something solid enough to blame for this.

I pull him down and kiss him again, harder this time. My mouth crashes into his like I can punish him for what he’s done to me by letting him do it again. And when I finally pull away, my thoughts are in pieces.

He looks at me for a moment, and then—small, quiet, devastating—he smiles.

My fingers tighten instinctively in his shirt, but they close on nothing. One second, he is there. The next, I am alone.

The room snaps back into place with a quiet violence that feels almost cruel. Shadows where they should be. Air that belongs to me again. Silence, heavy and complete.

I stare at the empty space where he stood, my pulse still stumbling like my body hasn’t realised he’s gone.

I press my fingers against my mouth like I can hold the evidence there, like I can stop it from becoming real. But I can’t.

Because somewhere beneath the shame, beneath the fear, beneath every rational part of me that should know better...I wanted him to kiss me again.

And worse—I don’t want him to stop.

Chapter Fifty-Three

Rheda

I don’t remember falling asleep.

I wake with my eyes already open. For a few seconds, I don’t move. My tongue is dry against the roof of my mouth, my neck stiff, one hand curled in the sheet like I fell asleep holding onto something.

He isn’t here.

I know that before I look for him, and my body reacts badly to the knowledge, my throat tightening before my mind can dress it up as relief. I push myself upright.