The Demon's Due

The air in Emily Chen’s apartment was thick with the smells of old paper, burnt coffee, and now, the acrid bite of sulfurous incense. Stacks of books teetered precariously on every available surface, their cracked spines and faded titles a map of her obsession: De Praestigiis Daemonum, the Pseudomonarchia Daemonum, and a heavily annotated copy of the Ars Goetia. This wasn't a hobby; it was the entire focus of her graduate thesis. Tonight was the practical application.

She knelt on the worn floorboards of her living room, a space she’d cleared by shoving her couch and coffee table against the wall. In her hand was a stub of pure white chalk, and with it, she drew the final sigil within the meticulously rendered summoning circle. Every line was perfect, every curve precise. This was a science, not a séance. She was a scholar, not some Goth kid trying to spook her friends. The goal was simple, controlled, and academic: summon a minor imp, a Gutterkin, to observe its energetic signature for a few hours before safely banishing it. It was the demonic equivalent of putting a microbe under a microscope.

Four black candles stood at the cardinal points of the circle, their flames barely flickering in the still, heavy air. The incense smoldered in a small brass censer, its foul smoke coiling toward the ceiling like a grasping hand. Emily reviewed her mental checklist. Circle of protection, complete. Glyphs of binding, inscribed. Offering, prepared. She picked up a sterile lancet from a small silver tray, her hand steady. Professor Albright had called her research "reckless and unprovable," but Emily knew he was just afraid of the unknown. She wasn’t. She was fascinated by it.

She paused, taking a deep, fortifying breath that did little to calm the frantic drumming in her chest. This was it. Years of research, of translating dead languages and deciphering cryptic texts, all led to this moment. She wiped a bead of sweat from her temple with the back of her wrist, leaving a faint smudge of chalk dust. With a sharp intake of breath, she pricked the tip of her left index finger. A single, perfect ruby droplet welled up. She extended her hand over the center of the circle, allowing the drop to fall directly onto the primary sigil. It sizzled faintly as it made contact, a barely audible hiss that seemed to suck the sound from the room.

The shift was immediate. The air grew colder, heavier, pressing in on her. The candle flames stretched tall and thin, burning with an unnatural stillness. It was time. Emily closed her eyes, focusing her will, and began the incantation. The words felt alien in her mouth, a series of guttural, sibilant phrases that scraped at her throat. It was a language not meant for a human tongue, full of sharp edges and deep, resonant tones. She pushed through, her voice gaining confidence with each verse, a low and steady chant that filled the small apartment. The floorboards beneath her knees began to vibrate, a low hum that resonated deep in her bones. The power in the room was building, coiling, far more than she had anticipated for a simple Gutterkin. But she was too deep in the ritual to stop, the ancient words pulling the energy from her, from the air, from somewhere else entirely. She spoke the final word of binding, and the vibration ceased. A profound, ringing silence fell. Emily opened her eyes, her gaze fixed on the center of the circle, expecting a puff of greasy smoke and the sight of a cowering, rat-like creature. The air shimmered, and she held her breath, waiting.

Instead of a wisp of smoke, a column of impenetrable darkness erupted from the sigil. It wasn't smoke; it had weight and substance, sucking the light from the candles into itself. The low hum Emily had felt in her bones escalated into a deep, guttural groan, the sound of a mountain splitting apart. The floorboards around the circle didn't just crack; they splintered, long fissures racing out from the chalk lines like black lightning. The protective circle she had so carefully drawn flared once with a brilliant, white-hot light, then shattered, the chalk lines blowing away like dust in a hurricane.

A wave of pressure slammed into her, forcing the air from her lungs and pinning her back against the legs of her couch. It was a physical force, immense and suffocating, laced with an energy that felt like raw, undiluted lust. It crawled over her skin, invasive and intimate, seeping into her pores and making every nerve ending scream. This was not the energy of a Gutterkin. This was the power of a king.

Her academic mind, her shield of logic and reason, fractured. Panic, cold and absolute, flooded her. Her eyes, wide with terror, were fixed on the column of shadow. It began to coalesce, to take a shape that was both horrifying and mesmerizingly perfect. First, a pair of long, powerful legs, clad in something that looked like black leather but shifted like living shadow. Then a torso, lean and corded with muscle, the likes of which she’d only ever seen on ancient marble statues. His skin was pale, almost luminous in the flickering candlelight, a stark contrast to the darkness that birthed him.

As the shadows receded further, they revealed broad shoulders and a strong neck. Two horns, curved and black as polished obsidian, swept back from his temples, disappearing into a mane of thick, dark hair that fell around his face. And then, his face. It was a masterpiece of cruel beauty, all sharp angles and unforgiving planes. High cheekbones, a straight nose, and a jaw that could have been cut from granite. His eyes opened, and Emily felt her heart stop. They were not human eyes. They were molten gold, glowing with their own internal light, ancient and intelligent and filled with a terrifying, predatory amusement.

He stood well over six feet tall, his presence dominating the small apartment, making it feel like a shoebox. He was completely naked, his body a study in masculine perfection. His cock, thick and heavy, hung nestled in a patch of dark hair, a clear and potent declaration of his nature. He was Bael. First and principal king of the East, commander of sixty-six legions. A demon of lust and power whose name was only ever whispered in the most forbidden of grimoires. The demon she had read about with a detached, scholarly fascination was now standing three feet away from her, radiating an aura of raw sexuality so potent it made her dizzy.

He took a slow, deliberate breath, inhaling the scent of her small, human world. His golden eyes roamed the room, taking in the teetering stacks of books, the shoved-aside furniture, and finally, they settled on her. He saw her, truly saw her, huddled and trembling on the floor. A slow, predatory smile touched his lips, revealing the tips of sharp canines.

"You were expecting someone smaller, I take it," he said. His voice was a low, resonant baritone, smooth as velvet but with an undercurrent of power that vibrated through the floor and up Emily's spine. It was the most beautiful and terrifying sound she had ever heard.

Emily’s mouth worked, but no sound came out. Her throat was a knot of pure terror. All the academic theories, all the carefully studied texts, had evaporated, leaving only the primal, animal fear of a predator. He was real. He was naked. And he was amused by her.

“B-Bael,” she finally managed to whisper, the name a puff of air. “No. I… the ritual was for a Gutterkin. A minor servitor.”

His lips curled into a smirk, a flash of white teeth in the dim light. “Your ritual had ambition, little scholar, even if you did not. You used a binding of the seventh order with a blood offering under a waning moon. You might as well have put up a sign.” He took a step forward, his bare feet silent on the splintered wood. The movement was fluid, impossibly graceful, the coiled power of a panther. Emily instinctively scrambled backward, her hands sliding on the dusty floor until her back hit the solid frame of the couch.

He stopped just outside the faint, ghost-image of the shattered circle. His golden eyes swept over her again, a slow, appraising look that felt more violating than a physical touch. He took in her frayed jeans, her oversized university sweatshirt, her face pale with shock. His gaze lingered for a moment on the frantic pulse beating in her throat.

“Still,” he mused, his voice dropping lower, “this is… quaint.” He gestured with one elegant hand at her cramped living space. “All these flammable little scrolls. The pathetic mortal attempts to categorize the infinite.” He turned his back on her, a gesture of supreme confidence, and began to walk toward the apartment door. Every muscle in his back shifted under his pale skin, a perfect anatomical display. His hips swayed with a natural, masculine grace, and Emily’s eyes were unwillingly drawn to the tight globes of his ass and the heavy weight of his cock and balls swinging gently between his powerful thighs.

He reached the door and wrapped his hand around the cheap brass doorknob. He turned it. Nothing happened. He turned it again, with more force. The lock clicked, but the door remained stubbornly shut. A faint, shimmering barrier of turquoise light, visible only for a second, flashed across the doorframe, repelling his touch with a sharp crackle of energy.

Bael snatched his hand back, a flicker of genuine surprise crossing his perfect features. He stared at his palm, then back at the door. A low growl rumbled in his chest. He turned his head slowly, pinning Emily with a gaze that had lost all its amusement. The molten gold of his eyes was now hard, cold, and utterly furious.

“What did you do?” he demanded, the velvet stripped from his voice, leaving only raw, menacing power.

Emily flinched, pressing herself harder against the couch. “I-I don’t know! It’s a standard binding ritual! It’s supposed to bind you to my will for the duration of the observation period!”

He laughed, a harsh, grating sound devoid of humor. “Your will?” He stalked back towards her, his nudity seeming more threatening with every step. He stopped a foot from her, forcing her to crane her neck to look up at him. The heat rolling off his body was immense. “You have no will that could hold me, mortal. Your spell was a butcher’s clumsy work. Powerful, yes. You poured more of your own life force into it than you realize, but it was unfocused. Sloppy.”

He crouched down, bringing his face level with hers. The smell of ozone and something else, something musky and uniquely masculine, filled her senses. “You didn’t bind me to you,” he snarled, his voice a low whisper that cut through her panic. “You bound me to the circle. To the space in which it was cast. You’ve turned your pathetic little home into my cage.”

The reality of his words crashed down on her with the force of a physical blow. He wasn’t her demonic captive to be studied and dismissed. He was a king. A being of immense power and insatiable lust. And she had just locked him in her one-bedroom apartment with her.

The words hung in the air, heavy and suffocating. A cage. Her home, her tiny sanctuary of books and tea and quiet desperation, was now a cage for one of the most powerful entities she had ever studied. His proximity was overwhelming. She could feel the heat of his skin, see the intricate gold patterns swirling in his irises, smell the sharp, electric scent of his anger.

“A cage?” she whispered, the words barely audible. The sheer absurdity of it warbled with the terror in her voice.

Bael’s lip curled in a sneer. “Do you have trouble with simple concepts, scholar?” He leaned in closer, his voice dropping to a dangerous purr. “This room. These walls. They are now the bars. Your clumsy magic has anchored me to the foundation of this miserable little hovel. I can feel it, a leaden weight tied to my essence. I cannot pass the threshold of your door. I cannot break through your windows. I am… here.”

He straightened up, turning away from her again to pace the small confines of the living room. It was like watching a tiger in a shoebox. Every movement was fraught with coiled energy, a promise of violence barely contained. His nakedness was no longer just a fact; it was a weapon. He dominated the space, his perfect, powerful body a constant reminder of what he was. Emily found herself unable to look away from the smooth, taut skin of his back, the flex of his thighs, the heavy, pendulous weight of his cock and balls. Her academic mind registered him as a specimen of immense interest. The rest of her, the terrified woman huddled on the floor, registered him as a predator.

“This presents a problem,” he said, his back still to her. “Beyond the obvious indignity of my imprisonment.” He stopped and turned, his golden eyes locking onto hers. The raw anger had been replaced by something colder, more calculating. “I am a being of specific appetites, mortal. I do not subsist on bread and water.”

Emily swallowed hard, her throat dry. She knew his nature. It was in every text, every grimoire. Bael, the King of the East, drew his power from the carnal. From lust.

“You feed on… emotion,” she managed, trying to sound clinical, trying to cling to the shreds of her academic detachment.

He let out a short, sharp laugh. “Emotion? What a delicate, human word. No, little scholar. I feed on the raw, filthy energy of desire. I consume arousal. I gorge on the frantic, mindless moments before climax. I sustain myself with the hot, wet fucking of mortals who can think of nothing but sinking into the flesh of another.” His gaze was intense, unwavering, and Emily felt a strange, hot shame coil deep in her belly, as if he could see every private thought she’d ever had.

“I require a steady diet of it,” he continued, taking a slow step towards her. “Without it, I weaken. And a weakened demon of my stature is not something you wish to be confined with. I become… irritable. Unpredictable. My very presence will begin to sour this place. The air will grow heavy, the food will rot in your cupboards, your dreams will fill with unspeakable things. My hunger will leak out, and it will be unpleasant for you.”

The implication was as clear as it was terrifying. He was trapped in here. His food source was out there, in the world of teeming, fucking humanity. He had no access to it. He looked down at her, a slow, deliberate appraisal that made her skin prickle with a mixture of fear and a strange, unwelcome heat.

“There is no one else here,” he stated, the words simple, the meaning vast.

The air crackled with the unspoken truth. She was the only source. Her. The thought sent a jolt through her, part terror, part a shocking, electric thrill that she immediately tried to smother.

“And then there is the matter of the binding itself,” he went on, seemingly bored with the topic of his own starvation. “This spell must be concluded. It is a contract, whether you intended it or not. It cannot simply be broken; it must be fulfilled. Only then can I return to my realm.”

“Fulfilled how?” Emily asked, her voice trembling. “The texts… they don’t say. They don’t describe what happens when you summon a king by mistake.”

“Of course they don’t,” he sneered. “Because the mortals who are stupid enough to do so are rarely left alive to write about it.” He ran a hand through his dark hair, a gesture of profound frustration. “We will have to examine your pathetic scrawlings. Your ritual. There will be a clause, a condition for release, buried in the arcane language you so carelessly threw around. We must find it. You will help me.”

It wasn’t a request. It was a command. He needed her to decipher her own mistake so he could be free. She needed to help him, or be trapped indefinitely with a starving, volatile demon king. They were bound together not just by the apartment, but by a shared, desperate goal.

He looked at her, his golden eyes seeming to glow brighter in the dim light. “So, we have two problems, little scholar. First, we must decipher the terms of my release. And second,” his gaze dropped to her mouth, then lower, over her body, a slow, possessive inventory, “we must figure out how I am going to feed.”

The next morning, Emily woke with a pounding headache and the flimsy, desperate hope that it had all been a stress-induced hallucination. A nightmare brought on by too much caffeine and arcane texts. She lay still for a long moment, listening. The apartment was silent, save for the distant groan of city traffic. Maybe he was gone. Maybe the spell had failed entirely and her mind had simply filled in the blanks with the most terrifying thing it could conjure.

She pushed herself out of bed, her body aching with a tension she hadn't realized she was holding. She crept to her bedroom door and opened it a crack. The living room was empty. The chalk circle was still there, a faint white scar on the floorboards, but the oppressive presence from last night seemed to have lifted. Relief, so potent it was dizzying, washed over her.

Then she smelled it. That same impossible scent of ozone, hot stone, and something else—a dark, musky sweetness that clung to the air like a film. Her stomach plummeted. She pushed the door open fully.

He was standing by the window, staring down at the street below. He was still completely naked, his back to her. The pale morning light traced the inhuman perfection of his form: the sharp ridges of his shoulder blades, the elegant tapering of his waist, the taut, sculpted curves of his ass. He was a statue carved from moonlight and sin, utterly out of place against the backdrop of her peeling window frame and dusty blinds.

Trying to ignore the primal part of her brain that was screaming in a mixture of terror and awe, Emily forced herself to move. She needed normalcy. She needed coffee. She stumbled into her tiny kitchen alcove, her eyes fixed on the familiar, comforting shape of her coffeemaker. She scooped grounds into the filter, filled the carafe, and slammed it into place. She hit the 'On' button.

POP.

A shower of blue sparks erupted from the back of the machine, followed by the acrid smell of burnt plastic. The single red power light flickered once, then died. The apartment fell silent again.

"Fuck," she breathed.

"The decay begins," Bael's voice rumbled from the living room, startling her so badly she nearly dropped the now-useless carafe. He hadn't even turned around. "Small things first. Electronics. Perishables. The energy that binds me here is unstable. It leeches life from its surroundings."

His words sent a fresh spike of ice through her veins. She yanked open the refrigerator door, her hand trembling. The carton of milk she'd bought two days ago was swollen. She unscrewed the cap and a wave of putrid, sour stench hit her so hard she gagged. Inside, the milk had separated into chunky, yellowed curds and watery whey. It was the kind of rot that should have taken weeks, not hours.

She slammed the fridge shut, her breath coming in ragged bursts. This was real. This was happening. He was a cancer in her home, and she was trapped here with him.

"You have to put some clothes on," she snapped, the words coming out harsher than she intended. It was a pathetic grasp for control, for some semblance of human decency in this insane situation.

He finally turned from the window. His movements were fluid, deliberate. He faced her fully, his golden eyes scanning her with lazy amusement. Her gaze was dragged down against her will. His body was a masterpiece of masculine power, his chest broad, his stomach etched with muscle. And there, hanging heavy and thick between his powerful legs, was his cock. It was semi-aroused now, longer and fuller than it had been last night, the dark purple head glistening faintly in the morning light.

"Why?" he asked, his voice a silken challenge. He took a slow step toward her, closing the distance between the living room and the kitchen. "This is my true form. Does it offend your mortal sensibilities?" He took another step, and she was forced to retreat until her back was pressed against the kitchen counter. "Or," he murmured, his voice dropping lower, "does it distract you?"

He was so close now she could feel the heat rolling off his skin, see the almost imperceptible black markings that swirled over his collarbones. The air was thick with his scent, filling her lungs, her head. It was intoxicating, making her feel dizzy and hot. Her body was betraying her, a slow, shameful wetness beginning to gather between her legs.

"I can't... I can't think when you're just... standing there," she stammered, hating the weakness in her voice.

A slow, cruel smile spread across his perfect lips. "Good," he whispered. "That's the point."

He didn't move. Emily's heart hammered against her ribs, a frantic, trapped bird. She was cornered. The cold edge of the counter dug into her spine, and the heat of his body was a furnace in front of her. She had to get out.

"Move," she gritted out, her voice barely a whisper.

His smile widened, showing the faintest hint of teeth. "Make me."

For a wild, insane second, she considered it. Shoving him. What would it feel like to put her hands on that hot, solid chest? Would he feel like stone? Would he even budge? The thought was so suicidal it was almost funny. Instead, she ducked, a clumsy, desperate movement, sliding sideways along the counter. Her hip brushed against his thigh. The contact was electric, a jolt of pure heat that shot straight to her core. His skin was smooth and impossibly hot, his muscle hard as rock beneath it. She gasped, scrambling away from him, her body screaming with conflicting signals.

She didn't stop until she was at the front door, fumbling with the deadbolt, her hands shaking so badly it took three tries to turn the lock. She grabbed her worn messenger bag from the floor, not bothering to change out of her jeans or the t-shirt she'd slept in. She didn't look back. She couldn't. She wrenched the door open and fled, slamming it shut behind her, the sound echoing in the hallway like a gunshot.

The university library became her sanctuary and her prison. For the next week, her life fell into a miserable, terrifying routine. She would wake up early, choked by the cloying, sweet scent of his presence that now saturated her sheets, her clothes, everything. She would force herself to walk through the living room where he would be lounging on her sofa or standing by the window, always naked, always watching her with those predatory, knowing eyes. He never spoke in the mornings, but his gaze followed her every move, a silent commentary on her frayed nerves and the dark circles under her eyes. Some mornings his cock would be fully, magnificently hard, jutting from his lap as he read one of her textbooks with an expression of bored disdain. She tried not to look, but her eyes were traitors, always snagging on the sight of him, the image burning itself into her brain for the rest of the day.

Then she would escape to the library's special collections, a hushed, climate-controlled room that smelled of old paper and leather. It was the only place she felt a shred of her old self. Here, she was a scholar, not a terrified roommate to a creature from Hell. She surrounded herself with towering stacks of grimoires and codices, her fingers tracing diagrams that made her blood run cold. She cross-referenced texts in dead languages, her brain aching with the effort of translating archaic dialects and obscure demonic genealogies.

But the books were failing her. They were full of warnings, of hubris, of rituals for binding and commanding. They spoke of imps and minor spirits, of wards and circles to contain them. There was nothing—not a single footnote, not one damned addendum—about how to reverse a botched summoning of a high-ranking Duke of Hell. It was like reading a manual on how to build a cage for a lion, only to find you'd accidentally trapped a god and had no idea how to ask it to leave.

Her stress mounted with every failed search. It was a physical weight in her chest, a constant thrum of anxiety that made it hard to breathe. The librarians started giving her worried looks. She was losing weight, her skin was pale, and her hands had a permanent tremor. Sleep offered no relief, her dreams filled with suffocating heat and the phantom touch of his skin against hers. More than once, she woke up gasping, her own hand between her legs, her body slick with sweat and arousal, the memory of his naked form more vivid than any dream. The intrusive thoughts were relentless, hitting her at the most inopportune times. She'd be deciphering a line of Enochian script, and suddenly her mind would conjure the image of his back, the way the muscles shifted under his skin as he turned from the window, the perfect, tight curve of his ass. She'd feel a jolt of pure, shameful lust, her panties growing damp as she sat in the sterile silence of the library. It was humiliating. It was exhausting. She was coming apart at the seams, and with every passing day, the hope of finding a solution dwindled, replaced by the terrifying certainty that she was well and truly fucked.

She returned late one evening, the weight of another fruitless day pressing down on her shoulders. The library had felt like a tomb today, the ancient texts mocking her with their silence. The moment she stepped back into her apartment, the change was immediate. The air was different. It was always thick with his presence, a scent of ozone, warm skin, and something else she couldn't name—something like burnt sugar and sin. But tonight, it was heavier, clinging to her like humidity before a storm. It coated her tongue, filled her lungs, a tangible substance that made the short walk from the door to her bedroom feel like wading through syrup.

He was on the sofa, one of her demonology textbooks open on his lap. He was, as always, naked, his long legs propped up on her battered coffee table. He didn't look up as she entered, but she felt his awareness of her like a physical touch. She tried to ignore him, to slip past into the relative safety of her room, but her feet felt leaden. Her senses were screaming.

It started with the sound. The whisper-soft rustle of the page as he turned it was unnaturally loud in the quiet room, a crisp, intimate sound that seemed to happen right next to her ear. She could hear the faint rasp of his thumb against the dry paper. Her gaze was dragged to his hands. They were elegant, long-fingered, but with a latent strength that was terrifying. She watched, mesmerized, as he lazily traced a line of text, his fingertip leaving a faint, shimmering trail of heat in its wake that only she could see.

Then came the scent. It wasn't just in the air anymore; it was a targeted assault. The musky, masculine scent of his skin, the faint, metallic tang of his demonic nature—it zeroed in on her, bypassing the stale air of the apartment and flooding her system directly. It was intoxicating, primal. Her nostrils flared without her permission. She could almost taste him. Deep in her belly, a familiar, shameful heat coiled and spread, slicking the insides of her thighs.

He still hadn't moved, hadn't acknowledged her beyond that initial wave of awareness. He was just… existing. But his existence was an act of aggression. Every minute shift of his weight on the cushions, the slow, even rise and fall of his chest, the way the lamplight gleamed on the hard muscle of his abdomen—it was all amplified, magnified until it was the only thing she could perceive. Her own heartbeat thudded in her ears, a frantic counterpoint to his utter stillness.

His cock lay thick and heavy against his thigh, semi-erect and pulsing with a slow, hypnotic rhythm she could feel in her own blood. The sight of it was both terrifying and utterly riveting. She wanted to look away, to run, to scream, but her body was frozen, her mind held captive by the sensory onslaught. She was prey, pinned by the gaze of a predator who wasn't even looking at her.

"Find anything interesting today, little scholar?" his voice finally cut through the charged silence.

The sound vibrated through the floorboards, up her legs, and settled deep in her pelvis. It wasn't just a question; it was a caress and a mockery all at once. Her throat was too tight to answer. She could only stand there, trembling in the doorway, trapped in a web of sensation he had woven just for her. The air crackled, and she knew, with a certainty that chilled her to the bone, that he was enjoying this. He was bored, and she was his new favorite toy. The tension in the room stretched taut, a wire humming with power, lust, and fear. It was only a matter of time before it snapped.

Her control finally shattered. "Stop it," she rasped, the words tearing from her raw throat.

Bael’s eyes, black and bottomless, finally lifted from the book. He raised a single, perfect eyebrow. "Stop what, precisely? Reading your rather rudimentary academic texts?"

"Don't play dumb with me, you bastard," she spat, her voice shaking with a week's worth of suppressed rage and fear. "Stop this… this thing you're doing. In my head. With the air. I can't even fucking think straight in my own home anymore!" Her hands balled into fists at her sides. "And for the love of God, would you put some fucking clothes on? I am sick of seeing you lounging around with your cock out like it's a goddamn centerpiece."

The amusement vanished from his face, replaced by a chilling stillness. He closed the book with a soft thump that sounded like a gavel falling. Slowly, languidly, he rose from the sofa. The movement was liquid grace, a predator uncoiling. His cock, already thick and half-hard, bobbed with the motion, its engorged head a deep, angry purple.

"This is my nature, little scholar," he said, his voice a low, dangerous purr. "And this," he gestured around the small apartment, "is my cage. You seem to be forgetting that. You also seem to be forgetting your place."

Before she could process the threat, he moved. It wasn't human speed. One moment he was across the room, the next he was on her, a blur of heat and hard muscle. The air rushed from her lungs as her back slammed into the wall. The impact rattled her teeth. His body was a wall of heat, pressing her into the plaster, stealing her breath. One of his hands clamped onto the wall next to her head, fingers digging into the drywall. The other arm barred her chest, pinning her arms. His thigh shoved between hers, forcing her legs apart, and she gasped as the hot, rigid length of his erection pressed insistently against the thin denim over her cunt.

She was utterly, completely trapped. His scent enveloped her—burnt sugar, ozone, and hot, musky male sweat. It was suffocating. She tilted her head back, trying to get away, but her head just hit the wall. His face was inches from hers. And his eyes… they weren't just black anymore. They were burning. Deep within the obsidian pools, embers of orange and red light swirled like dying galaxies. A pressure built behind her eyes, a crushing weight on her very soul. This was power. True, ancient, terrifying power. It wasn't just physical strength; it was an aura of pure malevolence and dominion that promised to unmake her.

"Let's be clear," he whispered, his breath hot against her lips, the vibration of his voice traveling from his chest directly into hers. "You don't give me orders. You don't tell me what to do. You exist in this space because I allow it. You breathe because I haven't yet decided to stop you." His hips gave a slight, almost imperceptible push, and the head of his cock ground against her pubic bone.

A strangled noise, half-sob, half-moan, escaped her. The terror was absolute, a cold flood that should have frozen her. But a treacherous, filthy heat bloomed low in her belly. The sheer force of him, the undeniable masculine dominance, the feeling of his hard cock against her—it was sparking a disgusting, thrilling current straight to her core. Her clit throbbed, and she felt a slick, shameful wetness begin to soak her panties.

His eyes flared brighter, and a slow, cruel smile spread across his lips. He knew. He could feel her body's betrayal. He could probably smell her arousal over the scent of her fear.

Then, as suddenly as it began, it was over. He pulled back, releasing her. The sudden absence of his heat and weight was a physical shock. Her legs gave out, and she slid down the wall to a crumpled heap on the floor, gasping for air, her body trembling uncontrollably. He stood over her for a moment, a magnificent, terrifying silhouette against the lamplight, his erection still jutting proudly from his groin. He didn't say another word. He simply turned and walked back to the sofa, leaving her shaking on the floor, drenched in a cold sweat and the hot, humiliating evidence of her own desire.