The Billionairess

Chapter 19

I thought I could follow the sound of her crying, but the penthouse was eerily silent. I quietly tapped my knuckles on her bedroom door, then peeked inside.

Rose was laying over the duvet, her body curved inwards and her face stuffed into a pillow that she wrapped her arms around. I hated seeing her that way. It seemed so unnatural. I wanted to rush to her.

I quietly closed the door, then slowly approached the bed.

"Mistress" I said softly.

She made no response. I came closer, unsure if it was right for me to move at the moment. I gently placed a hand over hers.

She glanced up at me from the pillow. Her eyes were red and puffy, her cheeks still streaming with tears. I wanted to wipe them all away.

"Mistress" I said, cupping her face in my hands. "Are you okay?"

Her eyes swelled up again, she looked down and shook her head.

"Thomas" she said. "I'm...so sorry..."

Tears streamed down her face.

"Mistress, please stop crying" I said. And I meant it. I couldn't see her like this. "It's okay."

"I... almost lost control..."

"Mistress, it was a little slip..."

Despite part of me warning against it, I crawled into the bed next to her. For a moment she was still, but then she curled into me. Her hands fisted into my shirt, and she nuzzled her face into my collarbones. I wrapped my arms around her and snuggled her close.

"Tell me what is wrong, mistress" I said. "Tell me what it is between you and Tristen. What is it that makes it so easy for him to turn you into this? Why can he not just let us be?"

She didn't answer for a while. She sniffled into my shirt, probably leaving snot on the collar but I didn't care. She finally wiped her eyes and looked me in the face.

"I supposed I've kept too much from you, Thomas" she said. "Perhaps it's now time you learned the truth about me. About Tristen. About my past."

She squeezed her eyes shut, her tears drying on her face, and she composed herself. She stood up from the bed, then approached a table by the window. A bottle of vodka and a few glasses awaited on it. She poured herself a glass, then stared out the window. She was no longer sniffling but I could still see her red, puffy eyes glazed. I could sense something building in her, something that took both strong hands to build up. She was silent for several minutes before finally speaking.

"I was not born Rose Delacourt" she said, pulling a cigarette out of a drawer and lighting it. "My name at birth was Hannah Steele."

I paused a moment to process the information. Hannah Steele.

"I had no idea.”

Rose stuck the cigarette between her teeth and took a long puff. The wisps of smoke were illuminated in the moonlight from the window, the moonlight glowing her skin and hair white. She looked so lovely, even when broken. Like a fallen angel look back up at heaven.

"Before I was who I am now, I was a university student, just like you. Majoring in business, minor in English literature. I was a shy girl then, living off the fantasies of books like Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights. I told you before I identified more with men like Rochester and Darcy. But that is only a newer development. Before, I wanted men like Rochester and Darcy. I wanted my billionaire lover who would sweep a poor, plain girl like myself off my feet. Pluck me from obscurity and give me such stuff that dreams are made of."

She took another puff. "One day, I finally did meet my Rochester. Tristen Grey had visited the publishing house I was working at, and I was asked to show him around. He took an interest in me, me being only an intern at the time."

She took a puff. And a sip of vodka.

"I was enamored with him. He was a hero out of all of my romantic fantasies, from the books I read."

I tried to picture Tristen Grey as the romantic lead in a novel, and it sent a shiver down my spine.

"We were together for some time. He would shower me with gifts, take me on helicopter rides, buy me new cars, allow me to sip from some of the most expensive champagne."

"So... what happened?"

She took a deep breath, then another drag.

"Eventually, he introduced to me the side of his life he never showed anyone else. He brought me to his own Playroom."

I looked at her, my eyes likely filling with shock.

"Tristen Grey, he introduced you to this stuff? All the b**m?"

She nodded. "I was originally his submissive."

I couldn't even begin to wrap my head around that concept. Rose Delacourt as a submissive. Impossible to imagine. It was like trying to picture a lion as prey, black as white. Too contradictory of ideas.

"I was just a twenty-one-year-old university student. A shy, naïve virgin, if you can believe it.”

I couldn't.

"Tristen taught me everything. Taught me the ropes, no pun intended." She chuckled, but then immediately took another sip of vodka. "The practice fascinated me, and I didn't entirely hate it. But I think a big part of me only did it because I thought I could change him. He was such a tortured man, and I believed if I tolerated his...quirks...I could eventually change him. That's every girl's fantasy, isn't it? To tame the cold, tortured billionaire?"

"I suppose" I said.

"But he never did change. I wanted flowers and chocolates, he wanted leather and chains. We were incompatible, and I was too wrapped up in my own fantasies to see what I was getting myself into. Eventually, the control went beyond the bedroom. He became possessive. He followed me to school and work. He even tracked my phone."

My jaw dropped. "He did all that?"

She nodded. By this point she was swaying a bit, her words dripping with sadness and fatigue. I eyed nervously at the shot glass as she downed some more vodka. I wanted to take it away from her, but I could tell she needed it to wade through the memories, poke at old bruises.

"And I let him. I even didn't mind it at first. I thought he was just being adorably overprotective." She dropped her eyes and shook her head. "I was such a fool."

She took another long drag and stared out the window for several minutes before speaking again.

"But soon, I had had enough. I left him one rainy afternoon. He tried to convince me otherwise, I but I had made up my mind."

I thought I saw her tearing up again. She took a deep, sharp breath to compose herself.

"After the breakup with Tristen, I felt lost and confused. I began trying to find ways to empower myself again after having felt so helpless for so long. I turned to parties. Drinking, hookups, smoking" She half-jokingly lifted her cigarette. "A habit I've still yet to totally abandon."

I wanted to snatch the cigarette from her fingers. To snatch away her unpleasant past that still lingered with her.

"Eventually I came back to b**m. I started experimenting in the dominant role. At first, it was to spite Tristen. Trying to play the dom behind his back. But I grew fond of it. I realized I as the woman wasn't required to be the submissive. I could be the Darcy, the Rochester, the billionaire dom if I wanted to. So, I began doing so with other men. I even worked as a professional dom in underground bondage clubs to make ends meet once I left university. Tristen kept trying to bring me back, and when he found out I was still doing b**m without him, he wasn't pleased. He missed the shy, lip-biting girl I was before. He didn't like me in my new form."

She took a drag.

"Eventually, with my new identity, I had the confidence to move up the ranks in the publishing industry, and with new financial success, I started Delacourt Enterprises. Tristen kept me around, believing he could simply tame me again." Her eyes softened. "A quest he still refuses to drop to this day."

"That's why he keeps coming back to you” I said, realization filling my head. “He still sees you as his submissive, that he just needs to put you back in your place."

She nodded, then wiped her eyes.

"But the worst part is," she said. "I do keep coming back. I don't know why, but I do."

She began sniffling again and looked at me with watery eyes. “I suppose it’s because I still cling to the positive memories. The days before things went wrong. Before hewent wrong. The days the roses after s*x and feeling like I found the dream most girls only dream of. I wanted that again. I kept coming back hoping he changed, hoping it was all some unpleasant phase that could be waited through.”

Tears were streaming down her face, shimmering like ice in the moon. I wanted to comfort her, but she looked as delicate as snow, like if I touched her she would fall apart, like dust in the wind. She sniffled then turned her wet eyes to me.

"But now there is you. I no longer have to be chained to Tristen. I can find my happiness and desires in you. My angel boy."

She sat down on the bed and rubbed her hands through my hair. I curled into her touch.

"But my biggest fear is" she said. "What if I become like Tristen Grey? What if I can't control my desire for control?" The tears came down. "I almost lost control tonight. I got angry, and almost hurt you. Hurt you the wrong way for the wrong reasons."

I grabbed Rose by her shoulders, squeezing them. I tried to look her in the eyes, but they were watery and hid behind the purple of her eyelids.

"Mistress" I said to her. "You are nothing like Tristen Grey. You've shown more compassion and empathy to me in a moment than Tristen ever has in all the interactions I've seen between you two. You are nothing like him" I took her chin on my fingers. "You are a better mistress than he was ever a master."

I wiped the tears from her eyes with my thumbs.

"Mistress, if you ever went too far, I would leave" I said. "But I know you are not Tristen Grey. You would never cross the line. You came close to tonight, but you stopped yourself. Do you think Tristen would ever show that kind of self-control?"

She sniffled. "I suppose you're right."

I pressed my forehead to hers.

"I love no one in the world as much as you, Hannah" I said. "And it's because I see the goodness in your heart that I can entrust my servitude to you. My mistress."

I pressed a kiss to her forehead, a kiss she nuzzled into.

"Thomas" she said.

"Yes, my gracious goddess?"

"I want you to pleasure me"

I looked at her for a moment. "Excuse me?"

"Just this once, I want you on top. I'm a broken woman at the moment, and I need someone to make me feel better. All those feelings you say you have for me, I want you to show me them. Right now."

Every drop of blood in my veins ran to my neck and face. Rose watched me expectedly.

"Oh...alright...as you command, mistress."

I kneeled down on the floor in front of her and scooted in so her legs were on either side of me.

For a moment, I was stiff. I wasn't used to being in control, and it felt slightly unnatural. But then I saw the water in her eyes again, and I was filled with an overwhelming urge to stop her tears.

I slid my hands down her ribcage and around the hourglass curve of her waist. I gently placed my lips to her neck, then kissed down to her collarbones. She titled her head back and sighed. I pressed a kiss to her upper breast.

Then my hands began to move. Just as my lips met hers, my fingers reached for the zipper at the back of her dress, and slowly moved it down. It peeled off with ease, leaving only the black lace lingerie underneath. I reached for my throat, and removed my tie, then my shirt. I unbuckled my pants, letting them fall off with my shoes.

Hannah's hands slid around my neck as we kissed, and she pulled me back so I collapsed on top of her. That's when I felt a hurried frenzy rise in me. My kisses became more aggressive. I kissed every inch on her skin and listened to her moan. I finally peeled off my boxers then wrapped my hands around her to unclasp her bra. Once it was off, she tossed it on the ground, and I cupped my hands to her breasts, massaging them as her moans grew louder.

I loved this woman. She was my goddess, my queen, my mistress. And I wanted to pleasure her. I wanted her to rise like the sun after a cold, dark night. I slipped off her panties, then readied myself at her entrance. With a prompt, I was inside.

Both of us gasped at the impact, and I began to move. Her hot juices greeted me, sending warm convulses that pushed me forward. I began to move. Desperately. Passionately. Insatiably. Slowly at first, then aggressively getting faster. She moans urged me forward. Her nails scratched down my back, and the pain made me hungrier. I pushed harder and harder, sweating glistening on my neck.

I watched her below me. The way she bit her lip, the flush in her cheeks, her immaculate moans. Her p***y was a mine of hot liquid gold. She was enough to drive any man insane.

Her fingers fisted into my hair, and I knew we were both close. I could feel her gripping tighter, her folds closing eagerly around me. I felt tears surging in my eyes, and I began grunting and crying out with her.

"Thomas" she moaned.

"Hannah" I croaked.

We both cam. Like two gods conceiving the genesis of the universe, sending stars and galaxies spiraling out in our wake, we both cam. Sweat, cries, tears. The pounded rhythm of the bed beat against the wall. Wet flesh against wet flesh. Biting lips and biting skin. Grips that could only get harder.

"Harder" Rose croaked. "Harder! Harder!"

We exploded like fireworks. Then it all leaked out of us. I pulled out and fell on top of her. I kissed her all over while she smoothed her hands down my back.

"I love you, Hannah Steele" I said over and over. "I love you, mistress. I love you, mistress. I love you, mistress..."

For the first time in our relationship, I felt like the protective one. I held her in my arms under me, using my back as a shield to guard her against the world. I wanted to stroke her hair, kiss her, whisper in her ear to soothe the thoughts of her past that haunted her. I wanted to buy her a thousand diamonds and shower them on her. I wanted to wipe the tears from her cheeks and replace them with endless kisses from a devoted pilgrim.

Eventually, she fell asleep in my arms. I stroked the hair on the back of her head, counting her breaths, feeling her ribcage expand and delate against mine. She was so warm, her body was perfectly fitted against mine.

Now with the heat cooled, I began to think about everything she said. I finally understood the woman I had come to worship. Beneath her cool, commanding exterior was a woman still chained to a brutish man. I wanted to scour her heart, body and soul for wounds and kiss them until they healed. And parallel to that, my hatred for Tristan grew tenfold. What monster hurts a woman like her? What monster dare attempts to make a mortal of a goddess?

The chain between Hannah Steele and Tristen Grey had rusted, but neither of them had yet to break it.