Chapter 145

The countdown kept chewing. Twenty. Eighteen. Ray could already feel the hallway changing in his head, the difference between sanctioned greeting and a problem. Milady felt it too. That was why she was smiling.

He swallowed it.

“Please,” Ray said. The word came out rough, pissed, unwilling. “Let go. Please.”

Milady’s laugh was quiet and delighted.

“Again.”

“Please. I’m asking. Let go before it drops.”

She held him one extra second just to be cruel, pinched once more, then opened her hands and released his wrists at the same time.

Ray stepped back like the floor had gone hot. His palms were empty. His chest still stung where she’d been playing. Milady smoothed her blouse with two fingers, ribbon still neat, like nothing had happened except she’d enjoyed herself.

Alter died.

The air changed. Not visibly. Just that wet-station humidity without the rewrite inside it. Common sense snapped back to the old kind. Hands on strangers were hands on strangers again.

Then the notification hit, cold and clean behind his eyes.

+1500 EXP

+800 Alter Points

LEVEL UP — 17

Ray flexed his fingers. The heat of her was still on them. The sting on his chest hadn’t faded either.

Milady tilted her head, already walking past him toward the darker end of the corridor.

“Good boy,” she said without looking back. “You begged pretty for a guy who just leveled up.”

“That’s enough,” Ray said.

The words came out flatter than he wanted. Level-up glow still buzzing behind his eyes, chest still stinging where she’d pinched him, hallway already feeling like regular station filth again. No alter. No greeting rule. Just the two of them and the leftover heat in his hands.

“You’re overdoing it. That was dangerous as hell.”

Milady laughed. Not guilty. Not even mildly sorry. She tucked a strand of hair back like the almost-harassment timer had been a joke she’d already filed away.

“Aw. The slave grew a conscience at level seventeen.”

“I’m serious.”

“I know.” She turned toward the exit like the argument was already boring. “Come on. We’re going home.”

Ray stared at her. “Huh? Home? Good girls don’t stay out playing at night, yeah?”

That got her. A small sound in her throat, almost a scoff, almost fond. She looked back over her shoulder, eyes bright in the bad light.

“Hmm? Don’t want a more interesting reward?”

Before he could answer she hooked two fingers in her blouse and tugged it down. Not all the way. Just enough. The ribbon slackened. The small split of her chest opened under the station lamps, tight, pale, the kind of cleavage that didn’t spill so much as cut a clean line and dare him to look away.

Ray swallowed.

He was already hard. Had been since she’d put her hands on him and made him beg. The warning in his head was still there—too far, too risky, the other her waiting behind this one like a second loaded clip—but his body didn’t care about the briefing. She’d told him straight, more than once: the bitchy version was the lid. If she stopped being cruel, the other one started climbing. So she stayed sharp. Stayed mean. Stayed the kind of woman who would hold a timer over his head and smile.

And Ray, against every clean instinct he still had, liked the fight in it.

“You’re insane,” he said.

“And you’re staring.” She didn’t pull the blouse back up. “Home. Or you can stand here lecturing me with a hard-on like a boy who just discovered rules.”

He hated how easy the choice was.

Ray followed.

They cut through the side corridor, past the smell of old tile and cigarette heat, her heels clicking like she owned the leftover night. Every few steps he caught that pulled-down line of her chest and felt the mission high twist into something dumber. Toxic. He knew it. She’d named it out loud the first time the other personality almost took the wheel. This version of her kept the leash short on purpose. He kept walking anyway, because a relationship with no challenge would’ve bored him to death and she knew that too.

At the station doors she glanced back, blouse still sitting wrong, small cleavage still on offer like a private punchline.

“Good,” Milady said. “Obedient looks better on you than righteous.”

Ray exhaled through his teeth. “Don’t push it.”

She smiled like that was exactly what she planned to do the second they got home.

They barely made it through the door.

Ray dropped onto the sofa like his legs had finally remembered the station, the fifteen greetings, the timer, the level-up. One second of sitting. That was all he got.

Milady was already on him.

She climbed into his lap hard enough the cushion barked, grabbed his jaw, and kissed him like she was trying to erase the lecture he’d started in the hallway. Aggressive. Open-mouthed. Teeth first, then tongue. Her hands were already at his shirt, yanking it open, buttons popping wrong, palms dragging down his chest where she’d pinched him twenty minutes ago.

Ray jerked. “The hell—”

She broke the kiss just far enough to look at him, blouse still tugged low from earlier, small cleavage right in his face.

“Hmm? Not happy?”

He opened his mouth.

She slapped him.

Not a full swing. Sharp enough to snap his head sideways and shut the answer down. Heat bloomed across his cheek while she was already standing, already shoving her slacks and underwear down in one impatient motion. The pants hit the floor. She didn’t give him the courtesy of a pause.

Her fingers twisted in his hair and pulled.

Ray went off the sofa hard, knees hitting the rug, mask still on from habit until the yank made it pointless. Milady stayed over him, one hand locked in his hair, the other holding herself open as she stepped her feet apart. No teasing angle. No slow reveal. Just her pussy in his face, already wet, already shining in the cheap apartment light.

Ray stared for half a second, then the smirk found him anyway.

“Hmm? So you were already horny?”

Milady’s grip tightened. She dragged him forward until his mouth almost touched her.

“Eat me.”

Not a request. The same voice she’d used when she made him beg in the hallway, only hungrier now, the cruel lid slammed down tight so the other her wouldn’t get a turn. Ray could smell her. Warm. Wet. Station dust still clinging to both of them.

He should’ve pushed back. He didn’t.

He leaned in.

Ray had his mouth on her when the thought finally cut through.

Sugar mommy.

The rumor had been sitting in the back of his head since the station, half-joke, half-static. He’d been too busy counting tits and chasing a mission timer to pin it down. Now he was on his knees in their apartment, face buried between Milady’s thighs, and the question showed up stupid and loud.

He pulled back.

Milady’s breath hitched, pissed already. Her hand was still in his hair.

“Why’s there a sugar mommy rumor?” Ray asked, voice rough against her skin. “I never got that part.”

The temperature in the room dropped.

Not alter-drop. Not game-drop. Her face changed. The teasing lid cracked and what came through wasn’t the usual mean little smile. It was real irritation, tight around the mouth, eyes gone sharp like he’d reached into a drawer she hadn’t given him.

She yanked his hair hard enough his scalp burned.

“Respect your master.”

Ray blinked up at her. “I’m asking a question.”

“And I’m telling you to finish.” She didn’t look playful. Didn’t look like she was performing the bitchy version to keep the other one sealed. She looked actually angry. “You don’t get to stop in the middle, wipe your mouth, and start an interview. Eat. When this is done, I’ll tell you everything.”

That last line should’ve sounded like a reward. It didn’t.

Ray stayed there a second longer than he should have, her wetness still on his lips, the off-feeling crawling up his neck. This wasn’t the usual leash-tug. This was her closing a door with her whole body.

“Milady—”

“Don’t.” Her voice went flat. “You want answers, earn them. Right now you look like a slave who forgot where his mouth belongs.”

He felt it then, clear as the level-up chime from earlier: she wasn’t acting. Whatever sat under that rumor, she didn’t want it in the air while she was standing over him half-naked and open.

Ray exhaled once, pissed and uneasy, then leaned back in because the alternative was watching her get colder.

Milady’s grip stayed locked in his hair, not guiding anymore. Holding him there like the question had been an insult.

Ray stopped being careful.

Whatever off-feeling was still sitting in his gut didn’t leave, but it stopped running the show. He grabbed the backs of her thighs, yanked her closer, and put his mouth back on her like the question had pissed him off too. No testing licks. He dragged his tongue through her, slow at first only to find the angle, then harder, flatter, eating her with the same stubborn focus he’d used counting to fifteen in that station.

Milady’s breath broke.

“There,” she muttered, not soft. “Finally acting like you want it.”

He sucked her clit between his lips and flicked it, then did it again when her hips jumped. Her wetness smeared his chin. He pushed two fingers into her without asking, felt how easy she took them, how hot she was already, and hooked forward until her knee buckled against his shoulder.

Milady laughed once, shaky and mean. “Bold now? Because I slapped you or because you want the story that bad?”