THE DON'S CAPTIVE MISTRESS

Anything

HAZEL

I didn’t even think. I didn’t even blink. The plate was just suddenly airborne, leaving my hand with this wild, reckless freedom I didn’t even know lived inside me. And for a split second, as it cut through the air, I actually felt good. Liberated. Powerful. Like maybe, finally, I’d gotten one hit in this insane war he was waging on me for no damn reason.

But of course....of course, Axel didn’t flinch. He just tilted his head slightly, like the plate was nothing but a paper aeroplane he’d already predicted the trajectory of. It smashed against the wall behind him, shattering in a rain of porcelain that echoed through the entire room. Pieces fell to the floor like broken teeth.

My chest was heaving. My palms were sweating. My throat felt raw from the scream I hadn’t even released yet.

Axel looked at me.

No anger. No shock. No outrage.

Just that lazy, slow smile. The one that made me feel like he’d seen this coming hours before I even woke up.

“Are you done?” he asked softly.

His voice. God, that voice.

It was infuriatingly calm, like I hadn’t just thrown a plate at his face, like I hadn’t almost concussed myself on his stupid sabotaged chairs.

I swallowed hard, my whole body trembling.

“No,” I snapped. “Actually, I’m not done. I’m not even close to done. Maybe if you’d let me eat without trying to break my spine, I....”

“Sit.” That one word was like a command pressed between my ribs.

I hated how it made my skin prickle. I hated how it made something inside me react.

“I’m not sitting,” I spit out. “I’m not....”

But my knees were shaking from fury. From humiliation. From the exhaustion of pretending I could handle any of this.

I looked at the chairs—the whole row of them like a trap he’d set just for me. He’d planned this.

He wanted me here. Sitting next to him.

And something in my chest twisted so tight it hurt.

“You think I’m your toy?” I whispered. “You think I’m some puppet you can drag around and make fall whenever you feel like it?”

Axel leaned back in his chair slowly, eyes trained on me like I was the only person in the world worth watching. Worth provoking.

“I think,” he said, voice low and patient, “you’re making this more difficult than it needs to be.”

“Difficult?” I laughed, a bitter sound that cracked at the edges. “You sabotaged chairs. You made me fall. Twice.”

“You chose the wrong chairs,” he countered.

My jaw fell open. “Are you....are you serious right now?”

He didn’t answer. He didn’t have to. Because the silence that followed told me everything: He enjoyed this. The chaos. My reactions. My anger.

For a second, just a flicker, I wondered what would happen if I stopped reacting. If I walked out. If I stopped letting his stupid games get to me.

But then he said it again.

“Sit down, Hazel.”

My name in his mouth felt like a warm hand around my throat. I clenched my fists until my nails dug into my palms.

“Or what?” I asked. “You’ll break the whole damn table next?”

A beat passed.

Then another.

And Axel..... Axel Morelli actually stood up.

Slowly. Deliberately. Like a man who had all the time in the world and loved showing me that I didn’t.

He stepped around the table, closing the distance between us with the unhurried confidence of someone who thought nothing could stop him, not walls, not rules....not me.

My breath hitched, but I held my ground. Barely.

He stopped right in front of me, so close I could feel the calm heat radiating off his body.

“Last time,” he murmured, eyes locking with mine. “Sit.”

And God help me...for the first time since I met him,

I didn’t know whether I wanted to slap him……or obey him.

I raised my chin up at him as I asked, no, demanded.

“And I'm going to ask you again. Or. What?”

I looked him straight in the eyes, seeing the irritation gathering there in the corners, sharp enough to cut. A vein in his temple beat so fast it almost distracted me. We stared at each other, holding our breaths, waiting for the other to blink first. And then, silently, without warning, his hands were on me.

I squealed, shouting, the shock ripping through me as my world tilted. Suddenly my head was on his shoulder, my body bent forward, directed down toward the ground like I was some disobedient child he was disciplining. Rage flared. I started stomping, kicking, wiggling, twisting, anything to get off him.

That only earned me a sharp slap on my butt.

I froze, breath caught in my throat. He… he didn’t just spank me.

Before I could even fully process the humiliation, the heat, the disbelief, everything shifted again. One moment I was in his grasp, and the next I was being thrown or that’s what it felt like, before landing hard in the chair on his right.

He didn’t even look winded. Not a hair out of place. Not one breath is uneven. He simply adjusted his jacket with calm, casual elegance and sat down.

“Now,” he said smoothly, “let’s have a civil dinner. I already have enough on my plate. I don’t want to deal with your little tantrums.”

I pressed my lips together, biting down on the inside hard enough to stop myself from screaming.

Tantrum? I was throwing a tantrum?

He was the one who snapped the damn chairs so I wouldn't find anywhere to sit but here. And now I was the one acting childish?

He was already eating, like nothing had happened. Like I hadn’t just been manhandled and humiliated and sat down like a doll. Like he hadn’t destroyed three chairs. I looked down at my plate, perfect steak, perfect knife, perfect fork and forced myself to move.

I cut the steak. It was tender. It looked delicious. My hands were shaking, but I lifted a piece to my mouth and took a bite. When I swallowed and lifted my head, Axel was looking at me.... Smiling.

That smug, knowing, proud, arrogant smirk. The fork left my hand before I even felt the decision form.

Of course, it didn’t get him. So I threw the knife.

I didn’t even wait to see if that one landed where I wanted. I grabbed the plate, steak and all and hurled it at him. Glass shattered. Food exploded. My breathing was wild, fast, furious.

Still not enough.

I grabbed the glass next to my plate and threw it too, aiming for maximum effect, maximum chaos, maximum anything that might wipe that smirk off his face.