章 32: A standoff

Eve frowned. The sound of warning bells in her head intensified. It was becoming clearer with every second that Victor wasn't in the rightest state of mind. She had never seen him to act as threateningly as now. The metaphorical thunderclouds hanging over his head were almost visible, and it looked like the lightning could appear from them at any moment.

"Get a hold of yourself!" Eve barked at him. In the past, Victor had always backed off when met with resistance; Eve hoped he would do it this time, too.

Victor did not, could not back off. It was too late for phrasing for his sanity—it has lost the fight already. He was filled with the urge to make Eve agree with him by force—a mental one, but a force nonetheless. The only thing he could do to stop himself from taking her free will away was to attempt to scare her into giving up on her own.

He made another step forward. Now Eve was only an arm's distance away. Victor's voice was icier than the dark emptiness of open space. "Do. As. I. Say."

Eve swallowed, feeling her hands covering in a cold sweat. Her attempt to deal with Victor did the opposite of what she intended. 'Reasoning, arguing, and ordering him all didn't work. What else could I do? Cajole him?' Eve wasn't any good at that, but she felt deep in her gut that if she won't pacify Victor right now, the situation might even turn violent—and he was stronger than her, no matter how did she look at it.

"Listen, I'd be glad to listen to you at any other time, but this is important, Victor. We had already agreed on the testing plan, and I don't want you to mess it up because of a sudden burst of emotion. I just follow your previous words. When you calm down, you will agree with me too," Eve said. She was a poor actress—while she tried to act meek, there was a harsh undertone in her voice.

Victor heard it as clearly as he heard her underlying motives. Her insincerity only made him feel worse. Eve had only followed—voluntarily—her own reasoning. He knew she didn't believe her own words and knew that even she knew he won't believe them. There was a tinge of helplessness coming from her thoughts and actions, but more than there there was determination to stand for her ideas no matter what.

He made one more step towards her, coming close enough that Eve's chest touched his whenever she took a breath. To his surprise and anger, she still stood her ground, not moving even a step back. Victor leaned towards her face, burning her with his glare. "No."

Even Eve herself didn't know where her sudden bravery came from. Maybe her recent experiences hardened her nerves. Or maybe she was just too irked to agree with Victor, even if it spelled danger. Either way, even if her heart beat two hundred times per minute and her hands shook under the pressure of Victor's presence, her spine didn't bend.

Since the cajoling didn't work, there were no reasons to pretend further. When Eve spoke again, her voice was cool and steely. "I'm doing this for myself, for you and for science. Any single one of these reasons is enough to keep disagreeing with you."

Victor was close enough to Eve that her breath tickled his face with each word. When he did a deep inhale, he could even feel a whiff of scent from her body—not dirt or sweat, but a clean scent of a woman. Suddenly, his thoughts made a turn in another direction. His eyes dropped to Eve's lips. 'There is more than a single way to dominate a person…'

Before he could even try to stop himself, his body already moved. Victor dived in, pressing his lips on hers. His hand grabbed the back of Eve's head, not letting her move away as he licked and nipped and bit on them, falling deeper and deeper into the whirlpool of the sensations with each second.

It must have been his long abstinence, but Victor would've sworn that it was the best kiss in his life. Eve's lips were every bit as soft and warm as they looked. Their position forced her chest to plaster against his—it wasn't big enough to interfere, but was big enough to be noticeable. Without thinking, Victor's other hand fell on Eve's thin waist and followed the alluring lines of her figure to her hip. His body was burning with inner fire.

Eve was too shocked to respond or even think. Her mind was absolutely blank—she could only feel. She never expected for this standoff to end like it did. Victor kissed her as if he wanted to eat her, and Eve had never been on the brunt of a kiss so intense in her life (not that had a lot of kisses to compare with). His bites stung, but his lips soothed; the combination made her heart beat with something other than fear. The heat of his hand burned her skin even through her clothes.

Then Eve finally regained her sanity. Her body moved on its own as she drove her knee into Victor's groin. He gasped and bended in pain, letting Eve go. Before he could resist, she continued the combo with a strike to the back of his head and a submission hold on his arm. Only when he was lying face in the ground, unable to move without dislocating his arm, did Eve stop.

"What are you doing?!" Her voice was full of incredulousness and fury in equal parts. Eve took a deep breath to calm herself down, but it was only partially successful. "I should've listened to Xia better. Men really are worse than dogs! How did I miss the moment when your brain had turned into mush, Victor?"

'I can't believe I would need Xia's self-defence moves so soon. And because of him, of all people.' Eve groaned inwardly. She could still feel the moistness of Victor's saliva on her lips, but had no free hands to clean it unless she let him free—and she wasn't going to.

At the same time, pinned by her knee, Victor was lying on the ground, drowning in guilt that washed away all other emotions. He couldn't believe himself—not only did he physically assaulted another person, it was a sexual assault! It was a good thing she knew so well how to protect herself, but what if she didn't? What he would've done? What he would do if his rash actions and lack of self-control just ruined all Eve's desire to help him? He had no excuses for what he had done.

Not hearing an answer, Eve grit her teeth. "I didn't think that I would need to spell it out, but there can be no romantic interactions in work time, and no romantic relations between researchers and test subjects. More than that, I'm not interested!"

"I deeply regret my actions, Doctor Ziffer," Victor said, his emotionless voice muffled a little by the ground.

Eve made another deep sigh. It, coupled with her angry speech, finally allowed her to regain her composure. "If you can't control yourself under certain circumstances to this extent, you must tell me beforehand so we could come up with countermeasures."

Victor's eyes widened in surprise. He could read the answer in Eve's thoughts, but he still couldn't help but ask, just to make sure. "You still want to continue the tests?"

Eve pursed her lips. "Of course. It was just a minor setback. Though now I think you need a therapy more than my help. Too bad that most of the psychotherapists are dead."

Victor couldn't believe how calm she was in this situation. With that knowledge, he could only give up. For once, he had no desire to argue with her—quite the opposite. The very idea of going into another similar standoff right now was terrifying enough to even keep his OCD at bay, though he didn't know how long that would last. What he knew, though, is that it would be impossible for him to forget the taste of Eve's lips.

"Then I will follow your words, or at least try my best to," he said in a heavy voice.

Only after these words Eve had finally let him out of the submission hold. She immediately made several steps back, but Victor had no inclinations to shorten the distance between them when he got up. There were no traces of previous anger on his face, only the visible guilt in his eyes. Eve was still too irked to feel pity for him. Besides, she knew many criminals felt very guilty about their crimes too—and still kept doing them.

'Maybe I should make him a shock collar.'

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