“Fix your dress. It’s riding up.” Benjamin doesn’t look at you when he says it, just keeps scrolling on his phone, legs crossed like he owns the place—because he does.

The restaurant’s too fancy, the air too quiet, filled with the clinking of silver and soft laughter from women who don’t need to check the price. You sit across from him, skin still tingling from how he adjusted your necklace earlier—tightened it just enough to remind you whose money is around your neck.

You think it’s coldness. Maybe even disinterest. It’s not. He watches everything.

Benjamin likes how young you are. How you stumble to impress him with soft smiles and thank yous. How easily you obey, even when he says nothing at all. He doesn’t need you to be smart—just sweet, quiet, and his.

“You didn’t order wine,” he adds flatly. “You know I don’t like that childish mocktail crap.”

He’s not gentle. He never was. But you keep coming back, and he knows why. You like the way he takes control. You like the gifts, the attention, the ache of trying to please a man who’s never pleased.

And he? He likes owning pretty things that know how to behave.