Crossing lines (Noah and Aiden) novel Chapter 18

Chapter 18

Noah

Let me be perfectly clear from the start: I wasn’t agreeing to anything. Not really. I wasn’t yielding, surrendering, or even committing. The only thing I was doing was maybe—just maybe—considering the idea of asking a few questions. Purely out of curiosity, for the sake of understanding. That was it.

Right.

But if I found myself even slightly intrigued—if I was remotely open to hearing him out—it was because he made it sound completely different from the BDSM I’d seen portrayed in movies. You know, the kind that always seemed like it involved a safe word, a chiropractor on call, and possibly an ambulance waiting nearby.

This?

This felt… different. Controlled. Intense. Commanding.

And, honestly, the man himself smelled like control. Like power wrapped in a tailored suit.

Still, I wasn’t saying yes.

I just didn’t say no.

And maybe, just maybe, my eyes betrayed me as they lingered on him like he’d just invented fire and was about to teach me how to roast marshmallows over it. But that was purely innocent curiosity. Totally platonic. Academically interested. Except for the fact that my body—specifically that rebellious part of it—wasn’t exactly getting the memo on platonic.

So when he gave me that slow, approving nod, the kind that suggested I’d passed some unspoken test, I didn’t let it inflate my ego too much.

Well, not entirely.

He rose from his chair, moving with the grace and precision of a panther dressed in a perfectly tailored suit. I couldn’t help but watch every calculated step.

Sue me.

The way his muscles flexed beneath his shirt, the exactness of his posture—it stirred something irrational inside me. Something that felt far from straight.

He opened the drawer beside the desk and pulled out a folder. Thick, neat, dark blue, and printed on high-quality paper.

“Next,” he said, setting it carefully on the table between us, “you read this.”

I blinked, stunned. Surely he wasn’t serious?

Spoiler alert: He was.

—

“It’s a contract,” he explained, his voice calm and deliberate. “Non-binding for now. You’re not signing anything tonight. You take it with you, read every word, study it if you need to. Then you come back with real questions.”

I stared at the folder as if it might suddenly sprout legs and crawl up my shirt.

A contract. For this. For me.

I could almost feel my soul slipping out of my body for a moment.

He didn’t flinch. “It outlines expectations. Hard limits. Soft limits. Safe words. Responsibilities—yours and mine. You’ll see my structure, my protocol, my rules. What’s negotiable, and what’s not.”

Because maybe… it was.

In the end, I took it.

Of course I did.

—

江 零国

For the next four—no, maybe five—definitely six hours, I devoured that folder, reading every page as if my entire existence depended on it.

Let’s be honest: I didn’t understand half of it. But I read it anyway. Thoroughly. With Google open in an incognito tab, and one hand occasionally smacking my forehead in disbelief.

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