For a house made of stone and shadows, it was warm.
Not normal warm — not the way radiators hum or sunlight filters through windows. No, this was... inside-the-skin warm. Like the walls exhaled and I was breathing something old and soft and a little dangerous.
Like her.
She walked ahead of me, silk brushing the floor, hips swaying like she didn't know I was looking.
She knew.
Of course she knew.
Her bare feet made no sound on the marble, but the house seemed to move with her—floorboards straightening beneath her steps, shadows tightening against the corners. The air thickened.
I should've left.
Should've turned and walked straight back out the way I came.
But I didn't.
She led me into a long hall lined with books and flickering candles. The air smelled like firewood and flowers I couldn't name — soft and spiced and strange. I could feel the house breathing again. Like it recognized me. Like it was... pleased.
That was worse.
She glanced over her shoulder. "You're quiet."
"I remember what happened the last time I opened my mouth," I muttered.
She smiled. It did something to me. Made the air in my lungs turn heavier, like I'd swallowed smoke.
"You're learning," she said.
I tried not to stare.
I really did.
But the silk clung. The low dip of the back showed the smooth line of her spine, the slope of one hip, the edge of—
Stop it.
Too late.
Her head tilted just enough to let me know she heard that thought.
Shit.
She pushed open a door and stepped into a room I'd never seen before.
It wasn't what I expected.
No chandelier. No velvet drapes. Just a fireplace, a wooden desk, and a faint hum in the air like someone had just left the room moments before.
She turned, and for a second I didn't move.
Because she was framed by firelight.
Because the silk clung just right.
Because I remembered how it felt to press my hands to her skin and hear her gasp my name like she owned it.
"Sit," she said, motioning to the chair by the desk.
I sat.
The leather was warm. The house had been expecting me.
She pulled open a drawer, drew out a black velvet pouch, and dropped it on the desk in front of me. I didn't reach for it.
"What is it?" I asked.
"Enough to pay your bills," she said. "For a while."
I stared at it. Then at her.
"What do you want for it?"
Her smile didn't reach her eyes. "Don't insult me. You already know the answer."
I swallowed.
"I'm not here to sell myself."
"No," she said, stepping closer, "you're here because the world out there doesn't want you. But I do."
Heat bloomed under my skin.
Not lust. Not just lust.
Shame. Want. Memory.
"I can leave whenever I want," I said quietly.
She didn't blink. "Then why haven't you?"
The room shifted around us.
The candle flames bent inward. The shadows grew deeper. The house was listening.
She reached for me — not roughly, not sweetly. Just... deliberately.
Her fingers brushed my jaw, the bruise there half-faded from a fight I barely remembered.
"You don't have to fight," she said. "Not here. Not with me."
Her thumb traced the corner of my mouth. My breath hitched.
I hated that she could make me unravel with nothing but a touch.
And I hated more that I wanted her to.
She touched my jaw like I was fragile.
Like she knew what I'd been through, and worse — like she knew what was still coming.
Her fingers were cool, smooth. Not cold. Not lifeless. Just... steady. Like she wasn't afraid of breaking anything, because everything in the room already belonged to her.
Including me.
I should've stepped back. Said something sharp. Cut the moment before it got out of hand.
But I didn't.
Because her eyes were on me — dark garnet, deep and still like wine that's seen too many years. Watching. Waiting. Knowing.
"I should go," I said, and it came out low. Too quiet.
She didn't move. "You won't."
And the worst part? She was right.
Her breath skimmed my mouth. Jasmine. Spice. Something older, darker — like secrets wrapped in velvet.
My hands curled at my sides. I didn't trust myself to touch her. Didn't trust what would happen if I did.
She pressed a hand to my chest, right over the heart I'd spent years pretending didn't feel much anymore.
"You burn," she whispered. "No matter how you hide it."
I couldn't breathe. Not properly. Not with her this close. Not with the fire curling low and hot in my gut like it had always been waiting for her.
"And you like that?" I rasped.
She leaned in, her mouth brushing my ear. "I crave it."
And then she kissed me.
Not soft.
Not slow.
Not the way women kiss men they like.
She kissed me like she remembered me from a past life and was furious it took me this long to find her again.
Her mouth crushed mine, not out of desperation—but possession. Heat. Hunger. And something older beneath it, coiled deep, like memory. Like history. Like she'd kissed her way through centuries and could still tell the difference between lust and something that would burn.
But this?
This didn't feel like any of them.
This felt like she wanted to forget them all.
Her fingers curled into my hair, sharp and urgent, pulling me closer like I'd dared wander too far. I let her. Couldn't have fought her if I tried.
The world narrowed to the wet press of her lips, the scrape of her teeth, the press of her thighs against mine. She moved us back—one deliberate step at a time—until the back of my knees hit something soft.
The couch.
She pushed.
I fell.
The velvet cushions caught me, but I barely noticed. Because the only thing I saw—the only thing I could see—was her.
Seraphine.
Climbing into my lap like this had been decided long before I was even born.
Her knees slid to either side of my hips, robe parting at the thigh, showing me just enough to make my pulse riot. My hoodie hit the floor. Her robe slipped down one shoulder, then the other.
And fuck.
Her skin.
Gold and dark and endless, kissed by firelight and shadow like she'd been sculpted out of smoke and slow-burning heat. The kind of body that made poets forget how to write.
She leaned down, slow enough to be cruel, and her lips brushed my jaw. Then my throat. Then lower.
I swallowed a sound that nearly broke me. Didn't want to give her the satisfaction.
She didn't need it.
She heard it anyway.
She always did.
"I could ruin you," she whispered against my collarbone.
Already have, I wanted to say.
"Maybe I want that," I breathed.
She laughed, low and dangerous, and rolled her hips once—just enough to make me twitch beneath her.
My hands shot to her waist. Tight. Anchoring. Needing something to hold or I'd float right out of my skin.
And then I stopped thinking.
The room faded. The fire cracked. The house groaned like it knew what was happening.
She devoured me.
Not rushed. Not frantic. Just... complete.
Every kiss felt like it was meant to erase someone else. Every slow grind of her hips like she was rewriting me. Her mouth returned to mine again and again, never quite sated, as if she wanted to memorize every shape my lips could make against hers.
Her body met mine in a rhythm so slow it hurt. Like worship. Like sin.
My fingers fisted in the couch. My head tipped back. Her name threatened to crawl up my throat even though I still didn't know it.
All I knew was that this wasn't just sex.
This was possession.
This was the holy kind of wrong.
She moved like she didn't need permission. Like gravity answered to her. Like the velvet heat between her thighs was designed to bring men to their knees—and I had the audacity to be seated.
Her breasts brushed my chest, soft and full and maddening.
I kissed her throat. Bit her shoulder. Clutched her hips and tried to ground myself in her flesh.
It didn't work.
I was gone.
She picked up pace—just slightly. Just enough to push me closer to the edge while keeping me dangling there. Watching. Feeling. Unmade.
When I finally came, it was with a broken gasp into her mouth, my whole body locking, my hands buried in her hair.
She didn't stop.
She kept moving, kept rolling her hips until her eyes fluttered closed and she broke.
Her thighs clenched. Her back arched. And she came with a sound that sounded too much like my name and not enough like mercy.
After, I lay there.
Ruined.
Sweat cooling on my skin. My heart trying to pound its way out of my chest.
She curled against me, one leg draped over mine, robe half-pulled on, half-forgotten.
The fire burned low, casting her in soft embers. Her body glowed. Her scent still coated my skin—jasmine and clove and something dangerous.
My back burned from her nails. My neck tingled from her bite. My thighs ached like I'd run a marathon and lost.
She stretched beside me—arms over her head, back arching, breasts rising with no shame at all. And why should she be ashamed?
She'd won.
She didn't cover herself. Didn't pretend modesty.
She existed—like a flame. Unapologetic.
I tried not to stare.
Failed.
Her eyes caught mine—red wine-dark, gleaming, amused.
"You're loud when you're trying not to be," she murmured, slipping her robe over her arms.
I swallowed. "You're smug when you know you've just ruined a man."
She smiled like a sin made flesh. Slow. Deep. Satisfied.
And the worst part?
She wasn't wrong.