I could feel his hand tracing the length of my back, unhurried, reverent, sending goosebumps blooming across my skin. Sunlight spilling through the open windows, warm and forgiving.
Somewhere outside, church bells chimed. Distant, rhythmic, blending in with the hush of wind drifting through the curtains. A city waking just a few blocks from my apartment. Ordinary life moving on while we stayed suspended in this moment.
Heaven. So this is what it feels like.
"I love you," he murmured against my skin.
My eyes fluttered open, and the warmth vanished.
I shifted onto my side, swung my legs to the floor and stood. The words lingered in the air long after my voice disappeared. It felt achingly familiar, as if I had lived them before.
My chest tightened. Was it a memory? Or merely a. dream?
I dragged my hands down my face, grounding myself until I became aware of the dull, intimate ache between my legs. That was when I realized what I've done. No, what we've done. Again.
I turned towards the bed, only to realize that he was still there.
For a split second my mind refused to accept it. The way his body lay tangled in the sheets like he belonged here. One arm thrown carelessly over the pillow where my head had been moments ago. Naked. The rise and fall of his chest slow, unbothered, like this was normal.
My breath left me in a sharp gasp.
I scrambled backward, nearly tripping over my own feet as I lurched out of bed. The sheets twisted and dragged with me, as if unwilling to let go. My heart slammed violently against my ribs, panic and disbelief crashing through me all at once.
The bed told the rest of the story without mercy.
The sheets were a wreck. Wrinkled, knotted and marked with the aftermath of excess. There were evidence everywhere. Creased fabric. Damp impressions. The quiet, humiliating proof of something that hadn't stopped when it should have. Once hadn't been enough. We had surrendered to it again and again.
Three times.
Yet my body still ached with the memory of him in a way that made my stomach twist with horror. Because even as I stood there shaking, every of my nerves raw and awake, some traitorous part of me still remembered how it felt like to be his.
A low murmur drifted from the bed.
"See something you like?"
The words were rough with sleep, unguarded. Too intimate.
My head snapped up.
He hadn't even opened his eyes yet. His arm shifted beneath him, muscles rolling as he stretched like a man entirely at ease in my space. My bed. As if we hadn't just shattered something irreparable. Three times.
"You're still here," I said. My voice coming out thin, disbelieving.
His eyes opened then.
Green. Sharp. Awake faster than he should have been.
"Did you expect me to vanish?" he asked quietly.
Something inside my chest collapsed in on itself. My pulse roared in my ears as I took another step back. My thoughts tangling, spiraling, replaying fragments of the night in cruel, unforgiving flashes. His hands. His mouth. The way my body had betrayed me so completely.
He sat up slowly, his mouth curling into a grin like he was daring me to run, knowing I wouldn't. The sheets slipped down his torso, and I had to force my gaze away. Shame and heat warring violently in my stomach.
"This means nothing," I said, brushing my hair back and moving towards the bathroom. Even when I could feel his gaze on my back, darkening at my naked body. Still, I didn't care.
"On the contrary," he said, his palm bracing the bathroom door just as I tried to slam it shut. "I think this changes everything."
"No," I shook my head, backing away, need space, any space at all. I folded my arms around myself, holding myself together by sheer will. "It doesn't."
"Yes."
"Why, Alex?" The exhaustion finally bled through my anger. "Why do you care so much whether I choose you or not? Why does it matter?"
"This is where you're wrong, Princess." He moved closer, unhurried, inevitable. The cold tile pressing against my spine, my back hitting the wall, trapped between the stone and him. His fingers lifted my chin, forcing my gaze to meet with his. "I don't care about choice."
My breath stuttered.
"I don't just want you," he continued quietly. "I want to make you mine."
The words landed like a blow. Possessive. Terrifying and intimate.
"No," I whispered. "I won't let you."
His mouth brushed my ear, his voice low and certain. "But I already do."
I froze.
"You feel it," he murmured. "The way you respond. The way you always come back. Your body knows me, even when you don't want it to. So why do you fight it?"
The question wasn't sharp. It was almost weary, as if he were genuinely curious. My resistance must've puzzled him more than anger ever could. His thumb brushed once beneath my chin. Not a caress, nor a threat. Just something in between.
Slowly, deliberately, his fingers traced a path from my jaw, following the delicate curve of my neck. His touch was soft, like a feather against my bare skin, igniting a trail of shivers that spread through my like wildfire.
"You could have given in," he murmured, his voice low and thick with something deeper, something almost tender. Then his hand slid lower, teasing along the hollow of my collarbone, each movement deliberate, as if he was memorizing every inch of me. "Stop clawing for the door, and I'll grant you your deepest, darkest desire."
I exhaled, breath trembling beyond my control. "You don't know what I want," I whispered, the words spilling out faster before I could stop them.
His eyes darkened, sharp and centered solely on me.
"No?" His tone was soft, almost coaxing. His fingers brushing over the soft swell of my breasts, pinching gently in an intimate, possessive touch that made my breath hitch. "You think I don't know you crave freedom? To break free from the cage your grandfather had built around you?"
My throat tightened, caught between shock and something far more dangerous. Something raw and vulnerable. How could he have known? Because it was the truth I hadn't even dared to face, let alone voice.
I held his gaze, fierce and unflinching. Then, with a sudden surge of resolve, I pressed my palms to his bare chest and shoved him back. Not hard enough to escape, but just enough to prove that I could.
"You're wrong," I said, forcing my voice to steady while everything inside me trembled. "I don't want to break free from the cage."
His eyes darkened.
"I'm not clawing to escape," I continued, strength bleeding into my words. "One day, I'll rule it. Every fucking inch of it. Even if I have to do the impossible to get there."
Silence fell between us, charged. Electric.
Something shifted in his expression. Not surprise. Not anger. Just fire. A quiet, dangerous kind of understanding that burned hotter than any promise of freedom he could offer.
And in that moment, I realized what I had just given away.
The impossible.
I had revealed the one truth I could never afford to speak out loud.
That I couldn't bring myself to kill him.
And he knew it.