Elena slammed her chamber door shut behind her and immediately pressed her forehead to the wood.
Brilliant. Just brilliant.
She had gone down to the dungeon. Defied direct orders. Got pinned against a wall by a six-foot storm of fury and leather.
And now?
Now her body was staging a coup.
She pushed away from the door, pacing.
"This isn't real attraction," she muttered. "It's adrenaline. Hormones. Biological nonsense."
She hadn't had sex in…She paused mid-pace, counting silently.
"Wow," she whispered. "Okay. That's… longer than I thought."
No wonder her brain was staging a coup.
She sat heavily on the bed.
"Right. So this isn't about him. Obviously. This is about basic physiology."
The castle was silent. Her room dimly lit. Her pulse annoyingly loud.
She inhaled.
Exhaled.
She could do this. Reset her system. Reclaim her sanity.
She flopped back onto the mattress, staring at the ceiling like it had personally wronged her.
"Think of someone else," she commanded herself.
A famous actor.Yes. A perfectly safe fantasy.She picked one with a jawline sharp enough to open mail.
She tried—she truly did.
Except the actor's face kept… shifting.
And then there was black hair instead. And a scar along a cheekbone. And a mouth that looked carved to ruin someone's composure. And broad shoulders framed in dark leather. And the faint, intoxicating scent of pine and cold air and something unmistakably Soren.
"Nope," she whispered. "Absolutely not. Pick someone else."
She squeezed her eyes shut and tried again.
Her hand drifted lower on instinct, while the other hand was touching her breast.
One deep breath.
Two.
But the image that came was not Hollywood-safe at all.
It was Soren—
Standing close behind her as in the dungeon.Breath grazing her ear.Voice low and possessive—
"You disobeyed me."
Heat unspooled low in her belly, warm and insistent. Her hand moved again—slow at first, hesitant, then seeking, treacherously certain of its path.
A soft sound escaped her throat before she could swallow it down.
She wasn't picturing anything explicit—nothing she could admit even to herself.Just the shape of him behind her, the weight of his presence, the ghost of his breath brushing her ear. How he could fill a room without touching her at all. How her body reacted before her mind could object.
Her fingers moved with growing urgency, following the rhythm her body begged for.Pressure built—hot, pulsing, impossible to ignore.
And then her thoughts slipped—dangerously : What would it feel like if it wasn't her hand?If it were his—gloved, steady, inescapably sure—closing over her, guiding her, undoing her with the same effortless control he used everywhere else?
The image wrecked her.
"Oh—god—" she whispered, back arching off the bed.
Her pulse thundered.Heat climbed.Everything tightened in one unbearable, rising wave—
A louder sound tore from her, helpless and unguarded.
And—
Knock. Knock. Knock.
Elena ran off the bed.
She slapped a hand over her mouth, eyes wide, heartbeat detonating.
A voice came through the door.
Low. Smooth. And absolutely aware.
"Elena."
Her spine liquefied.
Of course. Of course he had to appear now, when she was mid-existential meltdown and mid-… other things.
She scrambled upright, hair a mess, cheeks flaming.
"Y-yes?" she squeaked.
A pause.
Then—because the universe hated her—
"I heard a sound," Soren said, tone maddeningly calm. "Several, actually."
OH GOD.
"That was—nothing!" she blurted. "I—I dropped… something!"
"…Multiple times?"
Kill me. Just kill me.
"I'm coming in," Soren said.
"No!" she yelped, leaping toward the door like it was a live grenade. "I mean—no, I'm not… presentable."
Silence.
Then his voice again, lower.
"Elena."
She didn't breathe.
"You may want to compose yourself. I'm not certain the walls will hide you if you… drop more things."
Her soul disintegrated.
She pressed her forehead to the door, mortified beyond the capacity for speech.
Soren's footsteps faded down the corridor.
Elena slowly slid to the floor.
"…I'm moving to another dimension," she whispered.