His hand clamps around my jaw, not hard enough to hurt, but enough to shut me up.
Damn. Why is my pussy so wet from this? I should be seeing red flags not yummy green ones.
His thumb strokes along my cheekbone, causing my skin to goosebump.
“Careful,” he says softly. Too softly. “I don’t take well to being yelled at in my own house.”
The words land like a threat, but underneath something else simmers. A warning to him as much as me.
I swallow, my pulse drumming against his fingers. “Then stop treating me like I’m too fragile to hear the truth. What’s going on, Colter? Who are they? Why do they talk about you like you’re…untouchable?”
His gaze darkens, unreadable, the silence stretching long enough that I think he won’t answer. Then finally, “People like to talk.” He releases my jaw and steps back, rolling his shoulders like he’s shrugging off the weight of the question. “They see power, they invent stories. That’s all it is.”
“Bullshit.” The word is out before I can stop it.
His eyes cut back to me, sharp as a blade.
I push anyway, anger and fear tangling in my throat. “You think I haven’t noticed? The way people look at you. The way they look at me when I’m with you. Like they’re afraid, like they know something I don’t. You say one word and people move. You snap your fingers and it’s done. That’s not just money or respect, Colter. That’s?—”
“Enough.”
The word cracks like whip, and I flinch.
For a moment, the air between us is a battlefield—me daring him to admit, him daring me to stop digging. His chest rises and falls, steady but sharp, like he’s holding back something dangerous.
He leans in close, his voice low, his mouth brushing against my ear. “All you need to know is this: no one touches you. No one even looks at you wrong. Because you’re mine. And that’s all the power you’ll ever need.”
A shiver ripples down my spine, equal parts fear and something else I can’t name.
Bit isn’t not enough. Not anymore.
I force myself to meet his eyes, even though it feels like staring into a storm. “That’s not an answer, Colter. That’s a cage.”
30
Her words cut sharperthan I want to admit.That’s not an answer. That’s a cage.
I see the fire in her eyes, the ways she squares even though her hands are trembling in her lap. She’s scared, but she’s still standing her ground. Christ, she doesn’t even know what that does to me.
I drag in a breath, steadying myself before I do something I’ll regret, before I snap and shut her down the way I do everyone else. She’s not everyone else. She’s her. The woman I’m obsessed with. That I’ve been obsessed with since I saw her small and vulnerable in my father’s penthouse in L.A.
“Peyton,” I say, softer this time, her name like a rope keeping me tethered. I reach down, my thumb brushing over the inside of her wrist where her pulse is rabbiting. “I’m not trying to cage you. I’m trying to keep you safe.”
Her chin wobbles a fraction, so small most people would miss it. Not me. I notice everything about her.
“You keep saying that,” she whispers, her voice rough around the edges. “But you don’t tell me from what.”
I close my eyes for a second, weighing the truth against the ruin it would cause. If she knew, if she really knew, she’d eitherrun from me or get dragged so deep she’d never climb back out. Neither’s an option I can live with.
So, I skirt the line, the way I always do.
“There are people in this word who would use you to hurt me,” I tell her, opening my eyes again. My gaze locks on hers, steady, deliberate. “People who don’t give a dam about the cost. That’s all you need to know.”
She exhales, shaky, like she wants to argue but doesn’t have the words. I lean closer, pressing my forehead to hers, needing her to feel the truth I can’t say out loud.
“I can’t lose you, Peyton,” I murmur. My hand slides up, cupping the back of her neck, holding her like she’s the only thing keeping me alive. “So yeah, maybe it feels like a cage sometimes. But it’s the only way I know to keep you breathing.”
Her eyes flick up to mine, glassy but burning, and for once she doesn’t push. She doesn’t fight. She leans into me, her body softening in a way that tells me she’s letting go, even if just for now.
