The hallway goes quiet again. I can sense him before I see him, a shift in the air, the static of his focus landing on me.
He stands in the bedroom doorway, shoulder propped against the frame, arms folded. His eyes are bottomless, but I know by now how many things live in them: threat, tenderness, appetite, and a vulnerability so sharp it sometimes hurts to look at.
He wears nothing but a pair of low, drawstring pajama bottoms, the fabric riding the point of his hipbones, clinging to the muscle of his thighs. His torso is sculpted, so fucking perfect, he could be a model for a painting on perfection. The faint trail of dark hair runs from his navel down, and I know exactly where it leads.
To the bulge starting to form the longer he looks at me.
His hair is still fucked from sleep and the pool last night, falling over one eye in a way that should look ridiculous but instead looks deliberate. Like he engineered the entire universe to make sure he’d see me like this, naked but for a tangle of sheets and my own shuddering heartbeat.
He doesn't speak. He just looks at me, letting the silence breathe, and in that space I remember how to want.
I pull the sheet up, mostly to have something in my hands, but he frowns.
He crosses the room in three steps and sits on the edge of the bed, his palm grazing my ankle as he perches.
"You’re awake," he says.
It’s so obvious, so stupid, that I want to laugh.
Instead, I say, "Were you worried I wouldn't be?"
He shrugs, but his fingers tighten around my ankle. "You slept hard. Barely moved. I checked."
"That's not creepy at all."
He smirks. "Better than the alternative. I’ll never let you out of my vicinity again."
I flush, liking the protective edge that oozes from him.
"I’m not going anywhere," I say. The words are too big a promise to truly keep, but he takes them anyway.
"Good," he says, and traces a finger along the instep of my foot. "Breakfast is coming. You should eat. You were… depleted last night."
He means it as a joke, but I see the flash of something behind his eyes—worry, maybe. Or guilt.
I sit up, the sheet falling away, and I let him look. For the first time in my life, it doesn't feel like a violation. It feels like being seen.
He leans forward, hair falling into his eyes, and brushes the ghost of a kiss against my knee.
"You feeling okay this morning? After everything?"
I nod, running my own hands over my body.
"I liked it," I say. “All of it.” It comes out softer than I want, but it's true.
He looks up at me then, his smile not cruel, but proud.
He stands and offers his hand. "Come with me. I want you to see the city from the balcony in the day."
I take it, and he pulls me from the bed, tangle of hair and limbs, and leads me outside.
It is warmer this morning, like the world is righting itself after the deep evil has been cleansed. A sigh escapes me as he wraps his arms around me, pressing my naked back against the warmth of his chest. I feel every inch of him, every inch that was inside me, and it makes me ache in ways I never learned to name.
We stand like that, looking out at the world we’ve stolen, and I realize I’m not afraid anymore.
Not of him. Not of myself. Not even of what comes next.
His voice is at my ear, low and dangerous. "You’re never going back to who you were, you know."
