The cool air raised goosebumps along her arms, asharp contrast to the heat still radiating from her core. Water dripped from her hair, trailing down her spine, every drop like a caress. She was hyperaware of everything—the firm press of his palm against her lower back, the flex of muscle in his arm as he steadied her, the way his breathing had gone shallow and careful in that way that meant he was holding himselfback.
Her feet left wet prints on the stone, then the hardwood, markingtheir path like evidence. Like proof they were here, alive. That they were moving toward something neither of them was naming, but both of them needed with a desperation that made her chest tight.
The house wrapped around them, dim and quiet, as he led her through the halls she barely registered. She was too focused on him, on the water still beading on his skin, on the way his hand never left her even though he was being so careful not to pull or demand. She caught glimpses of their reflection in darkened windows as they passed, two naked, bruised bodies moving through shadow, and the intimacy of it hit her like awave.
They weren’t just naked. They were stripped bare in every way that mattered.
When they reached his bedroom, he paused at the threshold.
“Wait here,” he said, his voice rougher than usual.
Sera watched him disappear into the bathroom, heard the sound of cabinets opening, the soft rustle of fabric. When he returned, he carried an armful of thick, pristine towels, and something in her chest cracked at the tenderness implicit in the gesture.
He set all but one on the bed, then approached her slowly, giving her everychance to stophim.
She didn’t.
Alaric unfolded the first towel with methodical care and draped it over her shoulders, wrapping her in warmth. His hands lingered there, squeezing gently, and the heat of his palms seeping through the terrycloth into her skin. The simple gesture made her throat tight. After everything they’d been through tonight—the violence, the fear, the brutal certainty of mortality—this tenderness was almost unbearable.
He stepped back just enough to meet her eyes, and what she saw there made her breath catch. Need and restraint warring in equal measure, both held in check by sheer force ofwill.
“Tell me if I hurt you,” hesaid.
It wasn’t a request. It was a demand wrapped in concern, and hearing it sent warmth cascading through her chest.
“I will,” she promised.
He nodded once, then began to dry her with a focus that stole her breath. His hands moved over her shoulders with careful reverence, the towel absorbing water while his fingers traced the shape of her through the fabric. Each stroke was thorough, as if he were memorizing the landscape of her body. When he reached her arms, he liftedeach one slowly, drying from shoulder to wrist with long, thorough strokes that made her skin sing with awareness.
Sera watched his face as he worked, watched the intensity there, the absolute concentration. This was Alaric in his element, focused, meticulous, leaving nothing to chance. Except now that laser focus was trained entirely on her, and the effect was devastating.
Her breath hitched when he knelt.
Alaric glanced up at her, those ice-blue eyes dark with heat, and the floor tilted beneath her feet. He held her gaze as he draped the towel over one leg, his hand sliding down her thigh with exquisite slowness. The warmth of his palm emanated through the fabric, his fingers strong and capable as they traced over her knee, along her calf with devastating attention. Every touch was careful. Every touch burned.
When he switched to her other leg, his lips brushed the inside of her knee, so quick she almost thought she’d imagined it. Almost. But the heat that bloomed from that single point of contact was very real, pooling low in her belly and spreading outward in waves.
Her hand found his shoulder for balance, fingers digging in reflexively, and tension coiled beneath his skin, restraint that was costing him. His muscles werelike stone under her palm, rigid with the effort of going slow, of being gentle, of not taking what they both knew he wanted.
What they both wanted.
He rose slowly, the towel trailing up her body as he did, drying her stomach, her sides. When he reached her ribs, he paused, his hand hovering just above the bruises blooming purple and green across her skin. She could see the war playing out across his features. Desire versus concern, need versus the fear of causing herpain.
“Here?” he asked, his voice dropping to something deep and unguarded.
“Tender,” she admitted, because lying would help neither of them. “But touch me anyway.”
The muscles in his face tightened. “Sera—”
“Please.”
The word broke something in him. She saw it flash across his face, saw the exact moment his careful control fractured just slightly, before he banked it with visible effort. But his hand settled against her ribs with exquisite gentleness, the towel soft between his palm and her bruised skin. He dried her so carefully it was almost unbearable, each movement precise, while heat built low in her belly with maddeningintensity.
She could feel his breath against her skin, warm and unsteady, could feel the tremor in his fingers that he couldn’t quite suppress. He was unraveling, and knowing she had that effect on him, on Alaric Severin, who was in charge of everything and everyone, sent a surge of power through her veins.
When he reached her breasts, his hands faltered.
She watched his throat work as he swallowed hard, watched his chest rise and fall with increasingly ragged breaths, his gaze dropping to where the towel draped across her chest. The fabric moved with each of her increasingly unsteady breaths, and she saw the exact moment his discipline began to fray. Saw hunger replace restraint in those gorgeouseyes.
