He didn’t speak at first.
Neither did she.
Then he crossed the room in three strides and scooped her up as if she weighed nothing atall.
She gasped, more from surprise than protest, her hands clutching his shoulders.”Alaric?”
“Just for tonight,” he said quietly, already turning. “Don’t argue.”
She didn’t.
He carried her down the hall, into his room, and laid her on his bed with a care that didn’t match the force of his grip. He lay down beside her and pulled her against his chest, one arm locking aroundher.
He was naked, the heat of him unmistakable, and she was still in the slip, the thin fabric the only barrier as he pulled her hard against him. Her thigh slid between his, her stomach pressed to his, and she went still as she registered the thick evidence of his arousal against her hip.He didn’t move it. Didn’t grind. He just held her there, breathing carefully, control locked down so tight it shook, while her body burned with the knowledge ofhim.
He lowered his head slowly, as if giving her time to stophim.
“Just once,” he whispered, his mouth hovering a breath fromhers.
The choice landed in her chest like a crack.
She nodded.
The kiss was brief and devastating, his mouth warm against hers, nothing taken, nothing demanded. She surrendered to it anyway, melting into him for that single stolen moment, letting herself believe in the shape of his mouth and the steadiness of his hands and the way his breath shuddered when he pulledback.
No words that tried to fix anything.Just the solid, undeniable reality of him holding her as if letting go would be a mistake neither of them could survive.
She pressed her face into his chest and breathed him in, the familiar scent grounding her in a way nothing else had managed for weeks.
Her fingers curled against his chest.
His hand tightenedat herback.
They clung to each other like that, silent and unguarded, her body pressed into every solid line of him, aware of his restraint and the cost of it. The Brand eased by degrees, not disappearing but softening, loosening its grip just enough that she could finally draw a full breath without pain blooming behind her ribs. Her breathing slowed against his chest, syncing to the steady, relentless beat of his heart, and she let herself rest there, suspended in the fragile mercy of beingheld.
She didn’t ask what this meant.
He didn’t offer an explanation.
Sleep took her slowly, reluctantly, as if her body fought it even while her mind gave in. Her cheek rested over his heart, the steady, unyielding beat beneath her ear connecting her to the present, to him. She counted those beats without meaning to, letting their rhythm pull her under, letting the warmth of his body and the iron restraint in his arms convince her, at last, that she could rest because, for this one fragile night, she let the distance disappear.
For the first time in weeks, the pressure eased.
For the first time in weeks, the ache dulled into something bearable.
They stayed like that as sleep finally claimed them both, entwinedand unresolved, holding on to each other as if the night itself might steal something precious if they loosened theirgrip.
And for now, that was enough.
VIDAR LEARNED THINGSthe same way he acquired everything else in hislife.
Quietly.
Not from a press release or a family announcement. Not from a panicked call that demanded urgency. From a single line, delivered through the kind of channel that existed because men like his father builtit.
Regaining consciousness.
Two words. No punctuation. No warmth. Just a clinical update on a body that had refused to die quickly enough.
