My cheeks burned. My stomach clenched with want so sharp it frightened me.
His hands tightened at my waist, then slid back to my skirts, lifting them higher now, not with violence, but with urgency beginning to fray at the edges.
Not tearing.
Not damaging.
But no longer leisurely.
Once the last barrier was gone, he went still.
Not because the heat had faded.
Because it had become too much.
His gaze dropped. Took me in. The look on his face struck something in my chest so fierce I could hardly bear it, reverence tangled with hunger, as though he could not decide whether to worship or devour.
“God,” he breathed. The word was his ruin.
His hips shifted.
A controlled press at first. A measured friction meant to be nothing more than proof. His mouth found the sensitive spot beneath my ear, and he nipped my skin, not playful, not teasing, but as though the restraint was slipping through his fingers.
I shuddered so hard I had to clutch his shoulders to keep from falling.
For a moment he held there, pressed close, his entire body taut with discipline.
But my response betrayed me. I moaned as my body arched into him without permission, chasing more, begging without words.
And Steele froze.
The line had been reached.
His breath stuttered. His fingers dug into my waist. He pressed his forehead briefly to mine, eyes closing hard. When he spoke, his voice had changed, stripped of teasing and all pretense.
“I have to stop,” he said hoarsely. “If I don’t, I will not be able to.”
The words landed like a blow. Like a vow.
With hard-won effort, he stepped back, his hands leaving me as though it cost him to let go. My skirts fell in disarray, my petticoats loosened and indecent in a way they had never been with a man.
I swayed, breathless.
He looked at me once more, gaze fierce and pained all at once.
“Remember,” he said, voice low enough to feel like possession. “When the dreams come, remember this.”
He reached for the door, then paused, turning back once as though he could not bear to leave without giving me one last certainty.
“You are not alone in this,” he said. “Not ever again.”
Then he was gone.
I remained where I was, one hand pressed to my lips, the other over my heart.
The sounds from outside the room reached me as the house returned to order.
But inside me, everything had changed.
