She pulled out her phone.
“What are you doing?” I murmured, low and careful, my lips brushing her temple.
She didn’t look at me when she answered. Just smiled faintly and kept scrolling, thumb slow and unhurried, as if she wasn’t currently sitting in my lap with my cock pressed hot and aching against her.
“Lucy asked for proof earlier. Monaco bruises,” she said lightly. “She said she doesn’t remember seeing them when we met at that club after the race.”
I barely heard her. I was too busy fading slowly as she shifted, the friction enough to make my pulse jackhammer. I glanced around the table. Everyone was deep in their own drinks and conversations, too loud and distracted to notice the obscene tension coiled between my legs.
Then she stilled.
My eyes trailed down the side of her face, her throat to watch her swallow, her chest to see the swell of her breasts as she inhaled sharply, then down to her phone.
She wasn’t staring at the Monaco bruises.
She was staring at a video. I blinked once, leaned in without thinking, then blinked again. I realized what she’d opened, and the room vanished.
Mirrored walls. Harsh white light. The unmistakable stretch of a hotel gym. Her body was mid-motion on the screen, strong, fluid, sweat-sheened. Familiar in a way that made something deep in my chest twist.
And then—me. Not the version of me sitting here now with a wedding ring biting into my finger.
The other one.
The one who ran.
I saw myself step into frame, breathless, determined, hair damp with sweat, shoulders heaving like I’d just finished a race instead of sprinting across Monte Carlo because I couldn’t stand not touching her for another second.
The video had no sound, but my body remembered it anyway.
The burn in my legs. The snap inside my chest when I saw her. The moment my mind shut off and something more dangerous took the wheel.
I’d known then. Not clearly, but I’d known. I was already lost in her orbit.
My fingers tightened reflexively where they rested on her waist. My pulse roared in my ears. God, I could feel it all over again. The hunger, the recklessness, the way my entire life had pivoted on the simple truth that she existed and I would cross cities by foot to reach her.
Her phone dipped slightly, just enough that the angle changed. Just enough that I caught a glimpse of her face in the reflection—flushed, eyes dark, lips parted like she was reliving it too.
She locked her screen, and just like that, the restaurant rushed back in. Laughter, glasses clinking, the quiet hum of a restaurant full of conversation. Marco said something loud and ridiculous. Ivy swore at him fondly. Life continued on, completely unaware that I’d just been emotionally eviscerated in the middle of a booth.
Aurélie leaned all the way back into me, warm and soft and lethal, her shoulder brushing my chest.
“That was before,” she murmured, so quietly only I could hear. Not an apology. Not an explanation. Just a statement.
Before we were public. Before we were safe. Before we were married.
My hand slid from her waist to her thigh, grip tightening as if it was the only thing anchoring me to the present. My cock throbbed hard against her, unashamed, furious with memory.
“Christ,” I breathed, my mouth hovering near her ear. “You’re trying to kill me.”
She smiled. I felt it more than I saw it.
“No,” she whispered back. “I’m reminding you that it was always going to be us against the world.”
She was also reminding me of who I was when I chose her. Of how fast I ran. Of how little it took to undo me.
Her fingers laced through mine again, rings knocking softly together. Promise against promise.
She ground her hips back into me, and the ghost of that night collided violently with the reality of this one: her panties in my pocket, her body in my lap, her name legally bound to mine.
