She hadn’t let herself believe this was possible. Not after him. Not after the fists and the lies and the years of trying to pretend she hadn’t become invisible, even to herself. Callum’s father had convinced her, piece by piece, that she wasn’t real unless he said so. And when the police came for him, when she was finally freed, Amelia hadn’t known how to live as a woman outside of his shadow.
So she’d created another version of herself. Something darker and controlled. A mask she could slip into and out of, one that didn’t ache when it was touched. Satin gave her that. The dark room, especially. It made sense then—where it didn’t hurt to be faceless, to give herself to someone who couldn’t see her breaking.
But Jo had ruined all of that. She’d unravelled every tether Amelia had wrapped around her heart and made her want to be known in ways that terrified her.
And now here they were, with Jo’s fingers casually grazing her knee under the table like they’d always been together.
“You’re quiet,” Jo said as she lowered her menu. “What’s going on in that head of yours?”
“Sorry.” Amelia forced herself out of the headspace she was beginning to fall into. “Just…thinking about how grateful I feel.”
Jo tilted her head. “For overpriced ravioli?”
Amelia laughed as she reached across the table and took her hand. “For you. Forthis. For feeling as though I can breathe for the first time in decades without someone scolding me.”
Jo’s smile melted her. “You’ll always feel that way with me.”
“I know.” She stroked her thumb over the back of Jo’s hand. “But it still surprises me. How safe I feel with you.”
Likely sensing that Amelia was too deep in her own head, Jo smirked and leaned in as she said, “You should feelveryunsafe later tonight.”
Amelia lifted a brow. “Oh?”
“Well, I plan on undressing you slowly and then making you beg for mercy.”
Amelia took a sip of her wine. “Darling, if you thinkI’mthe one who’s going to be begging, you’re more deluded than I thought.”
“Is that a challenge?” Jo leaned across the table. “Really?”
Amelia’s whole body lit up as she took her bottom lip between her teeth. “Always.”
They spent the rest of dinner flirting between bites, kissing between sips of wine, and laughing at inside jokes that no one else could possibly understand.
It wasn’t loud, or showy, or dramatic. It was just…real.
And as Amelia sat here, for the first time in her life, she didn’twantto be anyone but herself.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
One month later…
The light filteredin through the freshly cleaned windows of Amelia’s newly renovated property, casting the most beautiful patterns across the herringbone floors. Jo adjusted her lens and crouched for the next angle, the sharp click of the shutter punctuating the otherwise easy silence that hung between them.
Well, almost silence.
“You know, if you shoot from a lower angle, it makes the ceilings look higher,” Amelia said from somewhere behind her. “Just a thought.”
Jo glanced over her shoulder with a smile. “Are you critiquing the professional?”
Amelia leaned against the open doorframe, her arms crossed casually, looking like every woman Jo had ever wanted. “I’m just saying that I’ve spent months on those beams. I want them to look like the architectural miracle that they are.”
Jo stood slowly, stretching her arms over her head as she turned to face Amelia. “Youlook like an architectural miracle.”
Amelia rolled her eyes playfully. “Oh, here we go.”
“You love it.”
“Tragically, I do.”
