I didn't sleep for hours.
I lay in the dark, touching my lips, replaying the kiss until every detail was burned into my memory. The way he'd held me—fierce and gentle at the same time. The way he'd asked permission even as he'd pulled me closer. The way he'd let me go when I'd said I should leave, even though we'd both known I hadn't wanted to.
I was attracted to him. There was no point denying it anymore—not after that kiss, not after the way my body had responded to his touch. I wanted him in ways that should have horrified me, ways that tangled up with everything else I felt until I couldn't separate the fear from the desire.
He was a monster. He'd admitted it himself. He'd stalked me, kidnapped me, forced me into marriage.
But he was also the man who'd given me work when I was drowning in boredom. Who'd told me I was stronger than anyone had recognized. Who'd kissed me like I was precious and then let me walk away.
I didn't know how to reconcile those two realities. Didn't know who I was becoming in the space between them.
The ring on my finger caught the moonlight, and for the first time, I didn't feel the urge to tear it off.
That scared me most of all.
Chapter 12 - Vasily
Sleep was impossible.
I stood at my bedroom window, watching the moonlight paint silver paths across the Mediterranean, and tried to convince myself that the kiss had been a mistake. A moment of weakness. A lapse in the control I'd spent decades perfecting.
But I could still taste her on my lips. Could still feel the way she'd gripped my shirt, not pushing away but pulling closer. Could still hear the small sound she'd made—half surprise, half surrender—when my mouth had found hers.
She'd kissed me back.
That single fact obliterated every rational thought I tried to construct. I'd told myself I would wait. Would give her time, give her space, let her come to me when she was ready. I'd promised myself I wouldn't take what she wasn't freely offering.
And then I'd kissed her anyway.
The worst part—the part that damned me more than anything—was that I didn't regret it. I should have. Should have been consumed with guilt for pushing too fast, for taking advantage of her exhaustion and her loneliness and whatever confused attraction had been building between us.
Instead, I felt something dangerously close to hope.
I poured myself a vodka I didn't want and drank it anyway, welcoming the burn. The clock on my nightstand showed 3:47 AM. In a few hours, I'd have to face her at breakfast, would have to pretend that everything hadn't shifted between us.
I didn't know if I could.
I didn't know if I wanted to.
***
She was already on the terrace when I arrived, earlier than usual.
The morning sun caught the auburn highlights in her hair, loose around her shoulders today instead of pulled back. She wore a simple dress—pale blue, flowing—and when she looked up at my approach, something flickered in her dark eyes. Wariness. Uncertainty.
Want.
"Good morning," I said, keeping my voice neutral.
"Good morning." She returned her attention to the coffee she was stirring, though I noticed she wasn't actually drinking it. Just moving the spoon in endless circles.
I sat across from her, leaving the usual distance between us. The silence stretched, thick with everything we weren't saying. I could feel the kiss hovering in the air like a living thing—the memory of her lips, her warmth, the way she'd trembled in my arms.
"About last night—" she started.
"You don't have to explain anything."
"I wasn't going to explain." She looked up, meeting my eyes with something that might have been defiance. "I was going to say... I don't know what I was going to say."
