Finally, he snapped—not fully, but enough. His hands guided me down harder, hips surging up to meet me. “Enough,” he rasped. “Come for me, Lia. Let me feel you.”
The command, laced with desperate need, shattered me.
My orgasm crashed through me in blinding waves, clenching rhythmically around him, my cry of his name echoing off the high beams. He followed seconds later, thrusting deep as he spilled inside me with a low, broken groan, his body tensing then melting beneath me.
I collapsed onto his chest, our breaths ragged, hearts pounding in frantic sync. His arms wrapped around me immediately, holding me close, lips pressing soft kisses to my hair, my temple.
In the quiet that followed, as the fire died to glowing coals and the snow continued its gentle, relentless fall, I realized this wasn’t just physical. It was us—teasing, taking, giving. Falling deeper into something neither of us had asked for but both craved with quiet ferocity.
We lay there entwined for what felt like hours, bodies cooling slowly, the vast lodge wrapping us in its hushed luxury. I tracedidle patterns on his chest, listening to his heartbeat steady, matching mine.
“You let me,” I said softly, lifting my head to meet his eyes.
He brushed a damp strand of hair from my face, thumb lingering on my cheek. “I wanted to see you take it. Wanted to feel you claim what’s already yours.”
Something in his voice—tender, possessive, achingly honest—made my chest ache in the best way. “And?”
His smile was slow, real, unguarded. “Beautiful. Every second of it.”
I kissed him then, soft and lingering, pouring everything unspoken into it—gratitude, wonder, the first fragile threads of something that felt dangerously close to love. For now, this was enough. This deepening, this connection that grew stronger with every touch, every shared breath.
As sleep finally tugged at the edges of my awareness, I nestled closer, his heartbeat a steady lullaby beneath my ear. The fire’s last embers flickered out, leaving only moonlight on snow and the quiet certainty of us.
20
The next morning, I woke before him.
That surprised me—not because I slept late, but because something about Cassian felt like it should precede everything. Like he would always be the first to move, the first to wake, the first to re-enter the world with that quiet, controlled awareness that seemed to define him.
But the room was still.
Early light filtered through the tall windows in muted shades of gray and blue, the kind of winter morning that felt suspended between night and day. The fire had burned down to ash, the last of its warmth lingering faintly in the air. Outside, the snow lay untouched, smooth and endless, like nothing had disturbed it.
Inside, everything felt closer.
Quieter.
More real.
And Cassian?—
He was still asleep beside me.
On his back, one arm bent loosely at his side, the other angled slightly toward me like he’d reached for me in thenight and stopped halfway. His breathing was steady, deep, unguarded in a way I hadn’t seen before.
It changed him.
The tension that usually lived in his jaw had eased. The sharpness in his expression—softened. Without that constant awareness behind his eyes, he looked … younger. Not less dangerous, exactly, but like the edges of him had relaxed just enough to reveal something underneath.
I shifted slightly onto my side, studying him without trying to hide it.
He was so handsome.
Not in the polished, intentional way I was used to seeing—men who curated themselves, who understood exactly how they were perceived and adjusted accordingly. Cassian didn’t do that. There was nothing curated about him.
His short hair fell slightly out of place, like he hadn’t bothered to fix it. His jaw carried the faint shadow of stubble, roughening the clean lines of his face. Even at rest, there was something coiled beneath the surface, something that suggested restraint rather than ease.
And still?—
