Everything in me locks up as I finish inside her, and it's not just physical. It's her. It's loving her. It's this intimacy I've never felt with anyone else—this connection that splits me open from the inside.
I groan her name into her skin like it's the only word I know, holding her so tight I might bruise her, feeling the slick warmth spread between us, our bodies stuck together everywhere we touch.
I can't breathe. Can't think. Can only feel her—around me, against me, in my arms—and know that this is what it means to love someone.
She doesn't move off me. I don't let her. We just sit there—her in my lap, my arms around her, both catching ourbreath. Neither of us ready to let go. I can feel her heartbeat against my chest.
I look down at Jane, her eyes closed, her breathing evening out.
Right now, in this moment, she's mine.
And I'm hers.
And I love her.
Even if I can't say it yet.
For now, that has to be enough.
Chapter 14
Claws Come Off
January 30 | Day 7 Anguilla AM | T–1
West
Istop in the doorway.
Jane's at the kitchen counter, laptop open, phone charging beside it. Hair damp from the shower, twisted into that messy knot she does when she's working. The one that makes my fingers itch to pull it loose.
She's humming.
Off-key. Some pop song I don't recognize. Completely unselfconscious. The yellow sundress again—the one with the thin straps that keep slipping off her shoulder. No bra. I can tell because I'm a man and I have eyes and she's standing in my kitchen and the morning light is doing things to her silhouette that should require a consent form.
I went for a run this morning. Early. Five miles along the beach while the sky was still turning pink, feet slapping wet sand, trying to outrun the mess in my head.
Not because of what Blake did last night—though watching him confirm himself as exactly the predator we suspected wasn't pleasant. I recorded every word. Every gesture. Every casual cruelty.
Because of what comes next.
When Natalie cancels this wedding—and she will cancel it, the evidence is airtight—the fallout will ripple throughevery boardroom and charity gala on the Eastern Seaboard.
"End of the Ashford-Hartwell Partnership?" "Billionaire Merger Collapses Days Before the Wedding."
The financial press will dissect it. The society pages will feast. Both families are too prominent to avoid scrutiny.
And the Prescotts? Right in the middle.
Blake and I grew up together. Our mothers lunched at the same country clubs. Aunt Milly went to Vassar with Blake's mother. Mom handles the Hartwell legal accounts through Prescott Legal Group.
Which means I need to call home before they hear it from Page Six.
I can already play the conversation.
Mom will answer on the second ring. "West. Is everything alright?"
"Define alright."
