"Because it's not a conversation we need to have."
"That's exactly what someone says when they know the conversation needs to happen." I pull my legs up onto the bench, turning to face him fully. "You moved me into your room. Your room. Not another guest suite, not another guarded wing. Your bed, your desk, your space. And then you sleep in a chair every night like you're standing guard."
"I am standing guard."
"From a chair. Three feet from the bed. While I'm in it."
His eyes come back to mine, and I see it. That flicker, that fracture in the mask. The thing he keeps trying to bury. It's there and gone in a heartbeat, but I caught it.
"You're not protecting me, Leone. Not in that room. You're protecting yourself. From whatever you feel when you're too close."
His jaw tightens so hard I can hear his teeth grind. "You don't know what you're talking about."
"I know exactly what I'm talking about. I've been watching. You reroute operations so I won't hear people scream. You check the kitchen logs to make sure I'm eating. You brought me documents so I'd feel useful instead of trapped. And every night, you sit in that goddamn chair and stare at the ceiling because lying next to me would mean admitting something you'd rather die than say."
He pushes off the wall, turning to face me fully, and the size of him hits me all over again. Six-two, six-three, shoulders wide enough to block out the light behind him. His eyes are dark and hard and burning with desire that makes my stomach drop.
"Careful," he says, low enough that I feel it more than hear it.
"Or what?"
He takes a step closer. Then another. I don't move. My heart is hammering so hard I can feel it in my throat, in my wrists, in the tips of my fingers, but I don't move.
He stops a foot away. Close enough that I can see the individual hairs in his stubble, the scar beneath his ear, the way his pulse jumps at the base of his throat. Close enough that if I reached out, my fingers would find his chest.
I want to reach out.
The realization makes my stomach do somersaults. Not gradually, not gently, but all at once, a wave of want so strong my breath catches. I want to touch him. I want to press my palms flat against his chest and feel his heart beating. I want to know if he runs hot, if his skin is as rough as his hands, if the muscles beneath that suit feel like they look.
I want him.
It's insane. It's reckless. It's the worst idea I've had in a life full of terrible decisions. He's my captor, my keeper, a man who kills people for a living and sleeps with a gun under his pillow. Wanting him is like wanting a wildfire. Beautiful and warm from a distance, fatal up close.
But I'm already too close.
"You want to know why I sleep in the chair?" His voice is rough, stripped of its usual control. "Because if I get in that bed with you, I won't sleep. And neither will you."
The words hit me low in the belly. Heat floods through me, fast and unwelcome, pooling in places I'm trying very hard to ignore.
"That sounds like a threat," I manage.
"It's a fact."
We stare at each other. The corridor is empty. No soldiers, no guards. him and me and a sad little tree and the sound of my blood roaring in my ears.
His hand moves. Slowly, like he's fighting the motion even as he makes it, he reaches up and tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. His fingers brush my temple, my cheekbone, the curve of my jaw. The touch is so light it barely registers on my skin, but I feel it everywhere. In my chest, my stomach, the backs of my knees.
My eyes flutter shut. His thumb traces my bottom lip, featherlight, and a sound comes out of me that I will deny to my grave. Small. Needy. The sound that saysmorewithout using the word.
His breathing changes. Heavier. Closer. I can feel the warmth of him, the sheer mass of him, hovering just inches away.
I tip my chin up. My lips part.
And he pulls back.
My eyes fly open. He's stepped away. One full stride, hands at his sides, jaw locked so tight the muscle jumps beneath his skin. He's breathing hard, chest rising and falling, and his eyes are wild. Not blank. Not controlled. Wild.
"Leone..."
