His eyes close. His whole body trembles.
“Why?” The word comes out broken. “After everything I’ve done, why would you?—”
“Because you make me feel safe.” The admission burns coming out. “Because whenever there’s a threat, you put yourself in front of it to protect me. Because you broke a twelve-year engagement with a text message when you thought I was comparing you to other men.” My fingers curl into his shirt. “Because you’re the only person in this entire fucked-up world who looks at me and sees me. The real me.”
His hand comes up. Covers mine. Pressing my palm harder against his heart.
“You matter.” His voice is wrecked. “More than anything. More than the empire. More than?—”
“Then stop asking if I’m sure.” I step closer, chest to chest, and look up at him in the moonlight. “Stop trying to protect me from my own decisions. I’m choosing this, Elio. I’m choosing you.”
He searches my face. Looking for doubt, for hesitation, for any crack in my certainty.
He won’t find one.
“Say it again.” He whispers. Almost begging.
“I’m choosing you.”
His face breaks open. Relief. Disbelief. Terror. Hope. All of it at once. His hands frame my face. Trembling. Gentle. Not taking. Asking.
“If you change your mind—” His thumbs stroke my cheekbones. “—at any point, for any reason?—”
“Elio.”
“—just tell me. Just say the word and I’ll stop, I’ll back away, I’ll?—”
“Elio.” I grab his wrists. Hold him still. “Kiss me.”
He does.
It’s nothing like before.
Not demanding. Not taking. Not the predatory conquest of a man who owns what he touches.
He cups my face in both hands and just looks at me for a moment, his thumb tracing my cheekbone the way it did in the courtyard, like he’s checking I’m real. Like he’s been waiting long enough that he needs a second to believe it.
His lips brush mine like a question, like he’s asking permission even now, even after everything I’ve said.
I answer by pressing closer, and I feel him exhale against my mouth, slow and unsteady, like something releasing that’s been held too long.
My fingers slide into his hair. His hands drop to my waist, drawing me against him, and his grip tightens by degrees, careful and then less careful, his breath going ragged against my mouth.
“Violet.” His voice sounds broken.
“Stop talking.” I kiss him deeper. “Just?—”
His mouth swallows the rest.
The kiss opens, his tongue sliding against mine, and heat moves through me in a slow wave that settles low and insistent. My back meets the stone wall, warm, heated like the floor, and his body presses against mine, solid and real and here.
His hands don’t grab. They explore. Sliding up my sides, skimming the silk of my nightgown, learning the shape of me like he has all the time in the world. Like I’m precious. Breakable. Something worth being careful with.
My throat tightens with it. I didn’t know being touched like this was something I was missing until right now, until his hands moved over me like I mattered.
“Are you—” He pulls back. Just enough to meet my eyes. “Violet, I need you to tell me?—”
“I swear to God, if you ask me one more time?—”
