But beneath the fury, something else simmers. Something I hate myself for feeling.
The memory of his hands on my skin, rough and gentle all at once. The way he whispered my name in the darkness like a prayer and a curse. The solid warmth of his body pressed against mine, his heartbeat steady beneath my palm. The protective instinct that made him twist his body to shield mine when we hit those rocks, taking the impact that could have killed me.
"You're thinking too loud." His voice cuts through my spiraling thoughts, that accent wrapping around the English words in a way that does things to my pulse.
"I'm not thinking anything." I keep my eyes on the window, but I can feel his gaze on me like a physical touch.
"Liar." His fingers brush my arm, just the lightest contact, and electricity arcs through my nerve endings. "You're cataloging every reason you should hate me."
I finally turn to look at him, and the intensity in those ice-blue eyes steals what little breath I have left. "I have plenty of reasons."
"I know." His hand doesn't move from my arm, his thumb tracing small circles against my skin through the thin fabric of my sweater. "But you don't hate me. Not completely."
"Don't tell me what I feel." But my voice comes out breathier than I intend, betraying the effect his touch has on me.
"Your body tells me everything I need to know." His gaze drops to my throat, where my pulse hammers visibly against my skin. "Your heart is racing. Your breathing is shallow. You're leaning toward me even as you try to pull away."
I jerk my arm from his grasp, hating that he's right. Hating that my body responds to him like this despite everything mybrain knows about who he is and what he's capable of. "You're insufferable."
"Yes." His lips curve into something that might be a smile. "But you knew that on the island."
The mention of those three weeks makes my chest constrict painfully. I turn back to the window, blinking against the sudden sting of tears I refuse to let fall. "The island was a lie."
"No." His voice drops to something rough and honest. "The island was the only truth either of us has told in years."
I don't respond because I can't. Because he's right, and admitting it would mean acknowledging that what we shared meant something beyond survival and circumstance. That the connection I felt wasn't manufactured by isolation but real and terrifying and impossible to reconcile with the world we've returned to.
The car pulls up to my building, and I'm out the door before it fully stops. I need distance from him, from the way his presence fills every available space and makes it impossible to think clearly. My hands shake as I unlock the building's entrance, and I feel him behind me, close enough that his body heat warms my back.
My apartment looks smaller with Nikolai filling the space. He moves through it with that predatory grace I remember from the yacht, his eyes cataloging every detail. The secondhand furniture I refinished myself. The cookbooks crammed into shelves. The framed photo of Maya and me from before everything went wrong.
"It's not much," I say, hating the defensive note in my voice.
"It's yours." He picks up the photo, studying it with an intensity that makes me uncomfortable. "You were younger here. Happier."
"That was before I knew what the world was really like." I snatch the frame from his hands and set it back on the shelf. "Before I learned that people lie and manipulate and use you for their own purposes."
His jaw tightens, but he doesn't respond, just watches as I move through the apartment, pulling clothes from my closet and shoving them into a duffel bag with more force than necessary. I grab my laptop, my chargers, the few pieces of jewelry that belonged to my mother.
"My people will move the rest," Nikolai says, his tone making it clear this isn't a suggestion. "Furniture, kitchen items, everything. You won't need to come back here."
I whirl on him, the duffel bag dropping from my hands. "You can't just decide that. This is my home."
"Wasyour home." He steps closer, and I'm trapped between him and the wall. "Your home is with me now. Where I can protect you and our child."
"Stop calling it that." My hands curl into fists at my sides. "Stop acting like you own me."
"I'm not acting." His hand lifts to cup my jaw, and I should pull away but I'm frozen, caught in the gravity of his gaze. "You're mine, Aria. The sooner you accept that, the easier this will be."
"I'll never accept it." But the words come out weaker than I intend, and we both hear the lie underneath.
His thumb brushes across my lower lip, and heat floods through my body with enough intensity to make me dizzy. "We'll see."
I force myself to step away, to break the connection before I do something stupid like lean into his touch. "I need to go to Thyme and Tide. Check on things."
He studies me for a long moment, and I see the calculation happening behind those ice-blue eyes. Finally, he nods. "We'll go together."
The commercial kitchen feels like sanctuary when we arrive. The familiar scents of herbs and spices, the gleam of stainless steel, the organized chaos of my workspace. This is mine in a way nothing else is. I built this business from nothing, every piece of equipment purchased with money I saved dollar by dollar.
