“I don’t want to sit in front of people I know and explain any of this.” A breath shudders from my chest. “I can’t tell them I was having the best sex of my life with someone I can’t name.”
He nods once. A single, silent acknowledgment.
The weight of my choice is absolute. Everything I vowed to uphold lies behind me. Everything I want stands right in front of me.
I step into him, shoulders braced, breath evening out. “I can’t lose you. I won’t.”
My hand reaches for his, and when his fingers wrap around mine, the decision seals itself inside me.
He leans in and presses a slow kiss to my forehead before stepping back. The warmth lingers as he thinks through his next step. This is a problem he already knows how to solve. Of that, I’m certain.
“I’ll take care of the body and his car.” His gaze flicks upward toward the bedroom. “You’ll straighten things while I’m gone and put everything back where it belongs. Then you’ll shower.”
A chill skims over my skin. “What about forensic evidence from the struggle? Blood? Fibers? Prints?”
His answer comes without hesitation. “I’ll come back and erase this as though it never happened.”
He says it with a calmness that makes the hair on my arms lift. A composure that tells me this isn’t new to him. A poise I’m already trusting.
“I can’t sleep in that room. I don’t know if I ever will again.”
“Then you won’t. Pack what you need for tonight and tomorrow. We’ll come back later for the rest.” He pulls me in for another kiss on my forehead. “You’re coming home with me, baby.”
I nod before my brain can form a single protest.
We return to my bedroom, and I slip into the bathroom to pull on my robe. The mirror catches me—bruised throat, kiss-swollen mouth, wide, frightened eyes staring back. I force myself to look away.
Something in Bastien’s face has shifted. The warmth that held me is gone, sealed away behind a hard, lethal calm I’ve never seen on him before. I’m watching a stranger wear the shape of the man I love.
A man who kills to protect.
A man who loves me and shows it in the darkest ways.
He doesn’t speak, but he doesn’t need to. His gaze sweeps over the room once and lands on the body. His shoulders square and his jaw sets. Every line of him sharpens into purpose.
This is who he is when he works.
The transformation is seamless, terrifying, and strangely beautiful in its certainty.
I stand in the bathroom doorway, my fingers curled around the frame, as he crouches beside the dead man with clinical precision. No hesitation, fear, or revulsion. Just method.
And experience.
He lifts the body in a single, controlled motion, efficient and practiced. Muscles bunch along his arms and back, moving with a surety that turns my stomach and steadies it at the same time.
And I understand. This is the world he lives in. This is the world I just stepped into. And there’s no turning back.
I chose this.
I chose him.
Bastien carries the body toward the hallway, his silhouette framed by the soft spill of light, danger and devotion bound in the same shape.
I watch him go, feeling myself break and mend in the same breath.
Because I’m his now.
And God help me, he’s mine.
