I fall into pace with him, allowing myself to feel it fully. Stretching the moment and drowning in the pleasure.
He holds tighter, brings one of my legs over his shoulder, and picks up the pace. The mirror rattles, and when I glance in the side mirror, I almost shatter at the sight of us, raw and primal, his face twisted in pleasure, my body at his disposal.
His palm grips my chin, forcing my eyes onto his. Sweat lines his temples as he huskily groans over my lips.
“Fuck.” It’s practically a growl.
“That’s it,” I pant. “Come inside me. I want you to fill me up.” My moans become louder. “I want all of you. I—”
The vanity rattles with the force of his thrusts. The words lodge in my airway. He lifts my other leg, too, and everything tilts. I’m ungrounded. The way he stretches me, hitting that perfect spot, rips wails out of me that I barely recognize.
His hips hit my flesh sharply, the sound filthy and wet. Adam finishes with a sound that goes straight to my center.
He keeps moving until I go still, ears ringing. Then it unravels in sharp waves, and I break into pieces in his arms.
We cling to each other, breathless.
The silence and comfort crack my chest open, and regret pours out, together with longing and a soft desperation for him.
He doesn’t let go either. And maybe that’s what finally undoes me. Not the way he made me break apart. But how he holds me like he’s still afraid I’ll vanish.
I shouldn’t say it. Not now. It’s the worst possible time. But the question presses past my lips. “Do you think we could… give us another chance?”
His jaw works, an unreadable emotion flickering across his features. Silence stretches, dense and suffocating, broken only by his ragged breaths.
“Jackie…” His eyes screw shut.
Then he says it. Quietly. Almost apologetically. “I want to give you the answer you’re looking for.” He lets his head fall into the crook of my neck. “I can’t believe I’m saying this,” he groans. “I still need you like crazy, but …” A shuddered breath. “I don’t know if I can be with someone who believed the worst of me. I need some time.”
His words hang between us like heavy mist.
I don’t push it. But something in my chest folds in on itself. I didn’t realize how much I was hoping for ayes.
Raised voices drift through the open French doors of the little courtyard as Adam and I exchange worried glances.
“I’m not signing such—” Carter’s voice cuts off, swallowed by the echo of his footsteps ricocheting off the high stone walls.
“Be reasonable,” Eliza pleads.
“Did my mother put you up to this?”
“No, Clara had nothing to do with it. I just want you to be sure…”
“Let’s give them a minute,” Adam says, his hand finding mine as he steers me away.
We slip through a narrow hallway into a secluded nook overlooking the canal, where morning light cascades through tall arched windows onto red and gold velvet cushions.
Adam settles onto the windowsill and draws me gently between his knees, his palms resting on my hips like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
“Never thought I’d see those two fight,” he says with a wry grimace. “Feels wrong, doesn’t it?”
When we woke up this morning, we just laid there, facing each other, the tips of our fingers barely touching. I left without saying too much. Slipped back to my room to change, to breathe, to collect myself. But when I stepped outside, he was already waiting by my door.
“I tried to tell her,” I sigh, shaking my head. “She’s still horrified someone might think she’s in it for his money.”
I wish the entire world knew the Eliza who brews a special tea for me when I’m down. Who’s so absurdly sweet and caring, I sometimes want to bubble wrap and hide her in my safe, so nobody can ever hurt her.
“Would you makemesign a prenup?”
