Her voice came out barely above a whisper. Fragile. Desperate. "I won't want it."
The denial was so thin I almost pitied her.
Almost.
Instead, I smiled. Slow. Predatory. Let her see exactly what lived beneath the careful control I usually maintained.
"You will."
Two words.
A promise and a threat.
I reached down. Threaded my fingers through hers with a deliberate gentleness that contradicted everything else. Not forcing. Claiming.
She could have pulled away.
She didn't.
Her hand trembled in mine—rage and confusion and something darker she refused to name.
I tugged gently. Led her toward the dining room where soft light waited. Where dinner sat prepared thanks to Maria. Where the next lesson would begin.
She followed. One step. Then another. Walking into the trap she couldn't escape because she'd already signed the papers that made it legal.
Chapter 15
Belle
The dinner plates sat untouched between us. Cooling. Forgotten. Nothing about this meal had ever been about food.
Gideon stepped toward me with that deliberate, predatory certainty I'd come to dread. The kind of movement that announced intention before he ever laid a hand on me.
I pressed back against the table. Told myself I wouldn't react. Wouldn't want. Wouldn't give him the satisfaction of watching me break.
But he touched me anyway—not aggressively, not cruelly, but with an unbearable confidence that said he already knew how this ended.
His hand cupped my jaw. Tilted my face up.
And my resolve shattered like glass.
His mouth found mine before I could mount a defense. Before I could remember all the reasons I was supposed to hate this. Hate him.
The kiss wasn't gentle. Wasn't asking permission. It claimed. Consumed. Took everything I'd been trying so desperately to hold back.
And my body?—
God, my body?—
It betrayed me completely. My hand fisted in his shirt without conscious thought. Pulled him closer instead of pushing away.
A gasp escaped me—soft and helpless and damning.
His tongue swept into my mouth and I whimpered against him like I'd been starving for this. Like six months of denial had been carved into my bones.
"Tell me," he murmured against my lips.
I shook my head. Couldn't form words.
