I lined myself up, the head of my cock pressing against her entrance. She was so fucking wet, so ready for me, her body already clenching like it knew what was coming. I pushed in just the tip, watching her face twist—pleasure, pain, something raw and real.
"Gideon—" My name on her lips was a prayer and a curse.
I gripped her hip, my fingers digging in hard enough to bruise. "Say it."
Her nails raked down my arms, her voice trembling. "Please."
I froze, halfway to sinking into her, the sound of that word stopping me cold.
Please.
She'd said it. Not dragged out of her, not coerced. She'd asked.
Something shifted in my chest—sharp, painful, terrifying. I stared down at her flushed face, her swollen lips, her eyes glazed with want she couldn't hide anymore. This wasn't happening because I'd forced it. This was happening because she wanted me.
My Belle. Finally fucking mine.
The realization hit harder than any check I'd ever taken on the ice.
Maybe she was just caught up in the heat. Maybe tomorrow she'd hate herself, hate me, go back to fighting tooth and nail. Probably would.
I didn't care.
I'd been waiting a goddamn year for this moment—since the second she laughed in my face at that gala, since she looked at me like I was nothing special. I'd thought about her every night since. Imagined her under me, around me, mine in every way that mattered.
And now she was.
I gripped her thigh harder, spreading her wider, watching her body open for me. But something else clawed its way up my throat, ugly and possessive and necessary.
"Has any dick been in your cunt before?"
Her eyes snapped to mine, fury cutting through the haze. "What?"
"You heard me." I pressed in just a fraction more, making her gasp. "Answer the question."
"That's none of your fucking business," she spat, shoving at my chest.
I caught her wrists, pinned them above her head with one hand. "Everything about you is my business now. Answer."
"Why does it matter?" Her voice cracked, half anger, half something vulnerable she tried to hide.
"Because I need to know." My jaw clenched so hard it ached. "I need to know if anyone else has been where I'm about to be. If I'm the first to fuck you in this perfect little?—"
"You're insane."
"Answer. The. Question."
Her chest heaved, eyes blazing. "And if there were? Would you stop?"
Never. Not in a million fucking years.
"Well, first," I growled, forcing my hips to still even though every instinct screamed at me to bury myself inside her, "I'm going to go slowly if this is your first time."
Her laugh was sharp, bitter. "Because you're so romantic."
The mockery in her voice snapped something in me. I leaned down until our noses almost touched, my free hand sliding up to wrap around her throat—not squeezing, just there. A reminder.
"And if you've fucked someone before," I snarled, feeling the pulse beneath my palm racing, "I'm going to fuck you so hard you won't even remember them. Then I'm going to find out who they were, and I'm going to kill them with my bare hands."
