Page 16 of The Chains that Bind
The contradiction in those statements doesn't escape me. Neither does the fact that some part of me—the part that responded to Knox's kiss, that went to him that night three months ago, that has never stopped dreaming of him despite eighteen months of determined effort—doesn't want to let him go for my sake, too.
And that terrifies me more than anything.
Chapter Ten
Knox
She wearsnothing but a towel when she emerges from the bathroom, her wet hair slicked back from her face, her skin flushed from the hot water. I haven't left the room as she expected. Instead, I've been waiting, seated at the foot of the bed we once shared, the bed where we created the life now growing inside her. Her steps falter when she sees me, the hand clutching her towel tightening reflexively. Good. Let her feel exposed. Vulnerable. It's the first step to breaking down the walls she's rebuilt during our time apart. Her body remembers mine—the kiss on the rooftop proved that much. Now I just need to remind her how perfectly we fit together, how completely I can satisfy her. Words won't convince Seraphina Vale. But pleasure? Pleasure has always been our most honest form of communication.
"I thought I made it clear I wanted to be alone," she says, her voice impressively steady despite the pulse visibly hammering at her throat.
"You did." I remain seated, deliberately non-threatening in my posture while my eyes devour every inch of exposed skin. "I chose not to listen."
"That's always been your problem." She edges along the wall, keeping maximum distance between us as she moves toward the closet. "Selective hearing when it comes to my boundaries."
"No, angel. My problem has always been listening too much to what you say and not enough to what your body tells me." I watch her shoulders stiffen at my words. "Your mouth says you want to be alone. Your body says something entirely different."
"My body is none of your business anymore." But the slight tremor in her voice betrays her.
"The goosebumps rising on your skin right now say otherwise." I stand slowly, noting how she tenses in response. "The way your pupils dilate when I move closer says otherwise. The fact that you're carrying my child says otherwise."
"That was one night of weakness," she insists, clutching the towel like armor. "A mistake."
"Was it? Did it feel like a mistake when you came three times before we even made it to the bedroom?" I take a step toward her, enjoying the way her breathing quickens. "Did it feel like a mistake when you begged me not to stop, when you wrote your surrender across my back with your nails?"
"Stop it." Her voice has lost some of its firmness, the command more plea than demand.
I take another step closer. "Did you let him touch you like that? Your safe, predictable fiancé? Did he know how to make you scream, Seraphina? Did he understand that the uptight gallery director needs to be taken apart completely to find her release?"
"This isn't appropriate." She backs up until she hits the dresser, nowhere left to retreat. "I'm pregnant, Knox. We need todiscuss co-parenting arrangements, not—not rehash our sexual history."
"Our sexual present," I correct her, closing the distance between us until mere inches separate our bodies. "There's nothing past tense about what's between us, angel. The heat. The hunger. The way your body calls to mine even when your mind is still fighting it."
She tilts her chin up defiantly, but I can see the flush spreading across her cheeks, down her neck, disappearing beneath the towel's edge. "Physical chemistry isn't enough for a relationship."
"But it's a hell of a starting point." I reach out slowly, telegraph my intentions as I brush a strand of wet hair back from her face. She flinches but doesn't pull away. Progress. "And we had so much more than that. Have so much more than that."
"Had," she insists weakly. "Past tense."
My fingers trail down the side of her neck, feeling her pulse jump beneath my touch. "Your body disagrees."
"My body is a traitor."
That pulls a genuine laugh from me. "Or the only honest part of you left."
Before she can formulate a retort, I cup the back of her neck, my thumb brushing the sensitive spot just below her ear that always makes her shiver. Right on cue, her body responds, a tremor running through her despite her attempt to remain stoic.
"You see?" I murmur, leaning closer until my breath warms her ear. "This is truth, Seraphina. This connection that has never dimmed, never weakened, despite your best efforts to deny it."
"Physical response is just—just biology," she stammers, her hands coming up to press against my chest. Not pushing me away, just resting there, feeling my heartbeat beneath her palms. "It doesn't mean anything."
"Then why didn't you respond this way to him?" I challenge, my free hand moving to the knot holding her towel secure. Not untying it. Not yet. Just resting there, a promise and a threat. "Why did you come back to me that night instead of finding satisfaction in his bed?"
"You're impossible," she whispers, but there's a weakening in her resistance, a softening in her body as it begins to remember what her mind is trying so desperately to forget.
"No. I'm inevitable."
Before she can argue further, I close the final distance between us, capturing her mouth with mine. Unlike our earlier kisses—the claiming on the helicopter, the possessive reminder on the rooftop—this kiss is deliberately slow. Seductive. I take my time, coaxing rather than demanding, teasing her lips until they part on a sigh that I swallow like the sweetest wine.
