Page 23 of Bound in Silk

We reach the SUV, and with a fluid movement that again reminds me of his physical power, Knox lowers me into the back seat. Before I can scramble away, he slides in beside me, his larger frame effectively trapping me against the leather upholstery. Gabriel closes the door behind us, the sound oddly final as the tinted windows seal us away from curious eyes and camera lenses.

"What the hell was that?" I demand the moment we're alone, fury freshly ignited now that I'm upright and facing him. "That caveman display, that public humiliation, that—that claiming!"

"That," Knox says with infuriating calm, "was me making a statement. To the press. To you. To anyone who might question what happens when my fiancée disappears."

"I'm not your fiancée," I counter automatically, though the ring on my finger makes the denial ring hollow. "Not officially. Not by choice or agreement or any of the normal ways people get engaged."

"The ring on your finger says otherwise," he points out, his gaze dropping deliberately to my left hand. "The Vogue exclusive says otherwise. And now, the photos that will be everywhere by evening will say otherwise."

The vehicle pulls smoothly away from the curb, Gabriel and the other security team member in the front seats studiously ignoring the heated exchange happening behind them. The privacy screen slides up without prompting, giving us the illusion of being alone in the confined space.

"You promised patience," I remind him, struggling to keep my voice steady despite the emotions churning inside me. "Understanding. Partnership rather than possession. That display was the exact opposite of everything you just promised."

Something flickers in his eyes—not regret, precisely, but perhaps recognition that his actions contradicted his words from minutes earlier. "You ran," he says simply, as if that explains everything. Justifies everything.

"I needed space," I correct him. "Time to think clearly without your overwhelming presence coloring every thought. And I was coming back."

"Were you?" The question carries genuine uncertainty beneath the challenge, a vulnerability that catches me off guard.

"Yes," I admit, the truth easier than I expected. "I wasn't rejecting you, Knox. Just trying to find clarity about what accepting you—accepting this—really means."

His hand covers mine where it rests on the seat between us, his thumb brushing over the ring in what has become a habitual gesture. "And did you find that clarity in your few hours away?"

"I was starting to," I answer honestly. "Before you found me. Before you threw me over your shoulder like some trophy being reclaimed."

"Not a trophy," he corrects, his voice softening slightly. "Never that. Something infinitely more precious. Something I can't bear to lose again."

The raw emotion in his voice disarms me, makes it harder to maintain the righteous indignation his caveman display deserves. This is the contradiction at the heart of Knox Vance—the possessive, controlling, utterly dominant man whose actions seem designed to overwhelm any resistance, alongside the vulnerable, devoted man who has shown me depths of feeling I've never witnessed in anyone else.

"You can't keep doing this," I say finally, turning my hand beneath his so our palms meet, a small concession to the connection I can't deny exists between us. "Can't keep overwhelming every boundary, every attempt at independence, every effort to maintain some sense of self separate from you."

"I know," he acknowledges, surprising me with his candor. "But you can't keep running when things feel too intense, too real, too demanding. Can't keep retreating behind walls when vulnerability feels dangerous."

His accuracy hits home, highlighting the parallel struggles we face—his to loosen control, mine to stop running from intensity. Both of us fighting instincts deeply ingrained, protective mechanisms developed long before we met each other.

"So where does that leave us?" I ask, genuinely uncertain about how we move forward from this impasse, this fundamental tension between his nature and mine.

His fingers intertwine with mine, the gesture both possessive and tender. "Learning," he says simply. "Me, to give you the space you need without feeling like I'm losing you. You, to accept the intensity between us without fearing it will consume you."

The SUV moves through Manhattan traffic, taking us back to the penthouse, back to the life Knox has crafted for us with such careful determination. The ring catches the afternoon light filtering through the tinted windows, sending small rainbows dancing across the leather seats. My heartbeat embedded in platinum and diamonds. His claim made physical, visible, permanent.

"No more throwing me over your shoulder," I stipulate, needing to establish at least one clear boundary after today's display. "No more public demonstrations of possession without my consent."

A small smile tugs at the corner of his mouth, not quite contrition but acknowledgment of my point. "Agreed," he concedes. "Unless absolutely necessary."

I narrow my eyes at the qualification. "Define 'absolutely necessary.'"

"Life-threatening situations," he offers. "Natural disasters. Zombie apocalypse."

The absurdity of the last example startles a reluctant laugh from me, breaking some of the tension that's coiled between us since the moment he found me in that hotel room. His answering smile—genuine, unguarded—reminds me of the man behind the billionaire facade, the man I've been falling for despite my best efforts at resistance.

The man who would throw me over his shoulder in broad daylight, before cameras and strangers, not just to assert hisclaim but because the thought of losing me again terrifies him more than any business challenge, any financial threat, any public scandal.

I'm still not sure if that devotion represents salvation or danger. If his intensity will elevate or consume me. If what exists between us can find balance between his need to possess and my need for independence.

But as his thumb traces circles on my palm, as the penthouse comes into view through the windshield, as my body remembers with treacherous clarity exactly how it feels to be claimed completely by Knox Vance, I find myself willing to stay and discover the answer.

At least for now.

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