Page 95 of You Were Always Mine
The glow hits me first—soft and golden, spilling out from the living room like the house itself is bleeding light. My steps falter. My heart does too. I follow the petals, my breath stuck in my throat, until I see him.
Kai is standing there, framed by a hundred flickering candles. Their flames paint him in gold and shadow, his face carved sharp, his eyes dark, unreadable, and all for me. My mouth parts, but nothing comes out.
“You… you did this?” My voice is barely a whisper, cracking against the silence.
He tilts his head, the faintest curve touching his lips, not quite a smile—something darker, more dangerous, more tender all at once. “I’d pull the stars out of the night sky for you if I could,” he says, his voice low and steady, “but I had to settle for candlelight.”
The words slam into me, dizzying, so heavy I can’t breathe through them. My knees threaten to give, but I stand rooted, staring at him like he’s not real.
“Where’s Mum and Dad?” I manage, my throat tight.
“Gone to bed.” His answer is simple, unshakable. Then his gaze sharpens, pinning me where I stand.
“So what is this, Kai?”
He moves—slow, deliberate—closing the space between us. His hand brushes my wrist, tugging me gently but firmly, pulling me deeper into the room, into the glow, into him. My pulse hammers like it knows the truth before my mind dares to speak it.
And then I see it.
The petals spiral across the floor, up onto the couch, onto the table covered in something I can’t fully process because it’s so impossibly beautiful, so wrong and right at the same time, like stepping inside a dream I never admitted I wanted.
His mouth grazes my ear, his breath warm, his voice wrecking me. “This,” he murmurs, “is your fantasy, baby.”
The air tastes like wax and sugar, smoke curling up from a hundred tiny flames that dance on every surface. My bare feet whisper against the carpet as I follow the trail of petals, crushed velvet red against pale cream. My chest won’t stop heaving, like my ribs can’t contain my heart, like it knows I should turn back—but I don’t.
He reaches past me, slow, like I’m too fragile to touch. His hand brushes mine, only a whisper of skin, and then he tilts his head toward the far corner.
“Look.”
And I do.
The television isn’t there anymore. It’s draped in white gauze, glowing faint with hidden lights behind it, like starlight caught in fabric. A makeshift canopy of sheer silk falls from the ceiling, petal-strewn cushions piled beneath it. It looks nothing like this house, nothing like my life. It looks like a secret dream carved out of the dark just for me.
My throat clogs. My eyes sting. I hate him, I swear I do—but no one’s ever done something like this for me. No one’s ever made fantasy real.
The threshold doesn’t hold me long. My feet move before my mind can catch up, before the sane part of me screams to turn back. The carpet is soft under my soles, rose petals sticking to my skin as if they don’t want me to leave either. The glow of candlelight paints everything gold, a flicker against the walls, against Kai’s face, against the sharp shadows that make him look both like salvation and sin.
I melt into it—into him.
His eyes drag over me, slow and consuming, and it’s enough to buckle the tension I’d been clinging to. The phone hidden upstairs, the texts, the fear—none of it follows me here. Only the heat of his gaze, the careful way he’s built this fantasy, like he knew I’d need something to drown in.
“I thought…” My voice breaks, too fragile for how much is inside me. “I thought I’d lost you.”
Kai steps closer, the air tightening, the soft rasp of his breath louder than the crackle of candle flames. His hand comes up, not rough this time, not cruel—just his fingertips brushing my jaw, steadying me like he doesn’t trust I’ll stand on my own.
“You never will.” His whisper scrapes against my skin. “Not while I’m breathing.”
The words pierce deeper than any threat he’s ever spat. My chest caves, ribs aching as I press into him, like I could dissolve here if he let me. His palm slides to my waist, warm and anchoring, pulling me until the space between us disappears.
And I let it. I let him.
Because maybe for tonight, under this candlelight, I don’t want to remember the outside world. I don’t want to feel strong or scared. I just want to melt.
The glow feels too soft for the way his eyes cut through me. My chest tightens when he leans down, lips grazing my ear like a secret he shouldn’t say aloud.
“Do you remember, Scar?” His voice is velvet and gravel, wrapping me tight. “That fantasy you told me once.”
I freeze, lashes lowering. The heat crawling up my neck is instant, shame and want curling together. “Which one?” I manage, though my throat is too dry. “You mean the one about?—”
