Chapter 13 - Harper
HARPER
His gaze lingers on the rain a moment longer before he finally turns his head, not enough to face me fully, but enough that the shadow of his expression sharpens.
The bruise on his cheek darkens the cut of his cheekbone, making his eyes look deeper, more unreadable.
When he speaks, it’s not in that low, taunting tone he usually wields like a blade. It’s quieter, almost reflective.
“You’re not the only one with secrets, Harper.”
The words hit harder than anything he’s said all morning. Not because of the accusation, not because of the implication, but because of the way he says my name. Like he’s tired of circling the truth. Like he wants me to understand something without him having to spell it out.
Anger surges up so fast my body moves before my mind can form the thought.
My boots strike the stone floor with purpose, and I’m crossing the small distance between us, ready to tear into him for his arrogance, for his half-truths, for the way he keeps tugging me closer with one hand while pushing me away with the other.
The storm inside me has been simmering since that dummy slammed into me, since my eyes glowed, since he pinned me to the wall, and his calmness now feels like a spark tossed onto dry tinder.
But Sebastian moves first.
In one fluid motion, he reaches forward, fisting the front of my shirt and yanking me toward him with more force than refinement.
The sound that leaves me is not fear, it’s surprise, sharp and unguarded.
My body stumbles, knee hitting the stone beside his thigh as I brace myself, my other hand shooting out to grip the front of his shirt for balance.
Suddenly I’m hovering over him, breath mingling with his, the fabric of my blouse clenched in his fist while my own fingers knot in the dark fabric stretched across his chest. The position is startlingly intimate, so unexpected I freeze for a moment, caught between outrage and something dangerously close to want.
His knee brackets mine, his body warm beneath me even through layers of clothing, and the library seems to shrink around us until only the rain and our shallow breaths exist.
Sebastian glances down, not at my face, but at the lines our bodies have formed, the scruff of his shirt twisted in my hand, the curve of my knee pressed into the alcove beside his leg.
His lashes lower for half a heartbeat, not with embarrassment, not even with desire exactly, but with awareness, as though the gravity of the moment settles onto him all at once.
When he looks up again, his eyes lock onto mine with a focus that borders on command.
“Sit.”
One word.
One syllable.
Soft, but laced with an authority that pulls at something deep in my spine.
He isn’t smirking.
He isn’t teasing.
The word hangs between us, suspended in the thin slice of air where his breath meets mine.
My pulse thrums loud enough that I’m certain he hears it, but I refuse to let him see how deeply that single command unsettled me.
My fingers slowly release the bunch of fabric I’ve gathered in his shirt, and I shift just enough to reclaim some sense of control.
If he wants me to sit, fine, I’ll sit. But I won’t let him think for a moment that he can dictate my every move.
I begin to lower myself beside him on the stone ledge, intending to put a respectable, safe, distance between us.
The window alcove is narrow, cold where the rain has leached its chill into the stone, but it feels steadier than hovering over him.
I ease toward that space, prepared to slide into place and regain even a shred of emotional footing.
But his voice stops me before I make contact.
“Not there.”
It’s quiet, almost gentle, but the tone vibrates with something I can’t quite name, something that wraps around my spine and pulls. My movements still instantly. The warmth of his hand is gone from my shirt, but its ghost remains, lingering on my skin like a held breath.
I turn my head toward him slowly, unwilling to give him the satisfaction of a startled reaction.
His expression gives nothing away, no smug grin, no raised brow, just an unwavering steadiness that tells me he isn’t making a joke.
His gaze drops to the empty space directly in front of him, then back to my eyes, and the message there coils tightly between us.
He didn’t want me beside him.
He wanted me closer.
A pulse of heat travels through my chest, confusing and unwelcome.
The rain outside blurs into streaks of muted gray, and the breath I pull in feels too thick, too warm.
The space he’s indicating places me between his legs, closer than any reasonable person would sit with someone they claim to barely tolerate.
For a moment, I don’t move.
Can’t move.
His jaw shifts just slightly, a muscle ticking beneath the bruise on his cheek as he watches the indecision flicker across my face. There’s no arrogance this time, no command sharpened by ego. If anything, there’s an honesty in the request that unsettles me more than his usual bravado.
He wants me there.
Close enough to touch.
Close enough to see every flaw.
Close enough that I could break him, too.
My breath stutters. I attempt to hide it, but the faint narrowing of his eyes tells me he caught it anyway.
The rain outside deepens, drumming harder against the glass. A flicker of worry, no, anticipation, crosses his features before he reins it back in, placing the unreadable mask over it once more.
I shift my weight slightly, testing the air, the distance, the sound of both of our breathing. My wand is still warm in my palm, as though aware of what it might mean if I step forward into that space.
Into his space.
“Harper,” he murmurs, barely above a whisper, just enough to anchor me in place, to remind me of the tension hanging like a thread ready to snap.
And still, he waits.
Caution steadies my movements. Every instinct I have screams to turn away, to create distance, to preserve whatever thin boundary still exists between us.
Yet something deeper, pushes me forward instead.
My palms hover uncertainly over the edge of the alcove as I shift my weight, angling myself toward the narrow space he indicated.
The ledge is cold beneath my knee as I ease closer, the scent of rain and parchment filling the quiet.
His legs bracket the space with unspoken expectation, and though he hasn’t touched me again, the memory of his hand on my shirt lingers like pressure against my skin.
My breath hitches as I finally settle into the narrow gap between his knees, careful, hesitant, ready to pull back if he so much as twitches wrong.
But Sebastian Harwood does not wait for careful.
In one fluid motion, he reaches for me again, not rough, not careless, but with a certainty that steals the ground out from under me.
His hands find my waist with deliberate precision, fingers curling just enough to claim the moment without bruising it.
Before I can brace myself, he draws me forward and upward in a single decisive pull.
A startled gasp escapes me as my body meets his.
Warmth floods the space between us. My knees slide to either side of his hips, the fabric of my robe brushing the dark fabric of his trousers. His chest rises beneath me, steady but tense, and the library’s dim light settles over us like a held breath.
Then he lifts my chin.
No force, just the gentle press of his fingers guiding my gaze until it meets his. Rain light glints across his eyes, brightening the green and deepening the darker ring around them, and for a moment the entire room empties of sound.
“Now,” he says quietly, voice low and steady, “tell me to stop.”
Not a command.
A challenge.
A plea wrapped in iron.
His grip doesn’t tighten, doesn’t trap me; if anything, it loosens slightly, giving me the space to pull away. The gesture is more intimate than any restraint could be. My breath trembles as I realize he’s handing the choice to me, expecting me to take it.
But there’s something else beneath the words, hidden under the smooth control of his tone. A flicker of uncertainty. A hesitation. A fear of hearing the wrong answer.
Magic hums faintly through my veins, responding to the heat of his hands, to the tension coiling through his body, to the proximity neither of us should want yet both of us undeniably sought.
My fingers, which had automatically gripped his shoulders to steady myself, curl deeper into the fabric of his shirt, grounding me and betraying me in the same breath.
For a heartbeat, I can’t speak.
For a heartbeat, neither can he.
Rain drums softly on the glass, the only witness to the fragile, dangerous line we are toeing.
He looks at me like the truth might ruin him.
Silence settles over us in a way that feels almost physical.
It wraps itself around my ribs, presses warm and heavy beneath my skin, tightening with every second I refuse to speak.
I should tell him to stop. I should push off his chest, climb off his lap, reclaim whatever crumbling sense of control I had left.
But the words stay locked behind my teeth, unmoving, and the stillness I offer instead becomes its own answer.
His gaze drops to my mouth before rising slowly, painfully slowly, back to my eyes, and that small movement alone sends a ribbon of heat spiraling beneath my skin.
One of his hands steadies at my waist, fingers molding to the curve of it with a gentleness that makes my breath hitch.
The other slides along my hip, his thumb tracing a line that isn’t meant to be seductive but becomes so anyway, simply because of how close we already are.
The warmth of him seeps through the layers of fabric between us, blurring boundaries I’ve spent my life enforcing.