Chapter 8 Sabrina
EIGHT
SAbrINA
The silence after Beck’s confession is louder than the storm ever was.
We’re back in the living room now—fire rebuilt, flames licking high again because neither of us could stand the dark. I’m curled on the couch in his lap, legs tucked under me, his arms a heavy cage around my ribs like he’s afraid I’ll slip away if he loosens his grip even an inch.
I don’t blame him. I’m afraid of the same thing.
His heartbeat thuds against my back—steady, too steady, like he’s forcing it to stay calm for my sake.
Mine is a frantic bird trapped under my ribs.
Every time I close my eyes I see Ethan’s face: the crooked smile he used to give me when we were kids, the same smile he must have worn when he sat across from Beck in that bar three winters ago and tried to buy a murder.
My brother tried to hire the man I love to kill someone.
And now he’s coming for me.
I twist in Beck’s hold until I can straddle him, knees sinking into the cushions on either side of his hips. His hands automatically settle on my waist—big, warm, grounding. I cup his face, thumbs brushing the sharp line of his beard, forcing him to look at me.
“You’re shaking,” he says. Voice low. Rough.
“So are you.”
He doesn’t deny it. Just exhales hard through his nose and pulls me closer until our foreheads touch. “I should’ve said yes to him back then,” he mutters. “If I had, maybe none of this—”
“Don’t.” I press my lips to his—quick, fierce. “Don’t you dare finish that sentence. If you’d said yes, you wouldn’t be here. You wouldn’t be you. And I wouldn’t have anyone to hold me while the world falls apart.”
His eyes darken. Something raw flickers behind them—guilt, fury, hunger all tangled together. “Then let me hold you,” he says. “Let me remind you what’s real right now.”
Before I can answer he’s kissing me—deep, claiming, like he’s trying to erase every ugly truth we just dragged into the light. I kiss him back just as hard, fingers knotting in his hair, hips rocking down instinctively until I feel him harden beneath me.
Yes.
This.
This is what I need.
Not plans. Not promises of violence. Just him. Inside me. Around me. Proof that something good can still exist in the middle of all this wreckage.
I break the kiss long enough to yank his shirt over his head.
He helps—impatient—then does the same to the flannel I’m wearing.
Cool air hits my skin; his mouth follows immediately, hot and open against my throat, my collarbone, lower.
He takes one nipple between his teeth—gentle bite, then soothing suck—and I arch with a broken moan.
“Beck—”
“Say it again,” he growls against my breast. “My name. Like you mean it.”
“Beck.” I drag my nails down his back, hard enough to leave marks. “Please.”
He flips us so fast the room spins. My back hits the thick rug in front of the fire; he’s over me in the next heartbeat, sweatpants shoved down just enough to free himself. Thick. Hard. Already leaking at the tip. He notches against me—bare this time, no condom—and pauses.
“Tell me you want this,” he rasps. “No barriers. Just us.”
I hook my legs around his waist, and pull him closer. “I want you. All of you. Now.”
He pushes in on one long, slow thrust. No preamble. No teasing. Just deep, stretching fullness that makes my eyes roll back and my breath punch out in a sob.
“Fuck,” he groans, forehead dropping to mine. “So perfect. So fucking perfect.”
Then he moves.
Hard. Deep. Relentless.
Each thrust drives the air from my lungs, rocks my body against the rug, sparks pleasure so sharp it borders on pain.
I claw at his shoulders, his back, anywhere I can reach.
He hooks one of my knees over his elbow—opens me wider—changes the angle until he’s hitting that spot inside me that makes stars explode behind my eyelids.
“Again,” I gasp. “Harder.”
He obeys.
The fire crackles beside us. The storm howls outside. But all I hear is the wet slap of skin on skin, his ragged breathing against my ear, the low, filthy praise he keeps murmuring like prayer.
“So tight for me… taking me so good… mine, Sabrina, you’re fucking mine…”
I shatter first—back bowing, cry ripping out of me, inner walls pulsing around him in hard, rhythmic waves. He doesn’t stop. Just fucks me through it—faster, deeper—until his rhythm stutters and he buries himself to the hilt with a guttural groan, coming hot and thick inside me.
We stay locked together. Panting. Sweaty. Trembling.
He doesn’t pull out right away. Just lowers himself carefully, covering me with his weight, lips brushing my temple, my cheek, the corner of my mouth.
“I love you,” he whispers. Raw. Broken open. “And I’m not losing you. Not to him. Not to anyone.”
I turn my face into his neck. Inhale pine and smoke and him. “I love you too,” I whisper back. “And I’m not running anymore.”
He kisses me slow then—lazy, tender, full of everything we can’t say yet.
When he finally rolls us so I’m draped across his chest, the fire has burned low again. Embers glow soft orange against the dark.
His hand strokes down my spine. “Tomorrow the pass opens,” he murmurs. “We’ll call the sheriff. Get your evidence somewhere safe. And if Ethan shows up…”
He doesn’t finish the sentence. He doesn’t have to.
I press my palm over his heart. Feel it beat strong and sure beneath my hand. “Together,” I say.
“Together,” he echoes.
And for the first time since I drove up this mountain, the fear feels smaller.
Not gone.
But smaller. Because whatever comes through that door when the snow finally stops— we’ll face it side by side.
Bare. Marked. Claimed.
And utterly unafraid.