Chapter 25 #2
I can’t stop seeing the way she looked when she broke in the middle of that room.
How she still reached for me. How she trusted me when everything else was collapsing.
I can’t stop hearing her voice snapping across the ballroom, taking command while half the room was still trying to understand they were under attack.
I can’t stop thinking about the way she sank into my chest afterward like I was the only place left that felt real.
I lean my forehead against the cool metal railing.
Goddamn it.
A soft knock sounds behind me.
I freeze.
Not because I don’t know who it is.
Because I do.
I straighten slowly, heart picking up pace in a way it has no business doing, and turn toward the door.
Another knock. Hesitant. Almost apologetic.
“Jon?” Her voice slips through the wood. Quiet. Careful. Tired in a way that scratches something low in my chest.
I swallow.
“Yeah,” I answer. “It’s open.”
The handle turns.
The door creaks.
And then she’s there.
Delilah stands in the doorway in one of her old sleep shirts—soft, oversized, slipping off one shoulder.
Bare legs. Bare feet. Hair loose and still a little damp like she showered not long ago too.
She looks small in the frame of the door and impossibly strong at the same time, like she always does.
Like she’s one breath away from breaking and still somehow the most dangerous thing in the room.
Her eyes flick to my chest.
Then lower.
Then back up to my face.
Color blooms across her cheeks.
I clear my throat and step back instinctively. “Sorry. I—uh. I was just… cooling off.”
She huffs a weak laugh, the sound thin but real. “It’s fine. I just—”
She trails off.
I wait.
She shifts her weight, fingers twisting together in front of her. A nervous habit I’ve only ever caught in the quiet moments, never in the field, never when anyone else was looking.
“I couldn’t sleep,” she admits.
Of course she couldn’t.
“Nightmares?” I ask gently.
She nods.
“Same,” I confess.
That earns me a small, surprised smile. Not because she didn’t know. Because I said it out loud.
I move inside and grab a T-shirt from the back of the chair, tugging it over my head before she can look too long. Not because I mind.
Because I do.
Because her eyes on me feels dangerous in a way bullets never have. Because every second she stood there looking at me like that, in that shirt, with her hair damp and loose around her shoulders, I was one bad decision away from making this night even more complicated than it already is.
When I turn back, she’s stepped farther into the room, standing near the edge of the bed like she’s not sure she’s allowed to be here.
The lamp by the nightstand throws soft gold across one side of her face, leaving the other in shadow.
She looks wrung out. Beautiful. Fragile in all the ways she hates being seen, though even now there’s steel under it.
“You okay?” I ask.
She shrugs. “Define okay.”
“Fair.”
Silence stretches.
Not awkward.
Heavy.
Loaded.
The kind of silence that doesn’t feel empty. It feels crowded with everything we haven’t said for weeks. Maybe months. Maybe years, if I’m honest enough to hate myself for it.
“I didn’t mean to come bother you,” she says softly. “I just… after tonight, I didn’t want to be alone in my head.”
Something twists low in my chest.
“You’re never a bother,” I say immediately. “You know that.”
Her gaze lifts to mine, searching harder than I’m ready for.
“Do I?” she asks quietly.
The question lands with more force than it should. Because she means now. Because she means after the distance, after the silence, after every time I chose command over honesty and expected her to understand anyway.
I step closer before I even realize I’m doing it.
“Yes,” I answer. “You do.”
We’re standing too close now.
Close enough that I can smell her soap. Clean and faintly floral, softened by the damp heat still clinging to her skin. Close enough that if I moved an inch, I’d touch her. Close enough that the room feels smaller for it.
Neither of us does.
“I’m sorry about earlier,” she murmurs. “About… everything. I didn’t mean to put you in the middle of it with my dad.”
“You didn’t,” I reply. “I walked into it willingly.”
Her lips part slightly, like she didn’t expect that answer and maybe hates how much it matters.
“I never asked you to,” she says.
“I know.”
That’s the problem. She never asks. She never has to. I keep showing up anyway.
I hesitate, then lift my hand slowly, giving her time to stop me.
She doesn’t.
My fingers brush her wrist first. Light. Testing. Her pulse jumps beneath my fingertips. When she doesn’t pull away, I slide my hand up, resting it gently against her forearm.
She exhales.
So do I.
The contact is almost nothing. It feels like everything.
“Delilah,” I say quietly. “If this is just… adrenaline, or fear, or trying to hold on to the nearest solid thing—”
“It’s not,” she interrupts. There’s no sharpness in it. Just certainty. “I’ve had plenty of both. This feels different.”
I search her face. “How?”
Her eyes don’t leave mine. “Like I’m… here,” she whispers. “Not stuck somewhere else. Like when I’m with you, my brain finally shuts up.”
My throat tightens so hard it hurts.
“That’s dangerous,” I murmur roughly.
“I know.”
We both do.
That’s what makes the silence after it feel so brutal.
So honest. There’s no pretending this is simple.
No pretending I can be just her captain and she can be just another soldier and we’ll both walk away from this untouched.
That lie died a long time ago. We’re just the last two people to stop stepping over its body.
She steps closer.
Now there’s no space between us.
Her hand lifts, hesitates, then rests lightly against my chest, right over my heart.
It’s like someone flips a switch.
Everything sharpens.
Her eyes. Her breath. The heat of her palm through the shirt. The way her fingers curl slightly into the fabric like she’s testing whether I’m real. The way mine have to resist the urge to drag her all the way in.
“Jon,” she whispers.
I cup her face without thinking, both hands lifting to hold her like I’ve wanted to since the moment she came through that door. My thumbs brush her cheeks, slow, careful, giving myself one last chance to be better than this.
“Tell me to stop,” I say.
She doesn’t.
Instead, she rises on her toes and presses her mouth to mine.
Slow.
Tentative.
Nothing like the desperation of before. Nothing like panic or survival or the sharp edge of too much adrenaline and too little control.
This is careful–intentional.
Real.
I kiss her back just as gently, pouring every unsaid word into it.
My hands slide into her hair, cradling her head like something precious, something breakable, something I’d never survive dropping.
Her mouth softens against mine. She sighs, and the sound goes through me like a match catching dry paper.
She melts into me.
Not because she’s weak. Because she’s tired. Because she trusts me. Because for once she’s letting herself lean instead of holding up the entire world with locked knees and sheer spite.
We break apart only when breathing becomes necessary.
Her forehead rests against mine.
Our breaths mingle in the warm, dim air between us. The whole room feels suspended—quiet, golden, held.
“I’m scared,” she admits softly.
The honesty in it tears straight through me.
“So am I,” I answer.
She smiles faintly, sad and warm all at once. “Good. At least we’re honest.”
I brush my thumb beneath her eye. “You don’t have to be strong all the time, you know.”
She leans into my touch, and that tiny movement feels more intimate than the kiss. “I know. I just… don’t know how not to be.”
My mouth goes dry.
“Fall into me,” I whisper. “I’ll show you.”
The words leave me before I can stop them. Too intimate. Too honest. Too much like a promise.
Her eyes search mine like she’s trying to decide whether I meant it.
I did. Every goddamn word.
And she does.
Her lips crash into mine like a dam breaking—no hesitation this time. No fear. Just heat. Just need. Her hands tangle in my shirt like she’s afraid I’ll disappear if she lets go, and I kiss her like I’ve been starving for this—because I have.
Because God, I have.
I walk her backward until the backs of her knees hit the bed, and she sinks down, eyes wide and wanting. Her sleep shirt rides up just enough to expose the soft curve of her thigh. One more inch and I’d see everything.
She opens her legs slightly. Just enough to invite. Just enough to ruin me.
“Delilah,” I rasp, dropping to my knees in front of her. “Tell me what you need.”
Her breath stutters. “You.”
“That’s not good enough.” My palms slide up her thighs, rougher than I mean to be. “Be greedy. Be specific.”
She bites her lip, hips shifting closer to the edge of the bed. “I want your mouth. I want to feel you everywhere.”
That’s all I need.
I grip her thighs and pull her to the very edge. My shoulders push her legs open wider, and I look up at her, waiting. Watching. She nods—barely—but it’s permission, and I take it like it’s holy.
I press my mouth to her bare skin and kiss my way inward. Slow. Teasing. She’s shaking already, breathing hard, fists clenched in the sheets like she’s bracing for impact.
But I don’t tease her for long.
Because the second my tongue finds her pussy, I moan. She’s warm and wet and fucking perfect, and the way she gasps my name makes me lose the last of my control.
I bury my face between her thighs like I belong there.
Because I do.
I devour her, tongue sliding through her folds, lips sucking her clit until her legs are trembling against my shoulders. She tries to close them, overwhelmed, but I growl and hold her open.
“Take it,” I murmur, voice wrecked. “You said you wanted me? Then take it, baby.”
She whines—this raw, broken sound—and grinds against my mouth like she’s chasing something only I can give her.
And I do.
I give her everything.
Two fingers slide inside her, curling just right while my mouth works her clit in tight, relentless circles. She’s soaked, fluttering around me, thighs trembling harder with every stroke.
“I can’t—Jon—fuck—I’m gonna—”
“Come,” I growl. “Right now. On my tongue.”
And she does.
She shatters with a scream, hips bucking, legs clamping around my head while I hold her down and ride it out, licking her through every wave of it. I don’t stop until she’s begging—literally fucking begging—for me to come up and kiss her.
I crawl up her body, grab her jaw, and kiss her hard—messy and claiming, letting her taste herself on my tongue. She moans into my mouth like it turns her on more.
She pulls at my towel like she wants it off and I let her take it—let her see everything.
Let her have everything.
Her hands roam my chest, nails dragging across old scars, and it lights me up inside like a fuse. She rolls onto her back, legs still spread, and looks at me like I’m the only thing that’s ever made her feel safe.
“I want you inside me,” she whispers.
Not a plea. A command.
And then I’m there—between her legs, cock dragging through her soaked folds, teasing her entrance until her hips rise off the bed in desperation.
“Jon—”
“I’ve got you,” I breathe. “You say stop, I stop.”
“I won’t.”
She looks me in the eyes when I push in—slow, steady, deep—and her mouth falls open in this perfect little gasp that makes me want to fucking ruin her.
She’s tight, gripping me like her body never wants to let go.
And when I bottom out, I just stay there for a second—feeling her. Letting her feel me.
She wraps her legs around my waist, arms around my neck, and pulls me in like she’s trying to fuse us together.
And then I start to move.
Not gentle. Not punishing. Just deep. Intentional. Every stroke pushing her higher, every thrust dragging another moan out of her lips. Her nails claw at my back. Her mouth is on my neck, my shoulder, my jaw.
“You feel so good,” she whimpers. “So fucking good, Jon.”
I thrust harder.
“Say my name again.”
“Jon—fuck—Jon.”
“Louder.”
“Jon.”
“You’re mine,” I growl, hand gripping her thigh, spreading her wider. “No one else touches you like this. No one else fucks you like this.”
She’s close again—I can feel it in the way her pussy clenches around me, the way her breath stutters and catches in her throat.
“Come for me,” I whisper against her mouth. “Wanna feel you lose it while I’m buried inside you.”
She cries out and breaks, body locking up, hips jerking, soaking my cock with the hardest orgasm I’ve ever felt from her. It rips through her like a wave, and I fuck her through it, chasing my own.
I don’t last long after that.
The way she’s pulsing around me, the way she moans my name while clinging to me—it undoes me. I grind deep one last time and spill into her with a groan that sounds like it’s been building for years.
We collapse together—sweaty, shaking, breathless.
But not broken.
Never broken when it’s her.
When the room finally stops spinning, I pull her into my chest and kiss her forehead.
“You okay?” I murmur, brushing damp hair from her face.
She nods sleepily, already fading. “Better than okay.”
I tighten my arm around her.
“Me too.”
And for the first time in longer than I can remember, I believe it.