Chapter 24
Gabriella
Holy hell, what was that?
What in the actual fuck was that?
Every inch of my skin felt alive. Every part of it tingled and burned, as though he’d somehow left pieces of himself behind wherever he’d touched me.
I could still feel the brush of his lips against my knuckles, the warmth of his breath against my neck, the way his forehead had rested so naturally against mine, as though the last ten years had never happened.
One minute I’d been trying to comfort him, trying to stop him carrying the weight of tonight on his own, and the next I’d forgotten why I’d walked into that bar in the first place.
I’d forgotten everything except him.
I fled because I knew if I didn’t, I wasn’t walking out of that room at all.
The moment he’d whispered in my ear, every coherent thought I’d had disappeared. It hadn’t been the words themselves. It had been the way he’d said them, his voice rough and strained, every sentence sounding like it physically hurt him to speak.
I’d never seen Vienna fight himself before. I’d seen him fight men twice his size. I’d seen him laugh with broken ribs, joke with blood running down his face, and walk into impossible situations wearing that same ridiculous grin.
Tonight there hadn’t been any grin.
Just a man hanging on by the thinnest thread, asking me to walk away because he no longer trusted himself not to pull me closer.
And, like the selfish woman I apparently was, I’d ignored every word.
My nipples tingled as I remembered how tight his face was. How conflicted he was. The power I held over him. The longing he had for me, and me alone.
He didn’t want me for status. He didn’t want me to prove a point. He just wanted me.
He wanted me so badly that he sent me away, because he would always put me first.
I reached the stairs before my legs finally remembered how to work, taking them two at a time as though putting another floor between us would somehow quieten the frantic beating of my heart.
It didn’t.
If anything, it grew louder, every step carrying me further away from him, whilst every instinct screamed at me to turn around and go back.
Go back downstairs.
Go back to him.
He needs you.
You need him.
And I did need him.
I needed him with a desperation that bordered on pathetic. I needed him to show me that he still wanted me, that he still desired me, that the past didn’t matter.
I needed to know I was still his Gabriella.
I paused outside my bedroom, my hand hovering over the handle as I replayed every second of the conversation in my mind, searching for something I’d missed.
Had he kissed me because he’d wanted to?
Or because he’d been saying goodbye to the idea of us until he believed I was healed?
Had he stepped away because he didn’t trust himself, or because he didn’t trust me to know what I wanted?
The answer came almost immediately.
Neither.
He just didn’t trust the timing.
He still saw Nico standing between us.
He still looked at me and saw every bruise I hadn’t shown him, every year I’d spent pretending I was surviving when really, I’d just been existing.
He blamed himself for all of it, and no matter how many times I told him otherwise, no matter how many times I reminded him that I’d made my own choices, he carried my suffering around like it belonged to him.
It wasn’t fair.
But then, neither was anything else about our story.
I pushed open the bedroom door and leaned back against it after closing it behind me, staring into the darkness.
The room was familiar now. Rachel had insisted on making it feel less like a guest room and more like mine, filling it with fresh blankets, books she’d apparently decided I’d enjoy, and enough fluffy cushions to stock a furniture shop.
At any other time, I’d have smiled at the thought.
Tonight all I could see was Vienna’s face.
The way his eyes had closed when I’d touched him.
The way his hands had trembled despite trying so desperately to appear in control.
The way he’d kissed my fingers and almost shuddered with delight.
Heat crept into my cheeks, and I pressed the heels of my hands against them with a groan.
“Oh, for God’s sake.”
I was behaving like a bloody teenager.
I’d spent ten years surviving Nico. I’d lied to murderers, manipulated violent men, hidden my fear so convincingly that I’d almost started believing my own act, and yet one almost-kiss from Vienna had reduced me to pacing around my bedroom, unable to remember how breathing worked.
I laughed quietly to myself, the sound disappearing almost as quickly as it had come.
He’d called me princess.
Such a stupid little word. One he’d been calling me since we were kids. And somehow tonight it had sounded completely different.
I walked over to the mirror, only then catching sight of myself properly. My hair was a mess, my lips were swollen from where I’d been nervously biting them, and my pupils looked far too wide. I looked exactly like a woman who had almost made a decision she wasn’t ready to make.
“Bloody idiot,” I whispered, though I wasn’t entirely sure whether I meant him or me.
My body felt more alive than it had in years. Every part of it tingled and lit up, burning me from the inside out.
I could still feel his breath on me. The way his body shuddered beneath my touch. Every word he spoke had been both an invitation and a warning. A caress and a plea.
I shivered, a dart of pleasure rushing straight between my legs.
God, how I wanted him.
I knew I shouldn’t. I knew my mind was not in the right place to be making these sorts of decisions. But I also knew how my body felt. How it responded to him—how it had always responded to him.
I’d always known I shouldn’t go near that man. And yet I’d always been powerless to resist.
I stomped into the bathroom, almost ripping the clothes from my body as I did so.
A cold shower was needed.
I’d be able to think much more rationally after a cold shower.
Except, the minute I stepped beneath the icy blast, I was plagued with an image of Vienna picking me up and slamming me against the wall, the water spraying over both of us.
“God,” I half moaned, half groaned.
This was going to be utter torture.