Chapter 15
THEA
Gabriel leads me by the hand up a private staircase.
We reach a large door, and he pushes it open, revealing a space that’s unmistakably his.
Dark wood furniture, charcoal walls, and a massive four-poster bed that dominates the room. Floor-to-ceiling windows look out onto the property. Through them, I can see the sweep of Midtown off in the distance. There’s even a fireplace in the corner with a fire crackling softly.
He shuts the door, keeping my hand in his. But as he begins to guide me to the bed, I find myself not wanting to move.
“Gabriel…”
He releases my hand, slips out of his suit jacket, and tosses it onto the back of a nearby chair. Then he turns to me, his eyes burning with want. The sight nearly blots out my thoughts again. But I stay where I stand.
“Gabriel.” My tone is a little firmer. “We need to talk.”
“Later.” Off comes his bow tie, tossed over the chair next to the jacket.
“No. Now.” There’s a hardness to my words that I didn’t intend. “This—tonight—all of it. You keep saying that I’m yours. And I said it, too. But I’m not. I can’t be.”
He turns, goes still. “Thea—”
“I want my freedom. I want to leave, to go back to my life, to…” I trail off, not quite sure how to finish the sentence.
“What life?” His tone is quiet but harsh. “The one where you cleaned toilets for minimum wage? The one where you lived in a shoebox and ate ramen three nights a week? That life?”
“It was mine.”
“It was barely surviving.”
“And this?” I gesture around the room. “This is yours, all yours. You bought me. I’m not even a guest here—I’m an item you purchased, one you can dress up and parade around like some kind of trophy when you want to impress people. And you expect me to just accept it?”
He says nothing at first. He’s weighing his words carefully, like he always does.
“You’re safer here.”
“From what, Kolya?” I laugh. “I don’t even know who he is. Why would he want to hurt me? Because he’s bitter that you outbid him?”
In that moment, Sylvie returns to mind. Kolya bought her. Is she okay? Where is she? Is she even alive?
I push the thoughts aside. They’re too painful to even consider.
“Trust me, you’re safer behind these walls.”
“No. I’m a prisoner behind these walls.”
“You’re protected.”
“I don’t need your protection!” My voice cracks. “I need my freedom. Let me go, Gabriel. I’ll disappear. I’ll leave the city, change my name, whatever you want. Just—please. Let me go.”
He crosses the distance between us in two strides.
“No.”
“You can’t just say no.”
“I can.” His hands frame my face, forcing me to meet his eyes. “I can and I will. Because the moment you walk out that door, you’re dead. Those men at the gala? Those guards there to protect you? I didn’t hire them for fun. Do you understand me? You have no idea the danger you’re in.”
His voice breaks a tiny bit. And in that moment, I see it—the fear beneath the control. The desperation. I have no idea what kind of danger I’m in. But right then, I can see that whatever it is, Gabriel’s not playing around. The danger is real.
“Tell me.”
He shakes his head. “I can’t let you go. When I look at you, I see everything I didn’t know I wanted. If I were to lose you, if something were to happen to you, I’d be destroyed.”
My breath hitches. And in that moment, I see Gabriel in a way I never have before.
“You’re scared,” I say.
“Terrified.” There’s no hesitation in his tone.
“Of what?”
“Of how much I want you.” His hands slide down to my waist. “Of how much I need you. Of what I’m willing to do to keep you, to protect you.”
He kisses me.
It’s not gentle, just like in the car. He presses me against him, letting me feel his hardness through his slacks. I gasp. He swallows the sound with another kiss, his tongue sweeping into my mouth.
I should push him away. There’s something big he’s not telling me. And whatever it is, it’s feeding into his fear.
I kiss him back.
He groans and walks me backward until my shoulders hit the wall. His hands find my wrists, pinning them above my head, and I’m trapped between the cold wall and the heat of his body.
“You’re not leaving,” he says against my mouth. “Say it.”
“I—”
“Say it, Thea.”
“I’m not leaving.”
“You’re mine.”
“Gabriel—”
“Say it.”
“I’m yours.” The words break something open in my chest. I’m not just repeating them because he’s telling me to. “God help me, I’m yours.”
I’m repeating them because I mean them.
He releases my wrists and steps back, his eyes burning.
“Take off the dress.”
My hands shake as I reach for the zipper.
“Slowly,” he commands. “I want to watch.”
I drag the zipper down. The burgundy fabric pools at my feet, leaving me in nothing but black lace underwear and heels.
His gaze travels over me slowly, thorough, hungry.
“The mirror,” he says, nodding toward the massive mirror leaning against the wall near the closet. “Stand in front of it.”
“Why?”
“Because I want you to see what I see.”
I move toward the mirror on trembling legs. He follows, standing behind me, his hands settling on my waist.
“Look.”
I force myself to meet my own gaze, to see what he sees.
Flushed skin. Swollen lips. Eyes dark with want. My body—curves and softness, and everything I’ve spent years, decades even, feeling ashamed of—on full display.
“You see her?” Gabriel’s hands slide up, cupping my breasts through the lace. “This woman. She’s fucking perfect. Every curve. Every inch.”
“Gabriel—”
“Say it. Say you’re perfect.”
“I can’t.”
His hand moves to my throat. Not squeezing, just holding, possessive. “Say it.”
“I’m—” I swallow hard. “I’m perfect.”
“Brava ragazza.” He unhooks my bra, lets it fall. His hands cover my breasts, thumbs circling my nipples, and I arch back against him. “Look how beautiful you are when you surrender.”
He’s right.
The woman in the mirror—head tilted back, mouth open, body pliant under his hands—she’s not the invisible maid who scrubbed floors and apologized for existing. She’s powerful. Desired.
His.
He turns me around, lifting me easily and carrying me over to the bed. There, he lays me out like a feast, sprawled across the dark sheets, my hair fanned around my head. He strips, and then he’s kneeling between my thighs, hooking his fingers in my underwear.
“Tell me what you want.”
“You.” My voice is barely a whisper. “I want you.”
He drags my panties down my legs, tosses them aside. Then he spreads my thighs wide and lowers his mouth to me.
His lips touch my pussy, and I cry out, my hands flying to this thick hair.
He devours me like he’s starving, tongue and lips working with devastating precision. When I try to close my legs, overwhelmed, he forces them open, his hands gripping my thighs hard enough to bruise.
“Gabriel. I can’t—”
“Yes, you can.” He adds his fingers, curling them inside me. “Come for me, Thea. Let me feel it.”
His tongue finds my clit, and he makes slow circles around it, pushing me to a new level of pleasure. I moan, my hips bucking against him. The orgasm approaches quickly, the intensity more than I can stand.
“I’m… fuck!”
The climax rips through me, sharp and brutal. I’m crying out his name, my body shaking. He doesn’t stop licking me until I’m panting, the trembling subsiding.
Then he’s over me, braced on his forearms, his eyes locked on mine. I glance down and take in the sight of his cock, the size, the precum on the tip. I shift, moaning, taking sweet pleasure in how hard I make him.
“Eyes on me,” he commands. “Don’t look away.”
He reaches down and takes hold of himself, placing the head at my entrance.
“Ask for it,” he says.
“Please,” I say. “I need it so goddamn badly.”
He grins, as if that was just what he’d wanted to hear.
With that, he pushes inside in one deep, smooth thrust.
“Fuck. You feel so goddamn good.”
He holds for just a moment, giving me a second to adjust to his thickness. Then he starts to move slow and deep, each thrust full and claiming.
“Say it,” he demands.
I don’t need to ask what he wants to hear.
“I’m yours.”
“Again.”
“I’m yours, Gabriel.”
“Sei mia. Solo mia.” His pace increases, rougher now. “No one else gets to touch you. No one else gets to have you. Capito?”
“Yes… oh God… yes.”
“That’s it. Take me. Fuck. You’re so goddamn perfect.”
He pulls out suddenly, and I miss him inside instantly.
“Turn over,” he says, his voice rough. “I want you on your hands and knees.”
I obey, trembling, needing him more than I’ve ever needed anything else.
His hand slides up my spine, then fists my hair. It’s not painful—it’s controlling—holding me in place as he pushes inside from behind.
The angle is devastating.
“You feel that?” His other hand grips my hip, pulling me back onto him with each thrust. “This is what it means to be mine. Every inch of you, every breath.”
I’m falling apart, pleasure building again impossibly fast, and I know he feels it.
His hand moves from my hip to the small of my back, pushing me down into a deep arch that makes the angle even more intense, his thickness plunging into me over and over, the room filling with the sounds of skin on skin.
“Touch yourself,” he orders. “I want to feel you come around me.”
I obey without thinking, my hand sliding between my legs, circling my clit. He groans.
“Così bella quando ti arrendi,” he mutters. “So fucking beautiful.”
The second orgasm hits harder than the first. I cry out, clenching around him, and it drags him over the edge. Gabriel buries himself deep with a guttural sound, his grip on my hair tightening as he comes inside me.
“I will never let you go.”
We collapse together, both shaking, both wrecked. He pulls out slowly, then gathers me against him, my back to his chest, his arm locked around my waist.
“Breathe,” he says. “Just breathe.”
“I don’t want to leave,” I admit, my voice breaking. “I should. But I don’t. Not right now.”
“Good.”
“It terrifies me. All of it.”
“I know,” he says. “I know.”
He presses a kiss to my shoulder. “Ti prometto,” he says quietly. “I promise I’ll keep you safe. I’ll do anything for you.”
“Gabriel—”
“Sleep. We’ll figure out the rest tomorrow.”
I should argue and demand answers about Kolya and whatever else it is that he’s keeping hidden. I remember the look in his eyes, the one that let me know without words that there’s so much he’s not telling me.
But I’m exhausted. And warm. And I’m where I want to be—even if it’s in the arms of a man who terrifies and thrills me in equal measure.
I close my eyes and let myself fall.