EPILOGUE
ANA
We’re somewhere off the grid, but not in the wild. It’s the kind of place that pretends to be rustic, but every fixture is custom, every lock reinforced, and the floor doesn’t creak no matter where you step. Dominik didn’t say how long it took to vet it. I didn’t ask.
The walls are stone and the windows are wide, but curtained for now. The bath is carved into the floor, half indoor, half open to the breeze outside, with heat that rises in visible waves. Steam curls through the room like it belongs.
Mila is two hours away, tucked into a warm house with a woman who used to be on our payroll and still remembers how to shoot.
She has every emergency number, every instruction, and every check-in protocol I could think of.
We didn’t leave until I saw the pantry myself, tested the alarm, and watched Mila settle in with a puzzle and a smile.
She’s safe, which means I can breathe and finally spend time with Dominik without feeling like the walls are closing in.
I undress without folding anything. That still feels new. Not looking over my shoulder. Not placing clothes where I can grab them fast. I drop my top onto the bench, step out of my underwear, and slide into the water without checking the time.
The heat bites at first, but I welcome it. My body adjusts fast, my muscles unwinding without permission. The ache I’ve been carrying—deep in my back, deeper in my thighs—starts to release, inch by inch.
I lean back, eyes closed, arms resting along the rim of the stone.
I don’t hear him enter. I feel it. The pressure changes, the way the steam moves when he steps closer.
I smile before I open my eyes. “How long were you watching me?”
Dominik crouches beside the edge, one hand ghosting up my arm. His fingers are warm even through the heat.
“Long enough to remember why we fought this hard,” he says.
I look at him. His beard is shorter, his jaw still tight. But the weight behind his eyes is different now. Not gone, but moved. Managed.
“Did you check the locks?” I ask softly.
He nods once. “Just once.”
I reach for him, dragging my fingers along the waistband of his pants. “Leave them,” I murmur. “Come in like this.”
His eyes darken. He doesn’t ask if I’m sure. He never does. He just strips the shirt over his head and steps into the water still half-clothed. The fabric clings immediately, heavy and soaked, outlining every inch of him in a way that’s somehow more obscene than if he were naked.
I rise to meet him, water dripping down my skin. I run my hands under the wet cotton and push it up his chest, slowly, my thumbs grazing over each scar like I’m re-learning the map of him.
“Let me,” I whisper.
He lets me.
I undress him piece by piece, underwater and unhurried, until he’s bare in front of me. He doesn’t speak. Just watches me with that look that’s still possessive, but settled. Like he knows I’m his without needing to prove it.
I slide back into the water, drawing him with me. He follows, pressing me gently into the warm stone seat, his hands braced on either side of my body.
We don’t rush.
He kisses my shoulder first. Then my collarbone. Then lower. Every kiss lingers. Every movement is soft enough to be a promise.
His lips brush the base of my throat, then the hollow between my breasts, and when he finally pulls one into his mouth, his tongue moves in slow circles that make my breath catch.
He doesn’t rush, doesn’t grope, doesn’t demand.
He learns the rhythm of my reactions, the way my hand tightens in his hair, the way my leg shifts around his waist, drawing him closer.
The water sloshes gently around us, warm and forgiving, wrapping us in steam and silence.
He slides one hand down, palm flat against my stomach, then lower, until his fingers find the place he’s been aiming for.
A startled breath slips out of me, not because I wasn’t ready, but because I already am.
He groans softly when he feels it.
“Always so ready for me,” he murmurs, his voice rough and reverent. “Every damn time.”
I want to answer, but his fingers slip between my folds and find just the right pressure, slow and steady, and the words die in my throat.
I grab his wrist, not to stop him, but to hold on.
He kisses my jaw, then my cheek, then lowers to his knees in the water. I gasp when I realize what he’s about to do.
“Dominik—”
His hands push my thighs apart, not roughly, just with enough pressure to make it clear he isn’t asking.
“Relax,” he says, looking up at me. “I’ve been thinking about this for weeks.”
He lowers his head, and his mouth is hot and certain when it finds me.
I cry out, one hand slamming to the back of his neck, the other clawing at the stone ledge. He licks slowly at first, dragging his tongue through my folds with maddening precision, then flicks it over my clit just hard enough to make my hips jerk.
He groans against me like the sound of my pleasure gets him off, and he does it again, then again, until I’m grinding against his face, shameless and shaking.
His grip tightens on my thighs, keeping me open for him, and when he slides one finger inside me while sucking my clit into his mouth, I splinter.
I come with a choked sob, head thrown back, the world narrowed to nothing but the heat of his mouth and the strength of his hands.
He doesn’t stop. He keeps licking me through it, soft and slow now, kissing my inner thigh like he’s proud of what he just did.
When he finally rises from the water, his face glistens, his eyes locked on mine, and his cock is hard and heavy between us.
He leans in and kisses me, deep and filthy, and I taste myself on his tongue.
I don’t want slow anymore. I grip his shoulders and pull him into me, my legs wrapping tight around his hips, my mouth finding his before he can answer.
He makes a rough sound in his throat, surprised and pleased at once, and I feel the shift in him immediately.
The restraint is still there, but it bends.
“You sure?” he asks against my mouth, his hand sliding down between us, testing, feeling.
“Yes,” I breathe. “No barriers. I want you.”
His eyes search mine for a second, not for doubt, but for certainty. I give it to him. I nod once, slow and steady, and that’s all it takes.
He lifts me easily, water spilling around us, and sets me on the wide stone edge of the bath. The cold hits my wet skin and I shiver, but he steps between my thighs and the cold disappears. He drags the head of his cock slowly through my folds, gathering slick heat, watching my face as he does it.
“Look at me,” he murmurs.
I do.
He pushes in without hurry, inch by inch, and it feels different without the thin layer between us. Closer. Hotter. Real in a way that makes my breath leave my lungs in a rush. I clutch at his shoulders as he fills me, my body stretching, welcoming, adjusting.
When he’s fully inside me, we both go still.
It isn’t hesitation. It’s recognition.
His forehead presses to mine, his hands firm on my hips, and I feel the steady thud of his heart against my chest.
“God,” he mutters. “You feel—”
“I know,” I whisper.
He pulls out slowly and slides back in, deeper this time, and I moan softly, my head tipping back. The movement is smooth, controlled, his hips rolling instead of snapping, but there’s nothing lazy about it. Every stroke is deep and sure, his pelvis grinding against me at the end of each thrust.
I wrap my legs tighter around him and rock with him, meeting him halfway, urging him faster without words.
The steam thickens around us, the water still lapping behind him, but the sound that fills the space now is skin on skin and our breathing, heavy and uneven.
He lifts one of my legs higher over his shoulder, changing the angle, and the next thrust hits something hot and electric inside me. I gasp and grab at his arm.
“There,” I say. “Don’t change it.”
He doesn’t.
He keeps that angle and increases the pace, not brutal, but urgent. His jaw tightens, his eyes dark, his control slipping just enough to make it dangerous. I can feel how close he is, the tension in his thighs, the way his hands grip me harder with every movement.
I slide one hand down between us and touch myself, needing more, needing the edge to tip faster. He watches me do it, his breathing rough.
“Let me,” he says.
He replaces my hand with his, thumb circling my clit in slow, firm strokes that match the rhythm of his hips. The combination is too much. My body tightens, my stomach pulling in, the heat coiling deep and heavy.
“Dominik,” I whisper, warning and plea tangled together.
“I’ve got you,” he answers, voice thick.
He leans down and kisses me while he keeps moving, swallowing the sounds I can’t contain. My nails drag down his back and I break with a cry, my orgasm hitting hard and fast, my walls clenching around him.
He groans at the sensation, hips stuttering, but he doesn’t stop. He thrusts through it, chasing his own release, each movement deeper, rougher now, the restraint finally gone.
I hold onto him like I might fall, my body still pulsing, still sensitive, and he drives into me with a rhythm that’s all hunger and possession and something softer underneath.
“Come inside me,” I whisper against his ear.
That does it.
He thrusts deep, holds himself there, and I feel him spill into me with a broken groan, his whole body shaking as he comes. It’s raw and full and completely unguarded.
He stays buried inside me while he finishes, his forehead pressed to my shoulder, his breath hot against my skin. I feel the warmth of him inside me, the slow pulse of his release, and I close my eyes and let the moment settle.
When he finally pulls back slightly, he doesn’t withdraw completely. He keeps us joined, his hands sliding up my sides, thumbs brushing under my breasts.
“You okay?” he asks, softer now.
I nod, brushing his hair back from his forehead. “More than okay.”
He kisses me again, not urgently this time, just deep and steady. The kind of kiss that says we’re not racing anything. We’re not hiding. We’re not bracing.
He lifts me from the stone edge and carries me to the bed inside the suite, laying me down carefully. He follows, stretching out beside me and pulling me into his chest.
For a second, I listen for footsteps.
For a second, I expect the old instinct to rise, but none of that happens. I rest my head over his heart and let my eyes close. He shifts slightly, and I feel him tense like he might get up to check the doors.
His hand tightens around me.
He doesn’t move.
And for the first time in years, I fall asleep without waiting for war.