Chapter 29
Florian
Next morning, I wake up in the same bed as Grimes.
My head is on his chest and he’s snoring gently.
He looks so handsome, his face powerful and calm, like he’s keeping the dangers of the world at bay even while he sleeps.
I’ve never felt so safe as with him. He tore up the contract, and technically he has no hold over me anymore.
But his hold over me is stronger than any legal document.
I’m falling in love with him. He thinks I’m too ill to know what I’m doing.
He’s wrong. My mind is crystal clear. I know how I feel about him.
I’ve never felt like this about anyone else.
Now I just have to convince him it’s true.
Watching him sleep like he’s mine is fun, but I’m impatient to see his dark eyes, hear his growly voice as he greets me. I ever so accidentally bump his arm with mine. He opens his eyes and blinks, his sleepy gaze settling on me. Happiness suffuses his expression as he looks at me.
“Morning,” I say.
“Morning.”
I smile at him. “I’m feeling much better now.”
Did that sound too forward? Slutty? But he smiles back.
“Are you?” he says, a teasing note in his voice. “What does that mean in this context?”
I reach up to stroke his cheek. It feels much softer than it looks. Tentatively, I run my hand down to explore his stubble, which is nice and scratchy in contrast to his skin. I’d love to rub my cheek against it. But he stops me, grabbing my hand and kissing it.
“You’re too weak,” he says.
Stars, still with this weak thing. Have I done something wrong?
“Have I upset you?” I ask.
“Absolutely not,” he says, surprising me with his vehemence. He seems almost angry. “Why would you say that?”
“Because we made love before but now you won’t even kiss me. If you don’t want to, just say the word and I won’t ever ask again.”
It might kill me, but I’ll leave him alone if that’s what he wants.
My face is on fire as I say all this. I’m never this forward about deep stuff.
Propositioning people I barely know? Sure.
Dancing on tables to catch the attention of strangers, sucking them off in alleyways?
Easy. But talking like this, making it clear I really want someone and not just for a night?
Never. Grimes takes my face in his hands and looks right at me, so close the russet in his dark eyes is visible.
My breath stops in my chest, held by the power of his gaze.
“I want to, Florian,” he says.
“So why won’t you?”
“Because... Because of everything that’s happened between us. There’s so much history, and none of it is good. Honestly, it’s a fucking mess. Plus, you just had a traumatic experience. You need some time to process that.”
“Shouldn’t I be the judge of that?” I ask.
He sighs, an unsatisfactory answer. Then he heaves himself out of bed, looking so serious. He’s such an overthinker. I won’t pressure him any more.
I can wait.
**
I start to doubt that when things stay infuriatingly exactly the same between us over the next few days.
Days turn into a couple of weeks, and I start to think I’m going crazy living in such close proximity to him.
My body is attuned to his every move. The way he gazes out the window at night, his gaze sweeping the yard like a guard dog before drawing the curtains against the hostile outdoors.
Folding that powerful body to sit next to me in the living room, arousing and cozy and domestic at the same time.
The way he dries his hands and his forearms muscles ripple with the slightest movement.
His hairy knuckles... Shit. There’s something wrong with me if I’m lusting after his hairy knuckles.
It’s all his fault. Why’d he have to give me a taste—just one taste—of that body and then decide he’s too noble to fuck me again?
Who does that?
Grimes, apparently.
It’s not just his body. It’s the way he treats me.
He looks at me with this indulgent kindness in his eyes now.
He’s warm and even funny in a weird, wry, cynical kind of way.
I guess this is the real him, now that he’s stepped out his bitterness and hatred.
It’s like watching a snake shedding an old skin.
He seems to like having me here, too. I’m not his servant anymore, and I don’t have to stay here, but neither of us has mentioned my moving out.
What are we, anyway? Friends, roommates?
He doesn’t look at his other friends the way he looks at me.
As much as he likes Breta, he doesn’t listen to her stories with a delighted smile curving his lips and his dark eyes alight.
“Er, Grimes?” I say one evening.
“Yes?” He folds up his newspaper and looks at me over it, giving me his full attention. The glasses he wears when he reads are so unconsciously sexy, and he has no idea. They make him look all thoughtful and quietly in control.
“Should I… get a job?” I suggest. “So I can pay you rent?”
He scowls. “I don’t need your money, Florian.”
“Sorry,” I say quickly.
“Don’t be.” His face softens. “Don’t be so quick to apologize. But I really don’t need rent. I love having you here.”
“And I love being here.”
Love. Saying the word unlocks something in me. All at once, courage I never knew I had springs up from somewhere. I stand up, walk over to the sofa where he sits, and sit beside him.
“I love you,” I whisper before I lose my nerve.
He stares at me. “You couldn’t,” he says flatly.
“I do.” I stamp on the ground for emphasis.
“Sorry, did you just stamp your foot like a small child?”
“Er, yes, I suppose I did.”
He bursts out laughing, enraging me. “Your spoiled little aristocrat side is coming out. It’s cute.”
I’m strongly tempted to stomp my foot again, but I resist.
“It is not cute. I just said I love you and you’re laughing at me.
It’s so frustrating, you acting like I don’t know what I’m doing, what I’m feeling.
The abask is long gone and you still act like it’s crazy that I like you.
That I love you.” I stand up and loom over his sitting figure: the only way I can be taller than him.
“Anyway, I won’t bother you about this anymore.
I don’t beg people to want me, Grimes. They beg me. ”
I turn, speech completed, all ready to flounce off impressively. But he grabs my arm in a grip like iron. I turn slowly. His dark eyes linger on my face. There’s a smirk on his lips. He stands up and looks down at me, dwarfing me effortlessly.
“You don’t beg, huh?” he says.
His calm scrutiny brings my face to flames. Can he see right into my mind, see the depths of my desperation for him? The depths of my adoration?
“No,” I say. “I mean, not in the general scheme of things. I mean, no, I don’t.”
“What about for me?” He drops his voice until I feel it in right in my cock. “Would you beg for me?”
My mouth goes dry. “Do... do you want me to?”
He grabs me around the waist and throws me onto the sofa. I lie breathless on my back, shocked at his suddenness, his strength. His black cloak hangs from his broad shoulders. His dark eyes are hooded. His lips part in hunger.
“Let’s hear it,” he says.
“Please,” I whisper. “Please just fuck me already.”
He straddles me, hands either side of my head, pressing into the sofa.
His shoulders cage me in, impossibly broad.
His scent fills my nostrils, the bare skin of his neck and a hint of cologne.
My body catches fire under his weight. He brushes his lips to mine, and I can’t breathe.
I’ve never felt so intoxicated before a kiss.
He has me gagging for him, and he’s barely brushed my lips.
“Don’t you want to hear if I love you first?” he says.
He loves me? The world stops spinning and I’m just a speck of dust caught in his gaze. The tenderness in his voice and the power in his body and most importantly those words he just said: I’m helpless before it all.
“I love you, Florian,” he says. “I love you more than I thought possible.”
“Why?”
I’m not fishing for compliments. I can see why he’d want to fuck me. Plenty of people do, but it doesn’t mean they love me or even like me. I don’t understand why a strong, resourceful man who needs no one is looking at a spoiled, soft little fool like me as though he needs me like air.
“When you were facing two years of servitude, you were equal to it,” he says. “You never let me crush your spirit. You see the bright side in everything. You’re full of joy, and you’re kind, and you’re so much stronger than you think.”
“You really think I’m strong?” I say, disbelieving.
“Of course. You just don’t know it. And so beautiful.” He raises an eyebrow in amusement. “I think you know that part.”
“Shut up.” I cover my face with my hands; I know I’m vain but I hate being called on it. Grimes won’t let me hide from him, grabbing my wrists and gently but inexorably pulling my hands away, forcing me to look at him.
“You’re my prize, my flower, and I want you to stay with me forever,” he says.
He wants me. Forever. I grab his face and drag him into a desperate kiss with none of my usual technique, just rabid desperation.
“I love you so much,” I whisper, voice trembling. “I just can’t believe you love me back.”
He presses a fingertip to my lips. “Don’t sound grateful, Florian. You’re the prize out of the two of us.”
His dark eyes burn with a tender fire and all the fear and worry and turmoil inside me settles into the safest, sweetest feeling.
Like coming home. Now I’m crying and still so turned on it hurts, and I need to get these trousers off but I can’t, just can’t, let him see me cry.
I’m supposed to know what I’m doing in bed, if nowhere else.
I do know what I’m doing. But completely effortlessly, Grime has thrown my game right off.
First he got me breaking my no-begging rule and now he’s got me crying, for fuck’s sake.
He’s the only one who make feel safe enough to submit. To be myself.