Charlotte
I sit in front of the mirror, staring at a woman I barely recognise.
My hair is down now, falling in soft waves over my shoulders.
I tugged out every pin the moment I stepped into this bedroom, unable to cope with the tightness against my scalp any longer.
This is the room, the room where tonight, everything changes.
I keep running my fingers through the strands, trying to calm the tremble in my hands.
I look… like someone pretending to be brave.
Do I… undress? Wait for him in the bed? Sit primly on a chair like a terrified woman waiting for execution?
My heart is a wild drumbeat as I whisper to my reflection: “You can do this. It’s just one night. One baby.”
A lie stitched into every word.
I take a shaky breath and stand, studying the lines of my body, the curve of my waist cinched by silk, the soft swell of my breasts against the snug neckline. Will he like what he sees when I’m undressed? Will he be disappointed? Will he… care?
I’m still debating which way to angle my shoulders when the door handle clicks.
My pulse stops.
He’s here and I’m not ready. Not at all. But I don’t think that will matter to him.
I straighten instinctively as the door swings open and he fills the space with dark suit and darker intent, closing it behind him with a soft, final click.
His eyes land on me, and everything inside me goes silent.
He moves first, stripping off his jacket, loosening his tie and unbuttoning his shirt. He doesn’t take his eyes off mine, even when mine flicker to watch his hands as they move over his buttons.
I have to swallow when he pulls it off his shoulders and throws it onto the small chair beside the door.
“Charlotte,” he says, his hands not hesitating to undo his belt as he toes off his shoes. His movements aren’t rushed or hurried, but methodical in his undressing. A routine that leads to a finality we only agreed on yesterday. “Undress.”
His words are commands, and I want to be offended, to at least tell him to speak to me with respect. Only the way my body responds to him would betray me anyway.
And I agreed to this.
“I can’t,” I say, lifting my eyes from the intricate tattoos that cover his chest, back to meet his. “It’s a wedding dress. You’ll have to do it. At least undo the buttons down the back.” I turn and lift my hair, pointing to the row of tiny pearls.
“Are you attached to the dress?” he asks. I look over my shoulder to find him stepping out of his trousers and briefs. He is entirely fucking naked and every bit as delicious as he looked yesterday.
Heat flares in my chest, travels up my throat, and I choke on the words before I get them out.
“No.” It comes out as strangled as I feel.
He is behind me in seconds, his long thick length swaying with the movement. The heat rolling off his skin hits me first, then the scent of him: clean, dark, expensive, something light and fresh, like mint, combined with something heavier and all man. My knees want to fold.
Then his hands find the neckline of my dress and pull it apart.
The sudden pull jerks my body, and I yelp, reaching out with one hand to steady myself on the dresser as the dress slips down.
It pools at my feet as pearls bounce along the wooden floor like hailstones.
I cover my breasts with my arms as I turn to face him, wearing only my white panties.
Now there’s nothing between us except air and the frantic thud of my heart.
He’s looking at me like he’s trying to burn every inch of me into his memory.
I’ve never been naked in front of anyone before. Not like this. Not with someone who could break me in half without trying.
“Drop your arms, Charlotte. Fair is fair.” His gaze is steady and unrelenting on mine. I know he means it because he is naked now, was naked yesterday. That I’ve already seen all of him, and he hasn’t seen me at all.
I take a shuddering breath and force them down at my sides. I don’t want him to think I’m weak. Not more than he already knows I am.
“Look at me,” he says in that low, rough voice that feels like fingers sliding down my spine.
I do.
His eyes are ice-storm-grey and terrifyingly gentle all at once. I don’t understand how both can live in the same man.
“I’ve never…” I start, then have to wet my lips because my mouth has gone dry. “I’ve never done this. Any of this. I don’t… I don’t know what I’m supposed to—”
“You’re supposed to let me take care of you,” he says simply. Like it’s already decided. Like I don’t get a vote anymore.
He lifts one hand and his fingertips brush my cheek, then slide down the side of my neck. Goosebumps chase after them. When his thumb settles over my pulse, I know he can feel how fast it’s racing.
“You’re still trembling,” he murmurs.
“I’m terrified,” I admit on a breath that sounds too loud in the quiet room. “I’ve been told how much it hurts.”
A tiny flicker of something crosses his face.
“You’re right to be terrified,” he says, and I blink, startled. “That means you understand the importance of what we’re about to do. But it won’t hurt as much as you imagine.”
I raise an eyebrow with a nod to what he has pulsing between us. I might never have been with a man, but even I know that’s bigger than the average bear.
“Trust me, I’ll make sure the pleasure drowns out the pain, but you have to try and relax into it. Meet me halfway.”
His hand keeps moving, tracing the line of my collarbone, the slope of my shoulder.
When he cups my breast for the first time, my breath catches sharply as I adjust to the pleasure he ignites in me.
His palm is warm, calloused, careful. His thumb brushes over my nipple and I shiver, a soft helpless sound slipping out of me.
“That’s it,” he soothes. “I’ve got you.”
He lowers his head and I think he’s going to kiss my mouth, but he doesn’t. He presses his lips to the place where my neck meets my shoulder instead. Open-mouthed. Hot. A slow drag of tongue that makes my toes curl against the fabric that still surrounds me.
I sway toward him without meaning to.
Both of his hands are on me now, sliding down my sides, mapping the dip of my waist, the curve where my hips flare. When his thumbs hook into the sides of my panties, I freeze.
“Vitali—”
“Shh.” He kisses the word against my skin. “Trust me for five breaths. Just five. Can you do that?”
I nod before my brain catches up because my senses are overwhelmed when his lips press into my skin again.
The cotton panties slide down my legs and I step out of them, trembling harder. Completely naked now. Completely his.
He straightens and looks at me again, longer this time, eyes moving slowly and possessively. I feel the weight of it everywhere he looks.
“You’re perfect,” he says, his voice rough. “So fucking perfect, I don’t know where to start.”
My cheeks burn. I duck my head.
He tips my chin back up with two fingers. “Don’t hide from me. Not tonight. Not ever while you’re mine.”
While you’re mine.
Fifteen months.
But the way he’s looking at me feels a lot longer than fifteen months.
He lifts me and walks towards the bed. Lowering me onto the edge where I sit, then scoot back when he follows, climbing over me like a predator who’s finally cornered his prey. The mattress dips under our weight and I sink into silk and down.
His hand slides up my thigh, gentle but relentless, parting my legs. I squeeze my eyes shut.
“Open them,” he orders quietly.
I do.
He’s watching my face like he’s learning every flicker of expression.
“Tell me if you need me to stop,” he says. “Say the word and I will. I swear it.”
I believe him. I don’t know why, but I do.
He lowers himself slowly, letting me feel his weight bit by bit. His skin is hot against mine, the hard length of him pressed against my belly. I whimper and he groans like the sound undoes him.
His mouth finds mine at the same moment his fingers slip between my legs.
The kiss is slow, deep and deliberate. His tongue strokes mine and I forget how to breathe.
Then his fingers move in one slow, firm circle, and my hips jerk off the bed.
“Sensitive,” he murmurs against my lips, approval thick in his voice. “Good.”
He keeps touching me, learning me, until I’m writhing and making sounds I didn’t know I could make. Until I’m slick and aching and clutching at him like he’s the only solid thing left in the world.
He moves downwards, dotting kisses over my chest, sucking each pebbled nipple into his mouth until my back arches, then lower, over my belly and hips. Then his head is between my thighs and he is nudging my knees further apart with his shoulders.
When his mouth covers my center, hot and hungry, I feel myself blast apart into a million fragments.
My body shudders and shakes as I grind and squirm against his mouth. His name is a broken mess in my mouth, my throat too tight to make words, instead breaking open on a cry.
“Breathe, malyshka,” he whispers when my body finally stops moving of it’s own accord. “I’ve got you.”
He kisses me, my taste thick on his lips, fresh on his tongue. The blunt heat of him nudges at my entrance, and I panic for one heartbeat.
He stills instantly.
I nod, shaky, and wrap my arms around his neck because I need something to hold onto.
He pushes in slowly and it burns, a sharp stretch that makes me gasp and cling on to him as I clench my teeth.
He stops again.
“I know,” he says against my temple, dropping a kiss there before leaning back so he can look me in the eyes. “I know it hurts. Just breathe with me and try to relax. If you clench like this it will all be over before I’ve been able to fully take care of you.”
I nod and take a deep breath, urging my body to relax and breathe with the stretch. In and out, I match him, until the sting starts to ease and something else takes its place.
He moves again, deeper this time, and I feel myself flutter around him, adjusting. I pull my knees back, feeling like he needs the extra space, that if I could just open myself up more, I could accommodate the sheer girth of him.
“Fuck,” he breathes, voice ragged. “You’re so perfect wrapped around me.”
I didn’t expect praise. Didn’t expect the way it floods me with heat.
He starts to move with slow, careful thrusts, watching my face for every wince, every sigh. When I moan, soft and broken, his control frays. I feel it in the tremor of his arms, the way his hips jerk like he’s fighting himself.
“Charlotte,” he growls. “You feel— fuck—” He breaks off to gather himself. “You have no idea what you’re doing to me.”
I arch into him. “Tell me.”
Something wild flashes across his face.
The next thrust is harder, deeper, and I cry out with shocked pleasure. He does it again. And again. Until the pain is only a memory and there’s nothing but heat and friction and the slap of skin on skin.
I wrap my legs around his waist because I want him closer, deeper, more. Every time he presses fully inside me, sparks of pleasure shoot to every nerve ending and I want more. I want all of it.
He makes a sound like I’ve wounded him and starts moving in powerful, relentless strokes, one hand sliding between us to touch me exactly where I didn’t know I needed.
I come apart with his name on my lips, back arching, toes curling, the whole world narrowing to the place where we’re joined.
He throws his head back on a moan that’s half desperate, half wild.
His hips snap forward in a broken stuttering pattern as a low guttural sound tears out of him.
My core clenches tight as I’m wracked with waves of pleasure, barely able to keep my eyes open, but I have to.
I have to see this man come apart inside me.
Each thrust is accompanied by a sound that gets weaker and weaker, and finishes like a plea. A plea to pleasure me, a plea to fill me, a plea that it takes and I get caught.
By the time his head falls forward and our eyes meet again, everything has subsided, and left behind the dulled edge of something I don’t recognize.
He stays buried deep, arms shaking, forehead pressed to mine while we both try to remember how to breathe. After a long moment, he brushes damp hair from my face and kisses me almost reverently.
“You’re mine now,” he whispers against my mouth, voice raw. “All mine.”
I should remind him it’s only temporary. And I should remind myself.
He pulls from me, softening but still huge and the sting of the loss is almost as bad as the sting of the stretch.
He settles beside me and pulls me into his chest, heart still racing, and holds me until our heart rates settle.