Chapter 12
(Aria POV)
The last thirty minutes of the drive went in silence, but not peaceful silence, his silence. One hand tight on the wheel, the other braced on the console, I’d won. Or maybe I’d lost. Either way, Marcus Hale was wound tighter than the road itself.
The hotel smelled like lemons and glass cleaner, the kind of sterile neatness that didn’t fit him. He handled check-in with crisp efficiency, sliding his ID across the counter, his voice steady. Like he hadn’t almost run off the road when I flashed lace under my blouse.
“Two keys,” the clerk said brightly, passing them across.
Marcus didn’t even look at me. “Two rooms. Same floor.” His voice was so flat it was almost cruel. He handed me one key, then led the way down the hall, long strides that made me half-run to keep up.
We stopped side by side, two doors, two brass numbers, identical except for the thin line of molding between them.
Marcus unlocked his door first. Held it half open. “Get some rest. We’re up early.”
That was it. Just business. Just him shutting me out, like I was nothing but cargo he’d been saddled with.
But as he turned, I caught it, the flicker in his eyes. Dark, raw, the same look he’d given me under the barrel room lanterns. He shut his door a little too fast, the click echoing down the hall.
I opened my door. My pulse thudded when I saw the connecting door. A seam in the wall. A single handle.
I leaned against the wall, staring at that brass handle. One thin door between us. His bed. My bed. My body still humming from every mile of the drive.
And I knew that tonight, his rules were hanging by a thread.
I tried to be good; I really did but the connecting door mocked me.
I stared at it from my bed, sheets tangled around my legs, the glow of the digital clock burning past midnight. Through the thin wall, I heard him, papers rustling, the clink of glass on wood, his low voice on a call that ended long ago.
I told myself not to move. To stay put. To be good.
But my body was humming, raw with need, every nerve lit from the last word he’d sent me. Mine.
Before I knew it, my bare feet were on the carpet. My hand was on the brass handle.
The door opened. Unlocked.
Marcus was at the desk, shirt sleeves rolled, hair mussed from his hands dragging through it. His head lifted, eyes snapping to mine.
“Aria.” One word, warning, gravel-deep.
“I couldn’t sleep.” My voice trembled. “You left it unlocked.” I stepped into the room, and his eyes dropped.
I stood before him in my red silk bra, barely-there lace thong and my long hair down in waves.
His face tightened, a muscle ticking as his gaze raked over me, heat darkening his eyes in a way that stole my breath.
“You need to go back to your room,” he said, but his voice wasn’t steady anymore.
“No,” I whispered. “Not tonight.”
For one long, suffocating moment, he didn’t move. Then he shoved his chair back and came at me, hands rough and certain, scooping me off my feet like I weighed nothing.
He threw me onto his bed.
The air left my lungs in a gasp, but then his body was over mine, his mouth on my throat, his hands mapping me like he’d been starving for this all along.
Every kiss was fire, every caress deliberate and consuming. His palm slid over my ribs, across silk, under lace until I was writhing beneath him, moaning his name without shame.
No one had ever touched me like this, like I was the only one in the world worth unraveling. Like every sound I made was a reward he’d earned.
“Marcus…” I gasped, arching toward him. “Please…”
He moved the lacy panties aside, and his mouth claimed me. God, his mouth.
He tasted me like he’d been waiting for this, slow at first, then devastating, each lick pulling sounds from me I couldn’t control.
Teasing, circling, pausing. Just long enough to make me beg.
Kisses and the occasional nip sparked fire across my nerves, like he knew exactly what would unravel me.
Then giving more, like he could read every stutter of my breath.
“Marcus…” My voice broke. “I’m so close…don’t stop.”
He didn’t. He drove me higher, his tongue relentless, his fingers joining in until sensation blurred into pure fire. I shuddered hard, crying out his name, my whole body trembling as he held me down, anchored, claiming every wave.
No boy had ever given me that. Only a man like Marcus Hale could.
When I stopped trembling, he got above me, his weight pressing me deeper into the mattress until I thought I’d break apart. The world narrowed to his mouth, his touch, the unbearable ache where I needed him most. My legs tightened around him.
“Now,” I begged, desperate. “I want you inside me…”
He froze. For half a heartbeat, I thought he’d give in. Then he swore, raw and guttural, and tore himself back like the bed had burned him.
His chest heaved as he stared down at me, silk and lace tangled, my body flushed and shaking.
“If I take you now, Aria, I won’t just fuck you, I’ll keep you. And I can’t do that.”
Before I could protest, his arms slid under me. He lifted me from his bed, ignoring my pleas, my hands clutching at his shirt.
He carried me through the connecting door, laid me down on my own sheets, and pulled the covers over me with a tenderness that broke me more than his hunger had.
The door shut. The lock clicked.
And I was left in the dark, trembling, sated yet starving, knowing he wanted me enough to almost break, but not enough to let himself have me.
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(Marcus POV)
The second I pushed the lace aside, restraint stopped existing.
Christ. The first taste of her hit my tongue and I was gone. Sweet, sharp, dizzying. I buried myself deeper, dragging every sound out of her until my name was the only thing on her lips.
She tried to move, to arch, to twist away from the pressure, like it was too much, but I wouldn’t let her.
My hands locked on her thighs, keeping her right where I wanted her, against my mouth, against my hunger.
I wanted her undone. I wanted her to beg.
I wanted her to know I could give her more than any other ever had.
And then I heard it. That breathless whisper, breaking apart, “I’m so close, Marcus. Don’t stop…”
God help me, I didn’t. Couldn’t. My tongue drove harder, faster, fingers joining in to push her higher. I felt her quake under my grip, felt the moment she shattered, crying out, and I held her there, drinking every drop of it like a man starved.
The taste of her. The sounds she made. The way she shook in my hold. It branded itself into me.
I’d told myself this was about control, that I could kiss her, touch her, stop. But there was no control left. Only her. Only the need to ruin her for anyone else.
And when she finally collapsed back, trembling, lips parted, eyes glassy, something in me knew I already had.
Her taste was still on my tongue. Sweet. Addictive. Dangerous.
I sat back on my heels, chest heaving, watching her collapse into the sheets, trembling, lips swollen, thighs still twitching against the ghost of my grip. I’d just wrecked her, and God, I wanted more. To take her, to bury myself inside her until she forgot her own name.
My body screamed for it. My cock was hard enough to ache, straining against denim I hadn’t even bothered to shed. One shift of my hips, one slip of control, and I could’ve had her, right then, right there.
And she would’ve let me. Fuck, she’d begged me.
Now. I want you inside me.
The words rang in my skull like a bell.
For half a heartbeat, I almost broke. Almost gave her everything she asked for. Almost destroyed every line, every promise, every ounce of discipline I’d built my life on.
Instead, I tore myself back.
Because if I took her now, I wouldn’t stop. I’d keep her until morning, until the next night, until her father found out and my entire world went up in flames.
I forced myself to look at her, skin flushed, chest rising and falling, eyes dazed and hungry, and it nearly gutted me. She deserved gentleness. She deserved more than being ruined in a hotel bed.
So I did the hardest thing I’ve ever done.
I lifted her, silk and lace clinging to her skin, her arms clutching at me like she already belonged to me. I carried her across the threshold, laid her back in her own bed, and pulled the covers over her like she was something breakable.
Her eyes caught mine, raw and pleading. My throat closed.
I brushed a strand of hair from her cheek, let my fingers linger one second too long, then forced myself away. The connecting door shut between us, the lock clicking like a sentence.
On my side of it, I pressed both palms flat, forehead against wood, my chest still hammering.
I’d tasted her. Claimed her. And somehow walked away.
But I knew the truth, brutal and unshakable: I wouldn’t walk away next time.
And Aria Bennett deserved more than to be ruined by the man her father trusted most.