7. GEORGIE #3
"You like it when I say filthy things to you. Like how wet you get when I call you my good girl. How you clench around my fingers when I tell you exactly what I'm going to do to you."
"Gavin." My thighs press together under the table, seeking friction. "Please."
"Please what, baby girl?" The nickname's deliberate now, weaponized. "Please stop, or please continue?"
"You're impossible."
"That's not an answer."
The server interrupts to refill water glasses, giving me a reprieve. Gavin sits back, satisfied smirk playing at his mouth like he knows exactly what he's doing to me.
We finish dinner while I talk more about the bookstore—layout ideas, inventory strategies, marketing plans that form themselves as I speak. He asks questions that reveal business acumen I'd forgotten he possessed. Smart questions about overhead and competition and differentiation.
Talking to him like this, watching his mind work through problems and possibilities, makes me realize how much I've underestimated him. The crime boss reputation overshadows everything else, but underneath that lurks genuine intelligence.
Sharp. Strategic. Lethal when necessary.
But with me, gentle in ways that probably surprise him as much as they surprise me.
Dessert arrives—some architectural chocolate construction that defies physics. We share it, trading bites and comfortable silence while the city glitters below. Other diners come and go, couples and business associates and what looks like an extremely awkward first date three tables over.
Normal people living normal lives.
We're not normal. Will never be normal. Our relationship started with kidnapping and lactation and an obsession that probably qualifies as unhealthy by any reasonable metric.
But sitting here, watching Gavin's face soften as he listens to my half-formed dreams, feeling the phantom weight of all those shopping bags waiting in his car—gifts given simply because he wanted to spoil me—something crystallizes.
This life. This man. This dangerous, impossible situation that should terrify me but instead feels like coming home.
The waiter brings the check. Gavin doesn't even glance at the total before handing over his card, attention still fixed on me.
"What?" The intensity makes me self-conscious.
"Nothing." But his eyes trace my features like he's memorizing them. "Just thinking about how lucky I am."
"Lucky?" Laughter bubbles up. "You kidnapped me."
"Best decision I ever made." No hesitation. No irony. Just absolute certainty.
We leave the restaurant with his hand at my lower back, that possessive touch guiding me through the elegant space. The elevator descent feels private despite two other couples sharing the car, Gavin's body angled to shield me from their notice.
Outside, cooler temperatures make me press closer to his warmth as we walk toward the parking garage. His arm slides around my shoulders, tucking me against his side.
Safe. Protected. Cherished.
Before him, I was eating ramen in my dorm, stressing about tuition and wondering how long my breast pump would last before needing replacement. Alone in every way that mattered, responsible for keeping myself afloat while the world remained indifferent to whether I sank or swam.
Now I live in a mansion with a man who buys me designer bags and asks about my dreams and makes me feel like I matter. Like my happiness ranks as high as his business interests, maybe higher.
The car's interior smells like leather and the faint scent of my perfume from this morning. Gavin starts the engine but doesn't immediately pull out, fingers drumming against the steering wheel.
"Thank you." The words feel inadequate for everything he's given me today, everything he continues to give. "For all of this. For caring."
"You don't need to thank me." He catches my hand, bringing it to his lips. "Taking care of you is the easiest thing I've ever done."
The drive home passes in comfortable quiet. His thumb traces patterns on my thigh while I watch the city thin into suburbs, then open space. Streetlights become sparse, darkness pressing against the windows.
But I'm not afraid of the dark anymore. Not when Gavin's beside me, solid and steady and absolutely certain about this thing between us.
The house looms ahead, all lit windows and security measures invisible to the casual observer. Home. When did I start thinking of it that way? When did his space become our space, his bed become where I belong?
He parks in the garage, kills the engine. Neither of us moves immediately, content to sit in this pocket of privacy.
"What are you thinking?" His voice cuts through the silence.
Everything. Nothing. How profoundly my life has changed, how completely he's rearranged my understanding of what's possible.
But what I say is simpler. Truer.
"I want this life with you forever."
The thought settles into my chest, taking root alongside the obsession and desire and terrifying affection that's been growing since that first night. Since he milked me and claimed me and promised to take care of everything.
"You will have it, baby girl. I am yours."