Chapter 10
Jess
The silence after the storm is heavy. It has mass. It presses against your eardrums and weighs down your limbs.
We were tangled together in a heap of half-discarded clothing and sweat-slicked skin on the edge of the mattress.
My jeans were around one ankle. Nick’s dress shirt was hanging off one shoulder.
The air in the penthouse bedroom was thick with the scent of sex—musk, salt, and the sharp, metallic tang of adrenaline that was slowly fading into exhaustion.
I lay with my head resting on Nick’s bare chest. His heart was still hammering against my ear, a frantic, thudding rhythm that matched my own. Thump-thump. Thump-thump. It was the only sound in the room, louder than the wind howling outside the glass walls.
I should have moved. I should have felt ashamed. I should have scrambled to pull my clothes back on and retreat to the safety of my guest room, citing the contract, the rules, the insanity of what we had just done.
But I couldn't move. My limbs felt like they had been replaced with lead. And more terrifyingly, I didn't want to move.
I felt Nick’s hand, heavy and large, resting on the back of my neck. His fingers were tangled in my hair, idly stroking the damp curls at my nape. It was a possessive touch. A grounding wire.
"You're shaking," he murmured. His voice was a wreck—gravel and smoke, vibrating through his chest into my cheek.
"I'm cold," I whispered, though that was a lie. I was burning up. I was shaking because my world had just tilted on its axis, and I didn't know which way was up anymore.
"Bed," he commanded softly.
He tried to shift, to lift me, but a sharp intake of breath hissed through his teeth. His body went rigid against mine.
The hip.
Reality crashed back into the room. The gladiator was wounded.
I pulled back immediately, sitting up. The loss of his body heat was a physical blow. I looked at him in the dim light of the cityglow.
Nick was pale. The flush of arousal was fading, leaving his skin ashen. Sweat beaded on his forehead, not from exertion, but from the pain he was trying to suppress. He was gripping the sheets with his left hand, his knuckles white.
"Don't move," I said, my voice finding its strength. The lover receded; the caretaker stepped forward. It was safer this way. "Let me help you."
"I don't need help," he gritted out, eyes closed. "I just need... a minute."
"You're stubborn," I said, sliding off the bed. My legs wobbled. I ignored them. I kicked off my jeans completely, leaving me in just my panties. I didn't care about the nudity. We were past that. "Shift your weight to the right side. I'm going to swing your legs up."
"Jess..."
"Do it, Nick."
He opened his eyes. They were dark, blown wide, swirling with a mix of pain and a lingering, dark hunger that made my breath hitch. He looked at me—standing half-naked in the moonlight, bossing him around—and a ghost of a smirk touched his lips.
"Bossy," he whispered.
"Someone has to be. You have a martyr complex."
He did as I asked, shifting his weight. I grabbed his ankles—gentle on the left one—and swung his legs onto the mattress. He groaned, a low, guttural sound, as his back hit the pillows.
"Pillows," I muttered to myself. I grabbed two extra pillows from the other side of the massive bed and wedged them under his left knee. " Elevation. It takes the pressure off the joint."
Nick watched me. His gaze felt like a physical caress, tracking my movements as I fussed over him.
"Come here," he said.
"I need to get you water. You're dehydrated."
"I need you," he corrected. "Come here."
He reached out his hand.
I hesitated. Standing at the foot of the bed, I felt the precipice. If I got into that bed—really got into it, under the covers, skin to skin—there was no going back. That was domesticity. That was intimacy. That was admission.
"Jess," he said. It wasn't a command this time. It was a plea. "Please."
I climbed onto the bed.
I crawled over the duvet, moving on my hands and knees until I was beside him. I lay down, curling onto my side, facing him.
He reached out and pulled the duvet over us, cocooning us in the dark warmth.
"Better," he sighed, pulling me closer until my front was pressed against his side. He was careful to keep his bad hip away from me, but he wrapped his leg around mine, tangling our limbs.
We lay there in the silence for a long time. Just breathing. Existing in the aftermath.
But the air between us was still charged. The frantic, desperate sex we’d just had hadn’t sated the hunger; it had only woken it up. It had broken the seal. Now that I knew what he tasted like, I wanted more. I wanted everything.
I reached out, my hand hovering over his chest. I wanted to touch the scar on his hip, the source of his pain.
"Can I see it?" I whispered.
Nick tensed. "It's ugly."
"I don't care."
He hesitated, then slowly moved the duvet down, exposing his hip to the cool air.
In the shadows, the scar looked like a jagged rift in the earth. It was a thick, white line of raised tissue, slicing through the muscle of his thigh and disappearing up toward his hip bone. It was violent. It told a story of trauma and survival.
I reached out. My fingers trembled as I traced the line of the scar.
Nick sucked in a breath. His stomach muscles rippled under my touch.
"Does it hurt when I touch it?" I asked softly.
"No," he rasped. "It feels... electric."
I moved my hand lower, tracing the heavy muscle of his quad. "You're so strong here. You've built armor around the injury."
"Armor keeps things out," he murmured, his hand coming up to cup my face. "But you... you keep finding the cracks, Jessica."
I looked up at him. His eyes were locked on mine.
"I'm not trying to break you," I whispered. "I'm trying to hold you together."
"I know."
He leaned in, brushing his lips against mine. It was a soft, chaste kiss, startling in its tenderness.
"Let me look at you," he said, pulling back.
"You've seen me," I tried to joke, feeling a sudden flare of insecurity. I was messy. I was curvy where he was hard angles. I had cellulite and freckles and scars from dance shoes. He was perfection carved from marble.
"Not properly," he said. "Not slowly."
He sat up, wincing slightly, but pushing through it. He grabbed the hem of the duvet and pulled it down to our feet.
We were naked. Exposed.
The city lights cast stripes of silver across the bed.
Nick’s gaze started at my face and moved down. Slow. Deliberate. He looked at my throat, my breasts, my stomach, my hips. He didn't just look; he devoured. He worshipped.
"You hide," he said softly, his hand tracing the curve of my waist. "You wear baggy sweaters. You hide this."
"I'm not..." I swallowed. "I'm not exactly model standard, Nick."
He looked me in the eye, his expression fierce. "You are a masterpiece of chaos. You are soft where I am hard. You are warm where I am cold."
He moved his hand to my breast, cupping the weight of it, his thumb brushing the nipple. I gasped, my back arching off the mattress.
"And you are mine," he growled.
The praise hit me in the center of my chest. Mine.
"Nick," I breathed, my hands reaching for him.
"Shh." He caught my wrists. He pinned them above my head against the pillows.
He loomed over me. Even injured, even in pain, he was the dominant force in the room. He needed this control. And God help me, I needed to give it to him.
"You took care of me," he whispered against my neck, his lips hot and wet. "Now I take care of you."
He kissed his way down my throat. He bit lightly at the sensitive cord of my neck. He moved lower, to the swell of my breast.
He took me into his mouth.
It was blinding. The sensation was so intense I cried out, thrashing against his hold. He didn't let go. He sucked harder, his tongue teasing, while his free hand moved down my stomach.
"So responsive," he praised, his voice vibrating against my skin. "Good girl. You like that?"
"Yes," I sobbed. "Yes, Nick."
"Tell me what you want."
"You," I begged. "I want you inside me."
"Not yet."
He moved his hand lower. He found the wet heat between my legs. He didn't hesitate this time. He slid two fingers inside me.
I shattered.
It wasn't a full climax, but it was a shockwave of pleasure that made my vision white out. I clamped down around his fingers.
"So tight," he groaned. "You're clenched around me. Relax for me, Jess. Open up."
He began to move his fingers. In and out. Curling. Hitting a spot that made me see stars.
"Nick, please," I whimpered, thrashing my head on the pillow. "It's too much."
"It's not enough," he said. "Look at me."
I forced my eyes open.
He was watching me. His face was a mask of concentrated pleasure and possession.
"I want to see you break," he said. "I want to be the only thing in your head."
"You are," I cried. "You're the only thing."
He withdrew his fingers. I whined at the loss.
He positioned himself between my legs. He was careful of his hip, using his arms to support his weight, but the determination in his eyes was terrifying.
He guided himself to my entrance. He didn't thrust. He pushed in slowly. Inch by agonizing inch.
He was stretching me, filling me, taking up every frantic beat of my heart.
When he was fully sheathed, he stopped.
He rested his forehead against mine. We were both panting, sweat dripping from our faces to mingle on our skin.
"Look at us," he whispered. "Look at the mirror."
I turned my head. The mirrored closet doors reflected the bed.
I saw us.
I saw the dark shape of him looming over the pale curve of me. I saw his back muscles flexing, the sweat gleaming on his shoulders. I saw my legs wrapped around his waist, holding him there.
It was primal. It was beautiful.
"Do you see who owns you?" he asked, forcing me to watch.
"You," I whispered. "You do."
"Say it louder."
"You own me, Nick."
He groaned, a sound of pure male satisfaction, and began to move.
It wasn't like before. It wasn't frantic grinding. It was a slow, deep rhythm that targeted my soul. He withdrew almost completely, then drove back in, hitting deep, touching places I didn't know existed.
"Good girl," he praised with every thrust. "Taking it so well. Perfect fit."
My hands roamed his back, tracing the dip of his spine, the tension in his shoulders. I wanted to absorb him. I wanted to merge with him until there was no line where Nick ended and Jess began.
"Nick," I gasped, the pressure building in my belly again. "I'm close."
"Come for me," he ordered. " Do it."
He picked up the pace. His hips snapped against mine. The sound of skin slapping skin filled the room, loud and lewd and perfect.
I fell over the edge.
It ripped through me. I screamed his name, my body bowing off the bed, shaking apart in his arms.
He followed me seconds later. He buried his face in my neck, biting down on my shoulder to stifle his own roar as he poured himself into me.
He collapsed on top of me.
This time, he didn't pull away. He couldn't. His strength was gone. He lay there, his heavy weight pressing me into the mattress, crushing me in the best possible way.
"Don't move," I whispered, wrapping my arms around him, holding him there. "Stay."
"I can't move," he mumbled into my hair. "My hip is fused."
I laughed. It was a breathless, watery sound. "I told you to be careful."
"Worth it," he said. "Totally worth it."
We lay there for a long time as our heart rates slowed. The sweat dried on our skin, cooling us.
Eventually, Nick rolled off, groaning as he adjusted his leg. He pulled me against his side, tucking my head under his chin. He pulled the duvet up to our chins.
The room was quiet again. But the silence had changed. It wasn't heavy anymore. It was fragile.
I traced the line of his pectoral muscle with my fingertip.
"Nick?"
"Hmm?"
"What happens now?"
I felt him tense. The muscles under my cheek turned to stone.
"We sleep," he said. But it was a deflection.
"I mean... with us. The contract. The fake dating. We just... we just decimated the rules."
He was silent for a long moment. I could hear the gears turning in his head. The chess player trying to calculate the next move.
"I don't know," he admitted finally. And the honesty of it scared me more than a lie would have. "I don't know how to do this, Jess. I don't do... feelings. I do objectives."
"And what is the objective now?"
He tightened his arm around me. "To keep you. To keep you here. Safe."
"Safe from what?"
"From everything. From the press. From my father. From the fact that I am about to go into the most stressful three months of my life and I will likely be unbearable."
I propped myself up on one elbow, looking down at him. His eyes were closed, his lashes dark against his pale cheeks.
"I can handle unbearable," I said. "I can handle the draft. I can handle your dad."
He opened his eyes. They were sad.
"You say that now. But when the camera crews are here... when the scrutiny starts... it destroys things, Jess. It destroys people."
"I'm tougher than I look."
"I know you are." He reached up and touched my lips. "That's what scares me. You'll fight for me. And I'm terrified I'll let you get hurt doing it."
He pulled me back down. "Sleep. We'll figure it out in the morning."
I settled back against him. I closed my eyes.
But I couldn't sleep.
My mind was racing. I replayed the way he had looked at me. The way he had touched me. Mine.
And then, the thought bloomed in my chest. Quiet, unassuming, and absolutely catastrophic.
I love him.
It wasn't just attraction. It wasn't just gratitude for the housing. I loved the broken, scarred, terrified boy hiding inside the gladiator's armor. I loved that he let me see him. I loved that he needed me.
A cold stone of dread settled in my stomach.
Because Nick didn't love me. He wanted me. He needed me. He possessed me. But love? Love was a weakness he couldn't afford. Love was a variable he couldn't control.
If I told him, he would panic. He would push me away to "protect" me.
So I stayed silent. I lay in the dark, listening to the man I loved breathe, and realized that the happiness I felt was built on a foundation of glass. And the draft was coming to shatter it all.
"Goodnight, Nick," I whispered into the darkness.
"Goodnight, Jess," he mumbled, already half-asleep. "Good girl."
I closed my eyes and let the tears leak out, hot and silent, soaking into the expensive pillowcase.