Chapter 10 #2
I wrapped my fingers around him. He was hot, hard as steel, and pulsed against my palm. I guided him to my entrance.
I looked up at him. His jaw was clenched tight. His eyes were burning.
"Slow," he rasped. "I want to feel every inch."
I lowered my hips as he thrust upward.
The slide was agonizingly perfect. It was a slow, filling stretch that felt like coming home. I gasped, arching my back, my breasts heaving.
He groaned, a sound torn from his chest. "God, Angela."
He began to move. But he kept his word—it was slow. He withdrew almost completely, then pushed back in, dragging the sensation out until I was writhing on the bench.
He couldn't use his hands to pin me, so he used his words.
"Look at you," he growled. "So beautiful. So responsive. You were made for this. You were made for me."
"Yes," I sobbed. "Yes, Elijah."
"Say it," he demanded. "Say you’re mine."
"I’m yours," I cried. "I’m yours. I’m yours."
He picked up the pace, his thrusts becoming harder, deeper. He was hitting a spot inside me that made my vision blur. I reached up and grabbed his shoulders, my nails digging in, trying to anchor myself.
"That’s it," he encouraged. "Let go. Don't hold back. Give it to me."
I felt the tension coiling in my belly, tight and hot. It was building faster than last night.
"Elijah, I’m close," I gasped.
"Come for me," he ordered. "Come on my cock, baby. Do it."
The command was the final straw. I shattered.
The orgasm ripped through me, a wave of pure white light. I clamped down around him, my body convulsing. I screamed his name, loud and uninhibited, not caring if the neighbors heard, not caring if the world ended.
He held out for another second, watching me fall apart, and then he followed me.
He drove into me one last time, hard and deep, and groaned, his body shuddering as he poured himself into me. He collapsed forward, catching his weight on his left elbow to avoid crushing me, burying his face in my neck.
We stayed like that for a long time. The only sound in the room was our ragged breathing and the distant hum of the city waking up below us.
I ran my hands down his sweaty back, tracing the ridges of his spine, soothing the storm inked into his skin.
My heart was pounding a frantic rhythm against my ribs.
I love him.
The thought arrived quietly, settling in the chaos of the aftermath.
I love him.
I loved the way he protected me. I loved the way he touched me. I loved the broken parts of him that he hid from the world.
And terror washed over me, cold and sharp.
Because I knew how this story ended. The Prince doesn't marry the Pauper. The Billionaire doesn't keep the Girl with the Debt.
Contracts end. Seasons end.
And when this one did, he was going to walk away with his legacy intact, and I was going to be left with a heart that was shattered beyond repair.
"Angela."
Elijah’s voice broke the silence. He pulled back, rolling off me and sitting on the edge of the bench. He ran his good hand through his messy hair.
"Yeah?" I asked, sitting up and pulling the edge of the sheet from the bed to cover myself. The instinct to hide was back, stronger than before.
He looked at me. His expression was unreadable. The "Iceman" mask was sliding back into place, but it was crooked.
"We need to talk," he said.
My stomach dropped. Here it comes. The regret. The payout.
"About what?" I asked, my voice trembling.
"About the schedule," he said, standing up and walking toward the bathroom. He didn't look at me. "I have rehab for my hand at ten. You have class at eleven. We need to be efficient."
I blinked. "Efficient?"
He stopped in the doorway. He turned back.
"And," he added, his voice softer, "we need to figure out dinner. I was thinking we cook. I’m tired of takeout."
He walked into the bathroom and turned on the shower.
I sat there on the velvet bench, wrapped in a sheet, staring at the empty doorway.
He wasn't ending it. He was... planning. He was integrating me into his routine.
Efficient.
I let out a shaky breath, part laugh, part sob.
He was terrified too. I could see it in the way he retreated to logistics. He didn't know how to handle the intimacy, so he was trying to schedule it.
I stood up, my legs wobbling. I walked to the mirror.
I looked at myself again. The flushed skin. The messy hair. The love and fear warring in my eyes.
I wasn't just a girl with a debt anymore. I was a variable in Elijah Vance’s controlled experiment.
And I had a feeling that when the explosion finally happened, it was going to be spectacular.
Elijah
I turned the shower to freezing.
The icy water hit my skin like a shock wave, gasping the breath from my lungs. I needed it. I needed to cool down. I needed to stop the spinning in my head.
I leaned my forehead against the black tile, letting the water pound against my back.
I’m in trouble.
It was an understatement. It was a catastrophic miscalculation of risk.
I had brought Angela Moretti into my home to control a narrative. I had slept with her to satisfy a craving.
But watching her in that mirror... seeing her come apart for me... feeling the way she held me afterward...
It wasn't a craving anymore. It was an addiction.
I looked down at my right hand. The swelling was worse. The purple bruising had spread to my wrist. It throbbed with a vicious, biting pain.
I flexed my fingers. Agony shot up my arm.
I gritted my teeth.
I was hurt. Badly. If the scouts knew how bad, my draft stock would tank. If my father knew, he would liquidate the team.
I was walking a tightrope over a pit of vipers, and for the first time in my life, I wasn't looking at the other side. I was looking at the girl holding the rope.
I needed her.
Not just for the optics. Not just for the sex.
I needed her because when I was inside her, the ghost of my mother stopped screaming. The pressure of my father stopped crushing me.
I turned off the water.
I stepped out and wrapped a towel around my waist. I looked at myself in the fogged mirror.
"Don't break her, Vance," I whispered to my reflection. "Whatever you do, don't break her."
But as I wiped the steam from the glass, I saw the truth in my own eyes.
I was a Vance. We broke everything we touched.
I opened the door and walked back into the bedroom. Angela was gathering her clothes, her back to me. She looked small. Vulnerable.
I walked up behind her and wrapped my arms around her waist, pulling her back against my wet chest.
She stiffened, then melted.
"Shower?" she asked.
"Quick one," I said. "We have a schedule."
"You and your schedules," she teased, but her voice was thick with emotion.
"It’s how we survive, Angela," I whispered into her hair. "It’s how we keep the chaos out."
Or, a voice in my head whispered, it’s how we pretend the chaos isn't already here.
I kissed the top of her head.
"Let’s go," I said. "We have a day to win."
She turned in my arms and smiled. It was a brave, fragile smile.
"Okay, Coach. Let’s go."
We were a team now. A team built on lies, money, and secrets. But standing there in the morning light, it felt like the most real thing I had ever known.