Chapter 15 Gianna
Gianna
I woke to weak sunlight filtering through unfamiliar curtains and Archie’s arms around me.
Sometime during the night, we’d migrated together.
His chest pressed against my back, his face buried in my hair, one arm draped over my waist like he’d been holding me all night.
The position should have felt claustrophobic, but instead it felt safe—like I’d finally found something I hadn’t known I was looking for.
I lay still, memorizing the moment before it ended.The weight of his arm, the sound of his breathing, the warmth of him seeping through my shirt. Outside, the rain had finally stopped, and morning birds were making their presence known.
His arm tightened around me, and his voice came out rough with sleep. “You awake?”
I turned carefully in his arms to face him. “Yeah.”
We were close enough that I could count his eyelashes, close enough to see the exact moment his gray eyes went darker as he looked at me. His hair was completely wrecked from sleep, roughened in a way that should have looked ridiculous but instead made him look younger, softer. More attractive.
“Morning,” he said, his voice still heavy with sleep.
“Morning.”
Neither of us moved. We just looked at each other in the pale morning light, and I was suddenly aware of how intimate this was. Waking up in his arms, our legs tangled together, his hand resting on my hip like it belonged there.
“I slept better than I have in years,” he said quietly. “Best night I’ve had in a long time.”
His thumb traced slow, lazy circles on my hip through my shirt. “Waking up with you makes everything else better.”
How was he always so smooth with words that made my heart feel like it might burst?
“I don’t want to move,” I admitted.
“Then don’t.” He pulled me closer, his hand sliding up my back. “We can stay right here.”
His eyes searched mine, something intense building between us. Then, I noticed the faint hint of color rising in his cheeks, barely visible but there. He looked almost shy about us like this, which was absurd for someone who’d kissed me senseless yesterday.
“Are you blushing?” I asked, delighted.
“Absolutely not. I don’t blush.”
“You’re definitely blushing.”
“You’re imagining things.” But the color deepened slightly, and he looked adorable trying to pretend otherwise. “I’m just warm. It’s a very warm room.”
“It’s freezing in here.”
“Then maybe you’re making me warm.” His hand slid into my hair. “Ever think of that?”
Before I could respond, he kissed me. When I responded by pressing closer, the kiss deepened into something more.
His hand tightened in my hair and I grabbed his shirt, needing him closer.
“We should stop,” he said, but his hand was still in my hair, his thumb tracing along my jaw.
“Probably.”
“Last night we agreed to slow down.”
“We did.”
“So we should stick to that.” But he kissed me again anyway, deeper this time. Hungrier “We should definitely stick to that.” He murmured but kissed me again like he couldn’t stop himself.
“Definitely,” I agreed against his mouth, pulling him closer.
His hand slid under my shirt, warm against bare skin, and I arched into the touch. He groaned and rolled us so I was beneath him, his weight braced on his forearms.
“Tell me to stop,” he said, his voice rough. “Tell me this is a bad idea.”
“It’s probably a terrible idea.”
“Probably?” His mouth moved to my neck. “Just probably?”
“Definitely terrible.” My hands found his hair.
“Then tell me to stop.” His hand traced up my side, slow. “Use your words, Gianna.”
I pulled him back up to kiss me properly instead of answering, and that was apparently all the permission he needed.
“God, you’re going to kill me,” he breathed against my lips. “You know that?”
“You started this.”
“I definitely did not. You turned around and looked at me with those eyes and I was done for.”
“My eyes didn’t do anything.”
“Your eyes did everything.” He kissed me again, slower this time. “You have no idea what you do to me. None at all.”
His hands moved with purpose now, sliding under my shirt and tracing patterns that made me forget how to think. When he pulled back to look at me, his expression was serious.
“Last chance,” he said. “Tell me no and I’ll stop. We can go back to just lying here.”
“I don’t want just lying here.”
Relief flooded his expression.
Clothes disappeared gradually this time.
Not rushed or desperate like yesterday, but deliberate.
He kissed my shoulder when my shirt came off, traced patterns on my collarbone that made me shiver.
His hands moved with careful attention, learning the shape of me like he had all the time in the world.
There was something different about tonight.
Yesterday had been fire and urgency, two people crashing into each other before doubt could catch up.
But this—this was intentional. This was him choosing me with every unhurried touch, and something about that distinction made my chest ache in ways I wasn't prepared for.
When we were finally skin to skin, he paused to just look at me, his hand tracing from my shoulder down my arm to my hand, threading our fingers together.
I'd been looked at before. I'd been wanted before. But not like this. Not with this kind of quiet intensity that made me feel like I was the only thing in the world worth seeing. It terrified me. It made me want to hide and be seen all at once.
"What?" I asked when the silence stretched.
"Just thinking about how lucky I am." His voice was quiet, sincere. "That you're here. That you want this."
Lucky. The word landed somewhere soft inside me. I'd spent so long feeling like wanting was dangerous, like needing someone was just handing them the tools to hurt you. But the way he said it—like he was the one who'd been given something precious—turned everything I thought I knew inside out.
"I do want this."
He leaned down and kissed me softly. "I want you more than I've wanted anything in my life."
I felt those words in my bloodstream, in the spaces between my ribs. Part of me wanted to deflect, to make a joke, to do anything to release the pressure building in my chest. But I couldn't. I didn't want to. For once, I wanted to sit in this feeling and let it be real.
When he moved over me, his eyes never left mine, watching my face with tenderness in his eyes.
"Look at me," he said when I started to close my eyes. "I need to see you."
I opened my eyes and found him watching me with an intensity that made my breath catch.
This was the part I always hid from. The part where you let someone see you without armor, without performance, without the careful masks we all wear to survive. Every instinct told me to look away, to retreat somewhere safe inside myself. But he was asking me to stay. To be here. To let him in.
So I did.
And it was terrifying and freeing in equal measure—this surrender that didn't feel like losing.
"Okay?" His voice was strained.
"Perfect. You're perfect."
"You're the perfect one." He kissed me deeply. "Do you have any idea how beautiful you are? How incredible?"
Beautiful. Incredible. The words washed over me and I wanted to argue, wanted to list all the reasons he was wrong.
But the way he looked at me made it impossible to believe he was lying.
And maybe that was the most frightening thing of all—that he saw something in me I'd never been able to see in myself.
I couldn't answer, just pulled him closer and held on.
"There," I breathed.
"Yeah? Like that?"
"Don't stop."
"Never." His free hand traced down my side, his touch gentle even as his movements became less controlled. "I could do this forever. Stay here with you forever."
Forever. People said that word so carelessly. But he didn't. I could hear it in his voice—the weight of it, the wanting of it. And instead of making me want to run, it made me want to believe. In him. In this. In the terrifying possibility that maybe some things could last.
The pleasure built gradually, intensely, his name becoming the only word I could remember. He watched me the entire time, his eyes dark and full of something I was afraid to name, something that looked like it might break me and put me back together all at once.
Love. That's what it looked like. That's what I was afraid to call it.
Because love meant vulnerability. Love meant handing someone your whole heart and trusting them not to drop it. I'd built so many walls, so many carefully constructed defenses, and here he was—not tearing them down, but making me want to open the gates myself.
"Gianna," he groaned against my neck. "God, you feel incredible. So perfect."
When was the last time I'd felt truly safe with someone? When was the last time I'd let myself be this unguarded, this open, this nakedly myself? I couldn't remember. Maybe never. Maybe I'd been waiting my whole life for exactly this moment, for exactly this person, and hadn't known it until now.
We lay there in the aftermath, neither of us moving or speaking. His hand stayed tangled with mine, his face buried in my neck, his breath warm against my skin.
I waited for the panic to set in. For the familiar urge to flee, to protect myself, to rebuild the walls before he could see too much. But it never came. Instead, there was only this: the weight of him, the rhythm of his breathing, the feeling of his fingers intertwined with mine.
I felt raw. Exposed. Like he'd reached inside me and touched something no one else had ever found.
And I wasn't afraid.
That was the revelation. That was the thing that made the tears threaten again. I wasn't afraid. For the first time in as long as I could remember, I'd let someone all the way in—and I wasn't afraid of what they'd found there.
Whatever this was between us, whatever it was becoming, I didn't want to run from it anymore.
I wanted to stay. Right here. With him.
“That was—” He stopped, apparently unable to find the words.
“Yeah,” I agreed, my voice shaky.