CHAPTER 48
HELENA
◆
Gabriel carried me through the open bedroom door and set me on my feet beside the bed.
The morning sun had reached the curtains. Sea wind moved the white fabric in and out, making the room breathe around us.
My engagement ring flashed when I opened his shirt.
His gaze dropped to it.
The hunger in his face changed from heat to wonder and back again.
“You said yes,” he murmured.
“I remember. It happened three minutes ago.”
“Say it again.”
“No.”
He caught my mouth with his.
The kiss had nothing careful in it. His hands slid beneath my robe, found the thin sleep shirt, and pulled me against the hard length of him. The monitor at his ankle gave a soft boundary-confirmed tone from beneath his trousers.
I laughed into his mouth.
“Ignore Augusto,” he said.
“The only reasonable policy.”
He untied my robe and let it fall.
Cool air touched my bare legs. His palms followed, slow over my thighs, up to my hips.
He knew exactly where I carried tension now. He also knew I hated being studied more than being seen.
So he did not explain my body to me.
He knelt and kissed the skin above my knee.
“Left knee,” I said.
He looked up. “Medical advice?”
“Sofia said your proposal form was excellent. I assume she coached the kneeling.”
“Betrayal surrounds me.”
“You have a type.”
His mouth moved higher.
The joke disappeared from my breath.
He pushed my sleep shirt up as he went, lips tracing the inside of my thigh. I steadied myself with one hand on his shoulder. The other went into his hair.
“Gabriel.”
He looked up again, eyes dark.
“Fiancée,” he said.
The word brushed across me like a hand.
I pulled him to his feet and stripped the shirt from his shoulders. The scar beneath his ribs was still pink, a curved reminder of the bridge, the ambulance, the hospital doors.
I kissed it.
His fingers tightened at my waist.
“Does that hurt?”
“No.”
“Good answer?”
“Honest answer.”
I kissed the scar again, then the center of his chest. His heart beat hard beneath my mouth.
He had spent years hiding fear behind perfect control. I loved the body that gave him away.
I unfastened his trousers.
His erection pushed against my palm, hot and heavy. He exhaled my name.
“You are wearing too many things,” I said.
“So are you.”
He lifted the sleep shirt over my head.
I stood naked except for the ring.
His face became still in the way it did when feeling exceeded language.
“Do not make a speech,” I warned.
“I was going to say you’re beautiful.”
“Acceptable. Continue.”
“Cruel woman.”
“Hopeless man.”
He kissed me again and guided me backward until my knees touched the mattress. I sat. He removed the rest of his clothes, careful with the monitor strap, and came between my thighs.
His mouth closed over one nipple.
Pleasure tightened low in my body.
I arched into him. He drew the peak between his lips, tongue moving slowly, while his hand slid between my legs.
“Already,” he said against my skin.
“Do not sound proud.”
“Impossible.”
His fingers found me wet and sensitive. He stroked once, twice, then eased inside.
I caught his shoulders.
The ring pressed cool against the back of his neck.
He noticed that too.
“Mine,” he whispered.
My body clenched around his fingers.
I pulled his head back by the hair. “Careful.”
Desire sharpened his smile. “The ring?”
“The grammar.”
He kissed the center of my palm. “My fiancée. Her own woman. Choosing me.”
“Better.”
He worked his fingers deeper while his thumb circled the most sensitive part of me. Heat built quickly, helped by the proposal, the beach, and the way he corrected himself without turning the correction into shame.
I came with his name against my teeth.
He held my thighs open and kissed me through the last pulse.
Then I pushed him onto his back.
The monitor flashed green from his ankle.
“Stay within approved limits,” I said.
“I am in bed.”
“Federal regulations are detailed.”
“You are enjoying this too much.”
I straddled him and lowered myself over his erection.
His hands closed around my hips.
The stretch made both of us groan.
I took him slowly until he filled me, then stopped and looked down at the man who had once tried to move me through the world like a protected object.
He waited beneath me.
Not passive. Not weak.
Trusting.
“Yes,” I said.
His eyes changed.
“Again.”
I rolled my hips. “Yes.”
He lifted to meet me.
The first thrust drove a cry from my mouth. I leaned over him, palms on his chest, and rode him harder. His fingers dug into my hips, helping the rhythm without taking it.
“Look at me,” he said.
This time the words were not a command borrowed from fear.
They were need.
I did.
His face broke open beneath mine. Every thrust carried the same stunned fact.
I had said yes.
He reached between us and touched me where our bodies joined. Pleasure tightened again, fierce and bright. I moved faster, the bed shifting beneath us, sea air cooling the sweat along my back.
“Gabriel.”
“I have you.”
“Beside me.”
“Always beside you.”
The climax caught me mid-breath. My body tightened around him, and he followed with a rough sound, holding me close as he came.
I collapsed against his chest.
For a while, the only sound was the ocean and our breathing.
Then the monitor beeped.
CHECK-IN REQUIRED.
I laughed so hard I had to lift off his ribs.
Gabriel stared toward the ceiling. “I am going to petition the court for a silent setting.”
“Denied. Accountability is noisy.”
He reached for the phone on the nightstand and completed the check-in while I remained draped over him.
The federal app asked whether anyone else was present.
I read over his shoulder.
“Disclose me,” I said. “I am a known bad influence.”
He selected YES.
RELATIONSHIP TO RESIDENT?
The options included family, counsel, medical, supervision, and other.
He typed FIANCéE.
The word appeared on the official screen.
My heart did something humiliating.
“Again,” he said softly.
I kissed him.
“Yes.”