46. CHAPTER 43
Léonie
I stared at him, and for a moment everything felt stripped bare.
Belong to me.
The words were simple but very unexpected of Orion Kade. The man who controlled everything about himself, down to his breathing. Same man who had once seen me only as part of a plan to fuel his ambition.
Now he was in front of me—eyes red, hands shaking, without his usual cold distance. It broke every fixed idea I had of him. He wasn’t falling apart. He was trusting me enough to let me see him.
My heart sped up at the sudden understanding that he was giving me the one thing he’d never given anyone else—the power to truly hurt him.
He wasn’t offering his money or his name—he’d already done that. He was offering me his choices, his trust. He was telling me that the man everyone called dangerous was done locking me out and wanted me at the center of his life.
For weeks, I’d wanted him to suffer. I’d wanted him to feel even a small part of the shame I’d felt when I found out about that clause. But looking at him like this, so unguarded and unsure, I didn’t feel the victory I’d imagined. I felt a deep, frightening love that mattered more than my anger.
He’s not distant and untouchable anymore, I thought, as my fingers wanted to do more than just reach for him. He’s just a man who’s terrified I won’t choose him.
I’d spent so long fighting the strict, controlled version of him who hid behind rules.
I wasn’t ready for this version that was vulnerable and openly wanting me.
If he was truly mine, then I wasn’t trapped anymore.
I was the one with the power. And for once trully, I didn’t want to escape the Kade name.
I wanted to stand beside the man who carried it.
I tried to reply but felt the breath stuck in my throat. Instead I wrapped my fingers around the back of his neck and tightened the hair at his nape, pulling him closer until there was no air left between us.
“Then stop talking about it, Orion,” I whispered, leaning in until only a breath separated us, the heat of his skin making my vision blur. “If you want to belong to me, then show me. Take me to your bedroom and prove that you are as much mine, as I am yours.”
The sound that left his throat wasn’t a word. It was a primal growl of relief and hunger. He didn’t wait. In one fluid motion, he swept me off the desk, his hands biting into my waist as he lifted me. My legs locked around his hips on instinct, my body choosing him before my brain could.
“Our bedroom, ma déraison,” he corrected, his voice thick and ruined.
“Ours,” I breathed.
The groan that rumbled out of him went straight through my chest. Then his mouth crashed onto mine, and everything narrowed to the violent sweetness of it. I moaned into him as he angled his head, taking the kiss deeper, his tongue sliding into my mouth with a feral hunger he barely restrained.
He carried me through the dark hallway without breaking the kiss.
His grip on my thighs was bruising, possessive, like he was reminding himself I was real, here, wrapped around him again after all this time.
Every few steps, he pushed my back into a wall, grinding his hard cock over my core, coaxing a helpless sound from my throat as his mouth devoured mine.
His teeth caught my lower lip, and his tongue plunged in short, frantic strokes as if he needed to taste every apology he hadn’t spoken yet.
By the time we staggered into the bedroom, we were both trembling, sweat slicking our skin, our breaths coming out in uneven pants that were close to sobs.
He lowered me gently onto the bed, a contrast to how he had pushed me back multiple times against the wall on our way here.
His eyes locked on mine, dark with a storm of regret and desire.
“We go slow first,” he rasped, his chest heaving. “I need to take my time with you. Worship every inch I don’t deserve, and earn my way back inside you.”
Goosebumps eroded my skin and my nipples peaked under my thin nightshirt just at the sound of his voice, at the promise buried in the words he just uttered.
I nodded, because my throat had locked. I wanted to tell him I’d missed him too, missed his hands, his mouth, his impossible intensity, but the words were stuck, and all that came out was a shaky, “Okay.”
“Shit.” He dragged in a breath, eyes flicking towards the closet, then back. “I don’t have any protection here.”
“Why would we…?” I started, but stopped myself, the memory slamming into me. The night I’d spat in anger that I was never having any of his children. I’d been hurting. I wanted to wound him back. I had.
Was he holding it against me?
“I don’t want—” He swallowed, lifting his hand to cradle my face, reading the direction of my thoughts before I could voice them.
“I don’t just want a child with you. I want you to want one with me,” he said gently.
“But if you’re not ready to have kids, I’ll wait.
As long as it takes. I’d never rush you, Léa. ”
I smiled at how adorable he was being right now. The ruthless Kade heir, terrified of overstepping a boundary I’d drawn in anger weeks ago.
Tenderness rose in me so swiftly it made my throat ache.
“I want the same thing you want,” I whispered, pulling his head down so I could speak against his lips.
“I want a family with you. I want little versions of both of us—silly, stubborn, and far too brilliant for their own good. I want a house full of the beautiful chaos we were both too afraid to ask for.”
Every word was the rawest truth I’ve ever spoken.
I wanted to see him at his softest when he held a daughter who looked like me. To see the Kade name finally mean something more than just cold hallways and deceptive contracts. Most of all, I wanted to give him the one thing his last name couldn’t buy… a home that was actually alive.
“You don’t need protection, Orion,” I murmured, my fingers slipping to his shirt buttons, working them open as I pulled him closer, leaving no room for doubt. “I’m your wife. And I want everything you have to give me.”
Every. Single. Thing.
His breath caught, the sound uneven, threaded with a hopefulness that was so heartwarming, even in the middle of our passion.
“Léa,” he choked out, eyes darkening with a heat that promised he’d take me at my word. “You have no idea how badly you ruin me.”
“I think I have a very good idea,” I teased, arching my back until I felt more of the friction I’d been craving for weeks. “Now, stop being a gentleman and be my husband.”
“I’ve missed that sharp mouth of yours,” he drawled. “Can’t wait to hear it beg for me.”
My pulse lit up like a fuse all through my body from his words
His hands slid under the hem of my shirt, and he peeled it off in one smooth motion. Cool air kissed my bare skin, and his gaze dropped to my breasts, darkening further. It wasn’t just lust in his eyes, but also awe just like the first time.
“You’re so beautiful,” he whispered, his voice cracking around the words. “I forgot how to breathe without you. These tits, this skin—fuck, Léa, you’re truly my undoing.”
My heart stuttered. Heat flooded my core at the way he looked at me, as though I was both a miracle and his favorite sin.
He bent his head, trailing his lips down my throat. He found my pulse and sucked lightly, until my back bowed and a helpless sound caught in my throat. His mouth moved lower, over my collarbone, lingering at the hollow there. His tongue tasting, marking, claiming me.
When he reached the swell of my breasts, his hands cradled them like he was relearning them by touch alone, his thumbs grazing until my nipples peaked, aching for his mouth. Then he took one between his lips—sucking hard, dragging his teeth lightly across the peak until I gasped.
“Orion—”
He made a low sound of approval into my skin, like my voice was the exact offering he’d wanted.
When his fingers went to the button on my shorts, they moved slowly, his knuckles grazing my inner thighs as he pulled them down, sending electricity down my spine.
Each inch of newly exposed skin got a kiss, a scrape of teeth, a slow drag of his mouth that had my nerves stretched tight. By the time he’d knelt between my knees, I was shaking.
“I missed you,” his voice scraped raw with the confession as our eyes met. “More than I knew I could miss anything. Your scent, your body, the way your pussy clenches around my cock. It’s all I’ve craved for weeks.”
My mind was in haze from the how turned on I was from the words coming out of his mouth. I threaded my fingers into his hair, sinking them into the soft silk of it, tugging him closer. His breath ghosted over my folds through my lace underwear. It was hot and maddening. I could barely think.
“I know,” I managed, the words coming out more as a whimper than a statement. I missed you too.
His lips pressed on the damp fabric leaving a soft kiss that made my hips jerk. Then he eased the lace aside, exposing my pussy completely to his hungry stare.
“Fuck,” he breathed, his eyes devouring me. “I missed the way you react to me. You're so pretty like this… and already aching for me.”
When his mouth finally settled on me, the world narrowed to that single point of contact.
His tongue darted out, licking me softly—so softly I gasped, tugging at his hair.
He traced sluggish circles around my clit, intentional and patient, lapping at my wetness.
Each stroke sent shivers racing up my spine, my thighs trembling around his head as he learned, and remembered, exactly what combinations unlocked me the fastest.
Between the wet, obscene sounds of his mouth on me, he whispered against my skin.
“I’m sorry.”
Kiss.
“You deserve better than my lies.”
Another kiss.
“I’ll never hide from you again.”
Then another.
“Let me make it right. Let me taste how much you forgive me.”
It was the sweetest torture.