The summons arrives through a warden I don't recognize when I was recuperating in my chambers after a court meeting—a pretty successful one if I do say so myself. The summon is a single sentence delivered with bored precision. The prince requests his consort's presence.
Arthur walks me to the connecting door and stops, his hand pressing flat against the wall beside the frame, knuckles draining white. "I'll be here."
"Comforting." I smooth my silk and step through. "Like knowing the lifeguard is on shore while the shark is already in the water."
Desmond's chambers are warm tonight—fire built high, candles lit along the mantle. He stands at the window with a glass in his hand, and when he turns, his expression is unhurried, open, almost soft.
My stomach drops, because soft is new, and new from Desmond is never a gift. It's a remodel on a trap.
"You handled Ashworth beautifully this evening." He crosses to me and takes my hand—not seizing it, taking it, the way you'd take a glass of wine at a party. "The redirect to grain tariffs was particularly elegant."
"I wasn't aware I was being graded." My pulse does something complicated against his palm. "Should I expect a report card, or is this more of a verbal assessment?"
"You've been performing above expectation." His thumb traces my knuckles one at a time. "The court expected a sacrificial lamb. You're giving them something more interesting."
He reaches for the clasp at my shoulder. The silk parts and his fingers trace the exposed collarbone—no grip, no bruise, just his thumb following bone like a sentence he's reading by touch. The catastrophic absence of pain makes my teeth clench harder than pain ever did.
"The way you stood during the trade dispute." The silk slides lower. His mouth follows—the hollow of my throat, the ridge of my shoulder. "You looked like you belonged there."
"I was calculating whether the door was closer than the window." My breathing hitches when his lips find the pulse point below my ear. "For escape purposes. Not architectural appreciation."
"You've stopped flinching when I enter a room." The second clasp releases and the silk pools at my waist, my hips, the floor. His hands settle on bare skin with a gentleness that makes something behind my ribs crack sideways. "That took longer than I expected."
"Family trait." My voice thins. "Genetic material doesn't care about custody arrangements."
He walks me backward until my knees hit the bed. His weight follows me down, and his mouth traces the mate mark on my forearm with slow, deliberate possession.
"Look at me." His hand frames my jaw. Silver eyes at close range, identical to Arthur's and nothing like them. "Stay here. Not behind whatever wall you're building. Here."
His mouth moves down my sternum, the valley between my breasts—then closes over one nipple, tongue circling while his thumb rolls the other. My spine bows off the sheets before I can stop it. He repeats it harder, the edge of his teeth dragging, and my hips jerk against him.
His hand slides between my thighs and finds me wet, and the sound he makes against my breast is low and knowing. Two fingers press inside—slow, curling forward—and his thumb settles over my clit with a pressure so precise my thighs clamp around his wrist.
He builds the rhythm with devastating patience—deep strokes matched to slow circles, pushing me toward the edge and pulling back. Every time my eyes close he stops, holds me in the ache until I find his gaze. Only then does he resume.
"Say my name." Not a command this time. Closer to a question—questions have answers you choose, and choosing makes it yours.
"Desmond." It tears out raw and wrecked. His fingers drive deeper, his thumb presses hard, and my whole body clenches around him—back arching, thighs shaking, a sound leaving my mouth I will never willingly claim.
He doesn't let me come down. He pulls his hand free, grips my hips, and pushes inside me in one slow stroke—the stretch filling me so completely my nails score lines down his back. He holds there, forehead pressed to mine, and I feel him pulse against the aftershocks still rippling through me.
Deep and measured, pulling nearly out and driving back at an angle that drags against the spot his fingers found—each thrust punches a sound from my chest I cannot govern. His thumb finds my clit again, matching his strokes, and the second orgasm builds on the wreckage of the first.
"Say it again." His mouth against my ear, his breath ragged for the first time. "Look at me and say it."
"Desmond— don't stop—" My legs lock around his waist. His hips snap harder, his thumb presses, and I shatter with my eyes open—watching his face fracture as he follows me over, his body shuddering, his grip bruising my hips in a way that makes the pleasure sharper.
He stays. That is the part that rewrites everything—Desmond Wolfblade, who has never remained in a room longer than his purpose required, rolls onto his back beside me and does not leave. The fire settles. The space between us holds heat like a closed hand.
"The cabin." His voice arrives in the dark, stripped of performance—quiet, curious, almost conversational. "What was it like?"
My body goes rigid. "Are you asking as my husband, my jailer, or my judge? Because the answer varies by audience."
"I'm asking as a man lying next to a woman who just said his name like she meant it." He turns his head on the pillow. "Was he gentle?"
"I'm not doing this." I stare at the ceiling. Count the stones. Lose count. "You don't get to weaponize that too."
"I'm not weaponizing." His hand finds my hip beneath the sheet—warm, heavy, settling into bone like something that has decided to stay. "I'm asking."
"The distinction is lost on me." My jaw aches from clenching. "Given our history of productive communication."
Silence. His thumb traces a slow circle against my hip bone—not through force but through the patient refusal to let go.
"I am not a patient man." He says it to the ceiling. "Never been accused of patience by anyone who survived the accusation." His hand tightens once, relaxes. "But you are teaching me new forms of it."
"I'll draft you a ruling in the morning." My voice comes out quieter than intended. "After I've consulted my legal team. Which is me. In a nightgown."
His breathing deepens. The hand on my hip does not move—not tighter, not looser, just there, a claim staked even in unconsciousness.
I stare at the ceiling. My body is still humming—flushed, wrung out, slick between my thighs—mapped by hands that knew exactly what they were doing. My chest holds something warm and unasked-for, curling around a name I said like I meant it.
I did mean it. That makes my nails bite crescents into my palms, because meaning it changes the geometry of everything—the bond, the brothers, the architecture of survival I've been building since I arrived.
Beyond the door, Arthur's breathing is barely audible — four counts in, four counts out. The man I am fated for is counting his way through another night. And the man I am bound to is holding me like something he is learning not to break.
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