POV Jaxson
The house is quiet when I return, the kind of silence that settles into old bones after midnight has come and gone.
My meeting with the accountants ran four hours longer than expected, sorting through the financial wreckage Constantin's demands have created. None of it matters as much as getting back to this house, to her.
The hallway stretches before me in pools of shadow, the only light coming from beneath my bedroom door. My pulse quickens at the sight, because Harper never comes to my room uninvited.
I push the door open slowly.
She's curled on my bed like she belongs there.
The sight stops me in the doorway, my breath catching with enough force to make my damaged ribs ache. Harper lies on her side, her blonde hair fanned across my pillow, her body wrapped in one of my white dress shirts. The fabric swallows her frame, the sleeves rolled twice at the wrists, the hem riding up to reveal the curve of her hip.
She's wearing nothing underneath.
I can see that with devastating clarity—the bare expanse of her thigh, the shadow where fabric meets skin, the way the cotton drapes across her ass without the obstruction of additional clothing. My cock hardens instantly, straining against my trousers with an urgency that borders on painful.
She came here to tell me about Preston. But exhaustion claimed her before I could arrive, and now she sleeps in my bed wearing my clothes like she's been doing this for years instead of hours.
I cross the room on silent feet, lowering myself onto the mattress edge. My good hand rises without permission, one finger tracing the line of her spine through thin cotton. The touch is barely there, a whisper of contact that makes her skin prickle beneath my fingertip.
Seven years of photographs never captured this.
She stirs beneath my touch, her body arching into my hand with unconscious seeking. Her lips part on a soft exhale, and the sound that escapes them makes my blood turn to fire.
"Jaxson."
My name falls from her mouth before her eyes open, shaped by sleep and wanting. She moans it again as consciousness returns in stages, her lashes fluttering, her body stretching beneath my palm like a cat seeking warmth.
"I've been waiting." Her voice is rough with dreams, her hand finding my shirt, fingers closing around the fabric, already pulling me down toward her. "I wanted to tell you about Preston, but now you're here and I don't want to talk about him at all."
I let her draw me closer, my body covering hers. Mrs. Wilson called three hours ago with every detail of her morning room ambush.
"Destroyed him with paperwork and precision." I murmur against her throat, teeth grazing her pulse point. "I've never been more attracted to you than I am right now."
Her hands slide beneath my shirt, nails raking down my stomach, and I hiss at the sting. She pulls the fabric over my head with movements that speak of impatience, her eyes darkening as she catalogues the healing bruises.
"These colors are fading." Her fingertips ghost over yellow-green shadows. "Which means I don't have to be careful with you anymore."
"I don't want careful."
I strip the borrowed shirt from her body, baring her to the moonlight. The sight of her—all pale skin and sharp angles and nipples already peaked from the cool air—makes my chest ache with possessiveness that borders on violence.
Mine. She's always been mine.
My mouth finds her breast, tongue circling the hardened peak before I suck it between my lips. She gasps, her back bowing off the mattress, her fingers threading through my hair to hold me in place. I bite down gently and she keens, the sound shooting straight to my cock.
I travel lower, kissing a path down her stomach, feeling her muscles clench beneath my lips. When I reach the apex of her thighs, her scent hits me—arousal and need and Harper—and I groan against her skin like a man who's been starving.
"Spread your legs for me."
She obeys instantly, her thighs falling open to reveal glistening flesh that makes my mouth water. I drag my tongue through her folds in one long stroke, and the sound she makes is obscene—a broken cry that echoes off the walls.
I devour her with single-minded focus, learning every fold and ridge, cataloguing what makes her gasp versus what makes her scream. My fingers slide inside her, curling against that spot that makes her thighs shake around my head.
I drive her higher, relentless, adding a third finger while my tongue works her clit in tight circles. Her body trembles with approaching release, her walls clenching around my fingers, her breathing ragged with anticipation.
Just before the peak, she moves.
Her hands find my shoulders, pushing me onto my back with strength I didn't expect. She rises above me, chest heaving, eyes wild with need as she tears at my belt.
"My turn." She frees my cock and wraps her fingers around the length, stroking once, twice, until I'm the one making desperate sounds. "You've been directing this dance since the beginning."
She positions herself above me, her wetness coating the head of my cock as she teases us both. Then she sinks down in one devastating motion.
The connection is overwhelming—her tight heat surrounding me, her weight pressing me into the mattress as she sets a punishing rhythm. My hands find her hips, fingers digging into flesh hard enough to bruise, but I let her lead. Let her take what she needs while I watch her come apart above me.
"You can have everything I am, Harper." The confession tears itself from my chest. "Every broken piece and ugly truth."
She leans down, her mouth hovering over mine, her walls clenching around me as her orgasm builds. Her breath mingles with my own as we climb toward the edge together.
"Sei sempre stato mio," she whispers against my lips.
You've always been mine.
The Italian flows from her tongue with perfect pronunciation, and the revelation crashes through me at the same moment her orgasm does—her body convulsing around mine, dragging me over the edge with her. I spill inside her with a groan that sounds like surrender, her name torn from my throat while mine falls from her lips in that perfect Italian she's been hiding.
Afterward, she lies draped across my chest, her breathing slowly steadying. The moonlight paints silver across her shoulder blades, and I watch the rise and fall of her ribs with focused attention.
"Harper." My voice comes out wrecked.
"Hmm?" She presses her lips to the space above my heart.
I stare at the ceiling, replaying every Italian phrase I've uttered in her presence. The calls with Daniel. The muttered curses. The way I sometimes think in that language when English feels too limiting.
"I didn't know you knew Italian."
She props her chin on my chest, her eyes glittering with amusement in the darkness. "There's a lot you don't know about me, Jaxson. Eighteen months of surveillance and you still missed the important things."
The words should sting, but her smile softens the blow. Before I can formulate a response—before I can ask how long, or why, or what else she's been hiding—she rises up and captures my mouth in a kiss that tastes like secrets and second chances.