“Thanks for wanting to.”
He leans in, the mattress dipping under his weight, the shift tilting me subtly toward him, as if gravity has already chosen sides.
His lips brush over mine in a kiss that’s barely there. Delicate, unrushed, like he’s saying,I want you, but I know we’re not going to.
Heat flares, sharp and sweet. And somehow, that unravels me more than anything else could.
When he pulls back, I’m smiling as if I’ve just been handed a sunrise, cheeks warm, matching the bloom in my chest.
“Five a.m. kitten alarm,” he reminds me, already turning off the nightstand lamp, then leaning back into his pillow.
“Right,” I say through a stifled yawn, nestling deeper into the sheets. “Guess we better fall asleep fast.”
“Race you.”
I’m lured awake by the hush of ocean waves, a cool night breeze slipping through the open bay window.
Knox lies on his side facing me, breaths slow and even, moonlight draping his skin in light, silvery shadows.
I let my gaze roam over him: the angular cut of his jaw, the perfect slope of his nose, the full curve of lips I’ve kissed, tasted, and endlessly crave like an addict needing a fix.
A stray lock of hair has fallen across his forehead, framing the edges of his beautiful face, and beneath the pillow, his arm shifts just enough to make his bicep flex, an unfair yet welcome distraction.
For a moment, I imagine leaning in, palm against scruff, the space between us vanished, me melting into him.
Instead, I hold still, desire coiling low in my belly, building slow and dangerous, a fuse burning toward something inevitable.
I steal a glance at the bedside clock—2:03 a.m., its low red glow a reminder that while everyone else is asleep, I lie wide awake, drowning in him.
My heart pounds, a frantic drumbeat I’m certain will wake Sleeping Adonis.
And as if summoned by its thrum, Knox’s lashes flutter open, his warm, sleepy gaze finding mine.
“Auditing my sleep patterns?” he says, words playful, laced in a raspy haze.
“Admiring the view.”
“Me too,” he says, his husky tone sending a breeze down my spine.
For a suspended beat, we hover in silence. Gazes locked. Breaths quickening, electricity thick, tangible between us. Until his hand slides into my hair, tugging me closer, a pull as natural as the tide to the shore.
Mouths part, tongues tangle in a delicate slide, heat and want curling between us, need following in a frantic rush.
Guiding me onto my back, Knox settles between my thighs, mouth still moving over mine as his body molds to me, hips rocking in a slow, deliberate rhythm that leaves no room for doubt about where this is headed.
A thin, shaky gasp escapes me, caught between the sweep of his tongue across my lips and the hard length of him pressing against me, heat blooming deep in my center.
He pulls back from our kiss, eyes searching, his chest rising and falling on ragged breaths. “Cami…baby, we don’t have to…if you’re not ready.”
A quiet pulse of fear hums low in my ribs, old wounds reminding me that nothing good ever stays. That this might not last.
But then he looks at me like I’m already his. Like he’s not going anywhere.
And I want this. I want him.
“I’m ready,” I whisper, heart racing.
Like a film running too fast to catch each frame, everything blurs. Clothes stripped away. Fabric forgotten. Mouths colliding in kisses that are equal parts hunger and wonder, our world shrinking to nothing but the heat of bare skin and the certainty of him above me.
