He looked at me with that infuriatingly perceptive calm of his. “You’re thinking.”
“That sounds accusatory.”
“It’s an observation.”
I smiled and leaned my head back against the seat. “I was just realizing I’m happier than I should be after a trip like that.”
His thumb moved once over my knuckles. “Why is that a problem?”
“Because it feels unfair.” I turned my face toward him. “I went home to deal with surgery and family drama and Adam being exactly as terrible as I remembered, and I’m still sitting here feeling…” I let out a breath. “Better.”
His expression changed, altered by something I could never quite look at directly without risking my own undoing.
“That’s because you faced it,” he said. “And you were stronger than what was waiting for you.”
The words settled deep, part of me waiting for someone to say them out loud.
“I love you,” I said, because it was there, warm and certain and true enough now that holding it back felt pointless.
His gaze held mine.
“I know,” he murmured. “And I love you.”
A low ache moved through me then, less hunger than tenderness, though hunger was there too, blunted by the exhaustion of a long emotional day and the relief of surviving it.
He must have seen that as well.
“Come with me,” he said quietly.
I lifted a brow. “Where?”
“There’s a small room at the back.”
I stared at him for a beat. “Pietro Benetti.”
His mouth curved very slightly. “What?”
“I’m not tired.”
“Neither am I.”
That was enough to make me laugh, something that still startled me every time it rose so easily around him.
He stood first, then offered me his hand. I took it.
The little room at the back of the plane was narrow, private, and dimly lit, and the second Pietro shut the door behind us the air changed.
He looked at me for one suspended beat, his chest rising once, hard, like even now he was fighting himself.
Then he came for me.
His hands closed around my waist and his mouth took mine in a kiss that was hungrier but still unmistakably him. Controlled. Deliberate. As if even when he wanted to lose himself, some part of him still needed to make sure I felt every second of being chosen.
“Let me take care of you,” he said against my lips, his voice already rough.
The heated words slid through me.
I nodded, and that was all he needed.
