I step closer, caging her between the open car door and my body without touching her.
“You can call it practice if that makes you feel better,” I say. “I haven’t pretended a damn thing.”
Her breath leaves her.
Then she gets in the car.
The drive to the Everpine takes fifty minutes.
I count every one.
Natalie sits beside me with her hands folded in her lap, too quiet for a woman who normally fills silence like it offends her. I let the quiet hold until she turns her face toward the window and whispers, “I’m nervous.”
“I know.”
She looks at me. “That is usually the part where people say not to be.”
“I’m not people.”
“No,” she says softly. “You really are not.”
I reach across the console and set my hand over hers. She turns her palm up and laces her fingers through mine, pulling another thread of control loose without even trying.
The Everpine is lit gold when we arrive, all stone, dark wood, and mountain wealth pretending to be rustic. The manager meets us before Natalie can start worrying about check-in. He gives me the key cards and tells me the wardrobe delivery is already in the suite.
Natalie’s head snaps toward me.
I look at the manager. “Thank you.”
He leaves.
She whispers, “Already?”
“I texted after you said yes.”
“When?”
“When you were looking out the window.”
“You are terrifying.”
“Yes.”
Her mouth trembles like she wants to smile, but the nerves are back. I take her hand and lead her to the private elevator.
The doors close, and the air changes.
She looks down at our joined hands, then up at me.
“I haven’t done this before.”
Everything in me goes still.
The elevator rises. My blood beats hard once, twice, then settles into something darker and more controlled.
I knew she was innocent. I knew from the way she reacted, from the way desire surprised her, from the way she looked at me like every touch was a door she had never opened.
Hearing it from her mouth is different.
