Page 122 of Hidden

The space seemed to shrink, the air turning heavy now that there was nothing left between us but skin, history, and every aching thing we had spent years refusing to name.

Vienna’s eyes dragged over me with an expression that looked almost painful. It wasn’t casual hunger. It wasn’t just want. It was recognition and reverence and rage and love, all twisted together until I could no longer tell where one ended and the next began.

“We only have tonight,” I said quietly.

His face hardened instantly. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

“It means exactly what I said.”

“No,” he said, stepping closer, his voice lower now, rougher. “No, you don’t get to walk in here, wearing my fucking jacket, naked beneath it like some kind of fever dream, and then tell me we only have tonight like you’re doing me a fucking favour.”

“It’s not a favour,” I snapped, sharper than I intended, because the truth of that lodged somewhere painful inside me. “It’s all I have. You once said you were waiting for me to chooseyou. And I said I was waiting for you to be an option for me to choose.”

“I remember,” he said, a slight tick in his cheek.

“I’m choosing you now, Luke. In the only way I’m able to do.”

Silence fell between us, thick and breathing and full of everything neither of us wanted to say first. Then he reached out, slow enough that I could have pulled away if I wanted to, and gripped my jaw in one hand. Not hard, but firmly enough that I felt the message in it. His thumb brushed once over my cheek.

“Don’t,” he said quietly. “Don’t come in here and give me scraps, Gabriella. Don’t fucking do that to me.”

“It’s not scraps,” I whispered, even though some part of me knew that was exactly what it was.

He looked furious. Hurt. Beautiful. Broken.

And suddenly I wasn’t as sure of myself as I had been when I came in here.

Maybe I had misjudged this. Maybe I had come here thinking I could take one thing for myself without fully understanding what it would cost him to be treated like a temporary escape. But before I could say anything else, before I could retreat into apology or excuse, he leaned down until his forehead nearly touched mine.

“You think I can survive another goodbye from you?” he asked, and his voice sounded wrecked enough to splinter something deep inside my chest. “You think I can touch you again and go back to pretending you’re not mine?”

My throat tightened painfully. I lifted my hands slowly, pressing them to his chest, feeling the hard thud of his heart beneath my palms.

“Then don’t pretend,” I whispered. “I am yours, Luke. I’ve always been yours. I was yours when we first met at that park. I was yours when you made my sides split from laughing in assemblies. I was yours through every night we spent apart, andthe moments we managed to steal together. I never stopped being yours. I was just claimed by someone else for a while.”

That was all it took.

He kissed me like he had been starving for years, like there had never been anyone else, like he was furious with me for making him want this so badly and helpless to stop himself from taking it anyway. The force of it sent me stumbling backwards until the backs of my thighs hit the desk, and then his hands were everywhere—my waist, my jaw, my throat, my hips—holding, taking, grounding, claiming. His mouth was all heat and teeth and grief and fury, and I gave it back just as desperately because there was no point pretending I wasn’t every bit as far gone.

“Put my cut back on,” he murmured against my lips. “I want to fuck you just once where I can really let myself believe you’re mine.”

I decided not to respond. I simply pulled away and retrieved the jacket from the floor and slipped it back over my shoulders, shoving my arms into it.

Vienna let out a groan that was almost desperate, and then spun me around by my hips, and pulled me back against his chest. “Remember what I told you over the phone?” he whispered against my skin, pulling my hair away from my neck. “Remember when I told you I think of you every night? This is what I’m imagining, Gabriella. This is what I fucking see.”

“Do I live up to expectations?” I breathed, tilting my head to the side, resting against his shoulder, giving him better access to my neck.

“You exceed each and every one of them.”

His hands crept around to the front of the jacket, slipping between the folds, his breath hissing against my skin as he traced my bare stomach. I arched into him, needing to feel his touch with a want that bordered on desperation.

“What do you want, Gabriella?” He moved us as he spoke, guiding us toward the bed.

“I want you,” I replied without a second of hesitation.

My knees hit the mattress, and he gently pushed me forward, nudging my legs apart.

“Put your hands on the bed,” he demanded.