Page 229 of These Tears

Firelight moves over the hollows of his face and traces the slopes, making him look more severe somehow.

And then I recognise his demon before it’s even fully out.

My breath sticks to the base of my throat just as pressure swells low in my core.

He reaches for the little iron latch and opens the firebox. Heat rolls over us as the flames climb hungrily into view. Then, ever so slightly, he takes my hand and brings it closer to the metal bar. With both our fingertips, he nudges the ring into the fire.

Barely a movement.

It doesn’t make a sound.

It does nothing. Even as I feel it burning in my sternum, scorching away whatever it had left behind.

Elias offers me his hand.

Without a second thought, I lace my fingers through his and follow him into the bedroom, my heart jolting with every step.

Lifting the camera from the desk, he turns the display towards me. The bed fills the frame with the flames from the fireplace falling across one side of it.

‘Is this right?’ he asks.

I adjust the exposure instinctively without taking the camera from his hands.

‘Depends…’ I manage, ‘on what you need it to do.’

His gaze flicks from the screen to my face. He doesn’t reply, but I can read the silence that begins to simmer low inside me as he walks away and towards the bed.

‘Slippers off,’ he orders.

My pulse trips over itself as I realise what this is, where his intentions lie.

I cross to him, the floorboards cool beneath my feet when I slide out of the slippers one by one. I look up at him from beneath my lashes, and the camera clicks. Then settles between us as natural as breath.

‘Your top,’ he says.

My fingers find the hem.

‘Slowly, Leah.’

Inch by inch, I draw it up, letting the fabric whisper over my ribs, my bra, my throat, until it leaves me and falls in a soft heap beside my feet.

The camera lifts again.

Click.

His eyes never leave me. Yet every time my hands stop, so does the shutter. He waits for the next movement before taking another frame.

‘Bottoms.’

When the cool air washes over me, he stops pressing the shutter and simply observes through the viewfinder. Holds motionless.

And then he lowers it.

His thumb flips to video mode and a quick pulse of recognition moves through me – I know what comes after this.

He sets the camera on the desk, angling the lens towards the bed, and he is guiding me towards it with nothing more than his body and that steady, dark look. But there’s a difference now – he moves slowly enough that I could step aside if I wanted to.

If I wanted to.