Oh my God.
I didn’t even mean to do that. Okay, maybe I meant a little.
But now?
Now I’m never letting this go.
His eyes were wide, disbelieving. Like the sound had betrayed him. Like he hadn’t meant to give me that much.
And me?
I was stunned. For a breathless moment, I just stared at him. Adrien Walton—controlled, cold, iron-willed Adrien—had whimpered under my touch.
And I liked it.
No.
I loved it.
Note to self: never underestimate the erotic potential of a hospital gown and a well-timed whisper.
I tilted my head sweetly. "Did you just—"
He shut his eyes like that would undo it. Like maybe, if he didn’t see me, I wouldn’t see him—
A slow, wicked smile curved my lips. "So that’s what happens when I touch you right." I murmured
He turned red. Actually red. Color high in his cheeks, jaw tight with tension.
"Isabella," he growled, warning laced in his voice—but it was shaky, and I knew now he was bluffing.
I leaned in, brushing my nose against his. My voice was soft-wicked. "You begged, my love."
His breath shuddered out of him. "I warned you, Isabella."
I let my lips trail down his jaw, feather light. "Burn me." That’s what I’d said. And now I was melting in his fire.
"You’re shaking," I murmured, feeling his restraint like a live wire beneath my fingers. "Is that what resisting looks like?"
Then I guided his hand back to me. Lower this time. Beneath the blanket, over the thin fabric of my gown. Right between my thighs.
I watched him break.
"Fuck," he hissed, the word strangled. His palm flattened, fingers twitching but not moving—not yet. "You shouldn’t be doing this."
"But I am."
"You could pass out again. Your vitals—"
"Then be gentle," I whispered.
My voice didn’t shake—but his fingers did.
"I trust you."
He looked at me, eyes gleaming with something dark and beautifully unhinged.
And he said:
"Lie back."
I did. Automatically. Brain melting like marshmallow fluff.
His eyes flicked to mine—dark, starved, worshipping. Then, slower than slow, his hand pressed down. I sucked in a breath. Through the gown. Through the blanket. Through the thin wall of self-control he had left, Adrien touched me.
Not with haste.
Not with greed.
With reverence.
Like I was something holy and fragile and dangerously alive.
And still, his fingers didn’t move—not really. Just a subtle pressure that made my thighs tense beneath the sheets, made my breath stutter in my throat.
"Tell me if it’s too much," he said, voice like gravel and reverence.
"It’s not," I whispered. "You’re not even moving."
A slow smile touched his lips, a dangerous, beautiful thing. "Impatience doesn’t suit you, little bird."
Oh.
I felt it in the way he said it—that he knew what he was doing to me. That he felt the tension coiled in my legs, the heat blooming under my skin. That the stillness, the promise of movement, was somehow more devastating than the act itself.
But I needed more.
I pulled him down. His mouth crashed against mine, and the kiss was everything. Desperate and shaky. His lips trembled against mine, and I felt his fingers finally, finally, move.
He swallowed the sound I made—rough, needy, almost broken.
"You’re—" His voice cracked as he pulled back just enough to look at me. "You’re shaking too."
I nodded. "Good."
"Isabella." My name was half a moan, half a plea. His forehead rested against mine, like he was trying to breathe through me. "If you keep looking at me like that—I won’t stop."
I kissed the corner of his mouth. "Then don’t."
That broke something in him.
He kissed me again—slower this time, but deeper. His hand slipped under the thin, worn cotton of the gown. And I gasped into his mouth as his fingers moved with intention. Careful, still. Reverent. But no less hungry. I arched into his touch, my head tipping back against the pillow, and he groaned against my throat.
His hand moved with quiet skill, and I couldn’t stop the sounds that slipped out. I didn’t want to.
And neither did he.
I was shaking in earnest now, tremors racking my body as my pleasure built, sharp and coiling low in my belly. The clinical beeps of the heart monitor seemed to speed up, a frantic rhythm that matched the frantic beat of my own heart.
"Adrien," I cried out, my fingers fisting in the front of his shirt. "Please."
"Please what, little bird?" he murmured, his voice thick and dark as he leaned down to kiss me again, swallowing my next gasp. "Tell me."
But I couldn’t speak. I could only feel. I could only arch against his hand, chasing the feeling, chasing him.
He must have seen it in my eyes, the plea I couldn’t voice. His thumb found the very center of me, pressing with a firm, knowing pressure that stole the air from my lungs. He held me there, right on the precipice, watching me.
"Look at me, Isabella," he commanded, his voice a low rumble.
My eyes fluttered open. I saw him—my Adrien—his face taut with a fierce concentration, his eyes full of a dark, possessive fire that I had ignited. He was mine in this moment, as much as I was his.
And then he moved.
Adrien was shaking now, one hand braced beside my hip like he was trying to anchor himself—but it wasn’t working. His lips ghosted across my neck, my collarbone, his voice breathless.
Then he stopped.
His hands moved to the hem of my gown and pulled it slowly up my thighs. Every inch he revealed felt like being skinned and worshipped at the same time. His palms were warm.
He looked down at me—half-drugged, needy, still hooked up to wires—and shook his head with a low, sinful sound.
"You’ll be the death of me," he said.
And then—he knelt.
Oh.
My God.
My breath caught in my throat, a sharp, painful little sound. The bratty confidence, the wicked smile—it all dissolved into a wave of pure, heart-stopping shock.
He knelt between my parted thighs, the thin hospital blanket pooled around my hips. His shoulders were broad, tense, his head bowed for a moment as if in prayer. The sterile, antiseptic air of the room suddenly felt charged, sacred. The steady, rhythmic beep of the heart monitor was the only sound, a fragile metronome marking the seconds of his surrender.
When he looked up at me, his eyes were black with a depth of emotion that stole the air from my lungs all over again.
"Adrien—"
"I told you I’d wait to have you," he said. ""I didn’t say I wouldn’t worship you."
I blinked. "Wait, here? In the hospital?"
He raised a brow. "You started this."
And then, he leaned in.
His mouth didn’t claim mine. It didn’t even touch my core. Instead, his lips pressed against the inside of my thigh, a reverent, searing brand against my skin. I jolted, a full-body shock, my fingers digging into the thin mattress. The heart monitor skipped a beat, then another, its rhythm quickening into a frantic, unsteady tempo.
My tempo.