Chapter 7 Seven
Elena's POV
The suite was all soft light and vast windows but I didn’t care. My whole world was the man turning from the door, the quiet click of the lock sealing us in.
The reality of it crashed over me. I was in a stranger’s room. I had kissed him like I was starving. My plan, which had seemed so fierce and clear at the bar, now felt like a thin paper shield. It was gone, burned up in the elevator. What was left was just me, shaking inside.
He didn’t come for me. He walked to a side table, where a bottle of wine sat waiting. He poured two glasses, the sound of the liquid a soft splash in the quiet. He handed one to me. Our fingers brushed. A spark.
“Tell me about your work,” he said, leaning back against the table. “The restoration.”
It was the last thing I expected. I took a shaky sip. The wine was deep and rich. “It’s… quiet,” I said. “It’s about seeing what’s broken. And fixing it without anyone knowing it was ever damaged.”
He nodded, his eyes on my face. He was really listening. Not just waiting for his turn to talk. “You must be very patient,” he said.
“Sometimes,” I said. My voice grew stronger. “But sometimes it’s not about patience. It’s about anger. The old masters… they hid their fury in the paint. In a saint’s clenched hand. In the way a woman looks at the man who wronged her. Finding that, bringing it back to the surface… that doesn’t feel like patience. It feels like justice.”
The words poured out of me. I never talked about this. Not like this. But he watched me, and he listened, and for a few minutes, I forgot why I was there. I forgot the future. I was just a woman talking about art with a beautiful man who made her feel… seen. Truly seen.
He put his glass down. He moved closer, stopping just before me. He reached out, and with a touch so gentle it made my throat tight, he brushed a stray hair from my cheek. His fingers traced the line of my jaw.
“The future can wait,” he murmured, his voice like dark honey. “Tonight is ours.”
The word ours undid me. It wasn’t yours. It wasn’t mine. It was ours. A shared thing. A collaboration. In that one word, I wasn’t a transaction anymore.
When he kissed me, it was a question. Soft. Exploring. His lips asked, Is this still what you want?
My answer wasn’t soft.
A surge of everything I’d been choking back for weeks: the fury, the fear, the trapped, screaming feelings all burst free. I kissed him back with a desperation that shocked me. My hands flew to his face, pulling him closer. This wasn’t a passive surrender. It was a fight. A claiming. I was matching him, touch for touch, heat for heat. I needed to burn away the powerlessness deep within me with this fire.
His control cracked. A low sound vibrated in his chest. His arms wrapped around me, crushing me to him.
This is mine, I thought, the words a fierce chant in my head. This heat. This weight. The shocking tenderness of his hands on my back. I am choosing this. I am here.
Clothes became obstacles. His jacket fell to the floor. My dress slipped from my shoulders. The cool air on my skin was a shock, then his hands were there, warm and sure, tracing my spine, learning my shape. Everywhere he touched, my skin remembered. I fumbled with the buttons of his shirt, driven by a need to feel him, just him, without barriers.
As the last of our pretense fell away, a final, clear thought broke through the fever.
I am not just reclaiming my body.
I am losing a piece of my heart to a stranger
Matteo's POV
She was unraveling in my hands, and it was the most exquisite thing I’d ever witnessed.
The wine and the talk of art was the final disarming. A direct strike at the core of her: the thinker, the seer of hidden truths. I saw the moment she forgot her fear. The moment her eyes lit with passion for her work, not for me. That was the key. To love the art, not the collector. I was just the audience she never had.
When I said, “Tonight is ours,” I saw the word hit her. Ours. It promised partnership, not possession. It was the truth, wrapped in the perfect lie. This night was ours. I would make sure of it.
Her kiss, when it came, was a revelation. It wasn’t just passion. It was fury. A beautiful, directed rage. She was fighting her future with her mouth, her hands, her body. She was an active, blazing participant. This was no scared girl. This was the woman from the thesis, the one who understood defiant saints and hidden knives. She was painting her rebellion on my skin.
I let my own control slip. I had to. To match her. To show her I was not just a taker, but a partner in this combustion. The taste of her, the feel of her slender strength under my hands, the little sounds she made was an intoxication far deeper than I’d planned.
As her dress pooled on the floor, as my shirt followed, the strategic part of my mind was still there, but it was drowned out by a primal, roaring need. This was no longer just about marking her for the future.
It was about having her, completely, now.
Her skin was like warm silk under my palms. Every shiver, every gasp, was a victory I craved. I mapped her with my hands, my mouth, committing her to memory. I would know this landscape better than the city I owned.
In the dim light, her eyes were wide, dark pools. I saw the triumph in them. The desperate, proud triumph of her choice. And then, just for a flash, I saw the despair. The realization that this was more than a transaction. That she was giving something she couldn’t name.
Good.
Let it hurt. Let it be profound. Let it be unforgettable.
I lowered her onto the cool sheets, following her down, covering her body with mine. Her arms wound around my neck, pulling me closer. Our breaths were one ragged sound.
The cliff’s edge was here. The point of no return.
My last coherent thought was a cold slash of certainty through the heat.
You think you are losing a piece of your heart to a stranger Elena.
But the stranger is real. And when you learn my name, this night will haunt you forever.