Chapter 47 Drawn In
(Micah POV)
I don’t remember walking back to the locker room. Some part of me feels like I’m floating, like I’m both here and somewhere else entirely.
The hallways are still echoing with the sound of Max’s retreating footsteps, Alison’s smirk lingering in my mind like a shadow I can’t shake.
But then there’s Dante, walking beside me, moving with that predatory ease that makes the air feel thicker around him.
I glance up, and our eyes meet, I can’t look away.
It’s like my chest has forgotten how to breathe without his gaze holding it in place.
“Micah,” he says softly, voice low enough that no one else could hear even if they were there, “focus on me.”
I do. Immediately. It’s almost involuntary, like every nerve in my body is tuned to him. I feel heat crawling up my spine, curling into my chest, and I don’t know whether to fight it or surrender to it.
I try to remind myself that Max, Alison, the team—they all matter. They all have opinions, control, influence over me, and yet, none of it pierces through Dante. None of it matters when he’s near.
I can’t deny it, I want him. I need him in ways I don’t fully understand yet. We reach the locker room, and he steps closer, just enough that the warmth radiates from him onto my skin.
The air shifts. I can feel it.
Something electric, unspoken, between us.
My hands shake slightly. I hate that they do, but I don’t pull them away. Dante notices, of course.
He always notices. He leans just enough that his chest brushes mine, and the world tilts sideways.
I catch my breath. A shiver runs through me.
“You’re trembling,” he whispers.
“I… I—” I falter, words dying in my throat.
Because how do you explain that it isn’t fear, even though it feels like it?
It’s anticipation, it’s longing. It’s… me being drawn into him, fully, without any defenses left.
He slides a hand along my arm, slow, deliberate, just enough that I can’t ignore it.
I flinch, but not away, I flinch toward him, like some part of me knows it’s right, knows it’s where I’m supposed to be.
He smiles soft, dangerous, knowing and I feel myself melting into it. The walls I’ve built, the rules I try to follow, the careful boundaries I’ve set they crumble, brick by brick, under his gaze.
Then he steps back slightly, and my chest aches.
I want to close the space, pull him in, claim him as much as he’s claiming me.
But I hesitate, terrified of just how much I feel for him, how quickly I’m falling into a place I can’t escape from.
“You’re mine,” he murmurs. Not as a threat.
Not as a demand. As a fact. And I believe it.
I swallow hard, trying to steady my breath.
“Dante… I…” My voice shakes.
Every instinct in me wants to say it. To confess everything I feel. But the words stick in my throat.
He leans closer, just enough that his lips are near my ear, his breath warm against my skin.
“Say it,” he whispers.
“Or don’t. I already know.”
I shiver violently, heat flooding through me. I can’t pull away, and I don’t want to. All I can do is close my eyes and let the moment consume me.
Somewhere, distant but still sharp, Max’s voice echoes in my mind.
He’s worried. Protective. Angry. But I can’t focus on that now. All I feel is Dante controlling, powerful, demanding, and impossibly close.
A noise from the other side of the locker room startles me.
I jump, heart thudding, and Dante’s hand tightens slightly on my hip not harsh, not cruel, just a reminder.
“You’re with me,” he says softly, the words anchoring me.
I nod, my pulse racing, breath uneven.
“Yes,” I whisper.
“I’m with you.”
He doesn’t smile. He doesn’t relax. He doesn’t need to.
The statement alone, the ownership in my voice, is enough.
It’s the confirmation he wanted, and I can feel him savor it, even without words.
He steps back again, giving just enough space that I realize how dependent I am on his nearness.
The ache in my chest doesn’t fade; it grows, a sweet, sharp pull that I can’t resist.
My mind flashes back to the last few days: the hallway confrontations, the locker room moments, the way he watches me, corrects me, touches me.
All of it is deliberate, all of it is controlling and all of it makes me tremble with desire, fear, and relief. I glance at him. He’s watching me. Always watching me. And I can feel the pull, the thread tying me to him, tighter than any rule, any whisper, any warning from Max or Alison or anyone else.
I swallow hard. “Dante…” I whisper again, voice barely audible.
He steps forward, closes the space between us once more.
Hand on my waist, his chest brushing mine.
Heat radiates off him in waves.
“Good,” he murmurs. “You’re exactly where you’re supposed to be.”
I close my eyes, letting the words sink in.
The tension in my body doesn’t fade, it twists into longing, into fear, into want.
I can’t breathe normally, I can’t think normally.
And I don’t want to because I am his.
Completely. And for the first time, I don’t care who sees. Who knows. Who tries to stop it.
All that matters is the way Dante looks at me, the way he controls me, the way he owns me without a word.
A shiver rolls through me.
He notices, of course. And he smiles again, slow, predatory, satisfied.
“You’re shaking,” he whispers once more.
“Keep shaking… only for me.”
I can’t stop, I don’t want to. Every nerve, every thought, every pulse is drawn to him and as he steps back just slightly, leaving the smallest space between us, I realize something terrifying and exhilarating all at once:
I have no control anymore. I’m his.
And I’ve never wanted anything more in my life.