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“Then remember me,” she breathes.

I've fucked Katarina before. Claimed her brutally against walls and in showers. Dominated her body with mine. But I've never made love to her.

I'm not sure I know how.

My hands are unsteady as I undress her—not with the urgent ripping of fabric, but with reverence. Each newly revealed inch of skin receives my gentle touch, my lips following the path of my fingers.

When she's naked beneath me, I stand to remove my own clothes. Her eyes never leave mine as layer after layer falls away.

“I've never seen you like this,” she whispers.

“Like what?”

“Vulnerable.”

The word should make me flinch, but tonight, I accept it. For her, only for her, I'll be vulnerable.

I lower myself beside her, our bodies facing each other. For long moments, we just look. Touch. Her palm is against mychest, feeling my heartbeat. My fingers trace the curve of her waist. No urgency. No battle for dominance.

When I finally move over her, I keep my weight on my forearms. Our foreheads touch as I enter her slowly—so slowly it's almost painful. Her gasp catches in her throat.

“Erik,” she breathes my name like a prayer.

I move inside her with measured strokes, watching her eyes, feeling her breath against my lips. This isn't the frantic coupling we've known before. This is something else entirely.

“Look at me,” I whisper when her eyes begin to close. “Stay with me.”

Our measured pace doesn't last. It can't last.

The tenderness shatters as her nails dig into my shoulders. A force awakens between us—the knowledge that these moments are finite, slipping away with each tick of the clock.

“Please,” she gasps, her hips rising to meet mine with increasing urgency. “I need?—”

I know what she needs because I need it, too. All restraint evaporates like morning dew under a blowtorch.

My thrusts turn harder, deeper. Her legs wrap tighter around my waist, heels digging into my lower back, urging me closer. Gone is the careful lover. The animal returns—the soldier, the fighter, the man who takes what he wants.

She meets my savagery with her own, teeth finding my shoulder, marking me as I've marked her so many times before. The pain sends electricity down my spine.

“Harder,” she demands, and I comply.

The bed frame hits the wall with each thrust. Her fingers tangle in my hair, pulling hard enough to hurt. I growl against her neck, tasting the salt of her skin, feeling her pulse race beneath my tongue.

“Mine,” I snarl, beyond rational thought. “You're mine.”

“Yes,” she hisses, her back arching. “Yours.”

We're frantic now, desperate to crawl inside each other's skin. To merge completely. Sweat slicks our bodies as we move together, finding a chaotic rhythm born of pure need.

I drive into her with abandon, flooded with blind, desperate want. She meets every thrust, her body tensing and yet demanding more.

My vision narrows to just her face—flushed and wild beneath me. Her eyes flash with the same madness I feel consuming me. We're both coming undone, racing toward something more significant than release.

“Don't let go,” she gasps, and I'm not sure if she means now or later.

“Never,” I answer to both of them.

Our movements grow erratic and uncoordinated. Nothing matters but this connection—this moment suspended between passion and despair. Every touch burns hotter, and every kiss tastes more essential than the last.