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I lean in, close enough to feel his breath against my lips. “Good,” I whisper. “Then we’re even.”

His hand snaps out, catching my wrist before I can pull away. Not tight. Not rough. But there’s no mistaking the power coiled in that grip.

“You’re reckless,” he says quietly. “You don’t care what it costs.”

“I care,” I murmur. “I just decided you’re worth the price.”

His fingers flex, that precise, infuriating composure cracking for half a second. Enough for me to see it—the hunger he's been swallowing whole since the night we met. The want that tastes like a curse on his tongue. The way he wants me, hates wanting me, and can't fucking stop.

But Ambrose Dalmar doesn’t fall. He doesn’t lose.

He releases me like I’ve burned him, like the taste of me lingers on his fingertips and he can’t scrub it clean. Then he turns, sharp and surgical, like he’s about to cut himself out of this moment entirely.

I should let him.

I don’t.

My voice is low, threading into the air between us like silk strangling a blade. “You can run, Ambrose. But you’ll never outrun yourself.”

That’s what finally stops him. The way his spine straightens like a blade unsheathed. He doesn’t turn, but his head dips slightly, like he’s listening harder than he should.

“I’m not running.” His voice is cool, perfectly crafted, but it’s a goddamn lie and we both know it.

I move then, closing the space with quiet, deadly precision. I reach for him, not soft, not coaxing—just enough to catch the fabric at his elbow, to tether him here before he can pretend this didn’t happen.

“Liar.”

That single word cuts him sharper than I expect.

His breath leaves him in a low exhale, but when he finally looks over his shoulder, there’s nothing controlled about the way his eyes drag over me. He’s fraying at the edges. And he hates it. Hates that I see it.

“Say what you want, Luna,” he murmurs, voice like cool wine poured over a wound. “But we both know what this is.”

I tilt my chin up, meeting him head-on. “What is it?”

“A mistake,” he says, but there’s a catch in it—a fracture, so subtle anyone else would’ve missed it.

Not me.

I close the final inch between us, pressing my body into the line of his back, lips brushing the shell of his ear. “Then stop standing here like you’re waiting for me to make it.”

He sucks in a sharp breath. His composure snaps taut between us, brittle as spun glass.

“I will ruin you,” he says quietly, like it’s a promise. Like it’s a fact already written.

I smile against his neck, letting my teeth graze the delicate skin just below his jaw. “You already have.”

That’s when he finally moves.

Fast. Rough.

He spins, catching me by the wrist again, but this time it isn’t restraint—it’s declaration. He backs me into the wall, one palm flattening beside my head, the other still gripping my wrist like he wants to crush me and devour me all at once.

His mouth hovers over mine, breath harsh and uneven. “You don’t want this.”

I laugh. Low and wicked. “I think you’re confusing me with yourself.”

His jaw clenches. I can see it—the exact second he gives in. That sliver of restraint slipping like silk between his fingers.