Page 78 of Ruthless Knot

Respectful.

Like he's asking permission to unwrap something precious instead of just undressing a girl he wants to fuck.

I nod.

Can't find words.

His fingers work the ribbons slowly—untying the elaborate bows I spent so long creating this afternoon, loosening the laces one at a time until the corset gaps and I can finally breathe fully.

The fabric falls away.

I should feel vulnerable.

Should feel the familiar urge to cover myself, to hide, to minimize the amount of skin visible to someone who could hurt me.

But when his eyes travel over me—when they trace the mottled purple-yellow bruises flowering across my ribcage, the jagged eight-inch scar that slashes across my stomach like a second smile, the constellation of raised white dots and puckered tissue that map a history of violence onto my skin—I don't see disgust in the green-gold flecks of his irises.

I see reverence. Absolute, breathtaking reverence.

"Beautiful," he murmurs, voice like gravel wrapped in velvet.

And I believe him.

Fuck, I actually believe him.

We shed the rest of our clothes in pieces—his leather jacket heavy with rainwater, my once-delicate skirt now a sodden mess, his button-down shirt clinging to the ridges of his abdomen, the elaborate satin ribbons wrapped around my thighs unraveling with a whisper. Each item falls to the slate-gray tile floor with wet splats that punctuate the silence like heartbeats.

Each revealed inch of skin makes the steam-thick air between us heavier, more charged with electricity.

He has tattoos that bloom across his golden skin like living art.

I noticed them before, teasing glimpses beneath his collar, but now I can see them properly: antique skeleton keys and intricate lockpicks and trompe l'oeil illusion motifs climbing his sinewy forearms, arcane symbols in midnight ink that I don't recognize but suspect tell stories I desperately want to hear.

And scars.

Faint rope marks around his wrists, like he's spent too long being restrained.

Like me, I think.Different chains, same cage.

We step into the shower together.

The warmth of the water is immediate—sluicing over my shoulders, washing away the cold and the rain and some of the agony still lodged in my chest. I tip my head back, letting it cascade over my face, and for a moment I just... breathe.

One-two-three-four.

One-two-three-four.

Then his lips find my shoulder.

Soft.

Feather-light.

A kiss pressed to the curve where my neck meets my body, so gentle it barely registers at first.

Then another.

Along my collarbone.