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Chapter Thirty-One

Jonathan-past

“So that’s it? You’re his now?” I stand in the middle of her hotel room. “Why did you call me over here tonight then?”

“I’m still me,” she says, but her voice is weak. Hollow. A ghost of the girl who used to race me barefoot through tidepools and whisper secrets into my hair.

“No. You’re half-his, never mine,” I mutter, stepping closer. “But I’ve loved you since you were thirteen and furious and wild and brave enough to scare the hell out of me.”

Her breath catches. “You’re not mine either. You married my cousin .”

“I was meant to be in your family, one way or another,” I spit, regretting my words the instant she flinches.

“You think I haven’t seen you trying to disappear into his world?

” I lean in until my breath hits her mouth.

“Regardless of anything else you’ll always be mine, Annabel. You don’t get to erase that.”

I kiss her before she can lie.

She shudders when my mouth crashes onto hers—no patience, no apologies. My hands are already in her hair, tugging, twisting. She moans into me, her body pliant and warm and frantic. Her fingers claw at my back. She tastes like lemon and longing.

I hover over her body on the hotel bed, grasping her thighs and pulling her against me. She gasps but doesn’t stop me. Her legs wrap around my waist, drawing me in, anchoring me.

I trail my lips down her neck, biting, sucking until her skin blooms red. She cries out when I bite her shoulder, when I tug her red dress off one arm and latch onto a nipple, hard and needy. I lick, suck, savor, the other pebbled peak begging for my mouth.

“You do this to me,” I whisper against her breast. “Only you. Always you.”

Her thighs quiver. Her hands tangle in my hair, pressing me closer, begging without words.

I kiss down her stomach, over every dip and hollow like they were carved just for me. Her navel, her hips—I bite there too, marking her where he won’t see. Where only I know.

Then I’m standing again, yanking the shirt off her body. She’s completely bare beneath it. I press her back onto the bed, pull my belt open, shove my jeans down just enough.

Our eyes lock.

“You want this?” I ask, my voice rough with need and something darker.

She nods, breathless.

“Say it.”

“Yes,” she moans. “God, yes—Jonathan, please.”

I push inside her in one hard, desperate thrust.

Her head tips back. Her mouth opens in a silent scream as she tightens around me. I lose every rational thought I’ve ever had. Her heat, her grip, the way her body molds to mine—it’s religion. It’s punishment. It’s salvation.

I move, deep and fast and reckless. Our moans fill the air, the rhythm urgent, frantic, raw. Her nails dig into my back. My name spills from her lips like prayer and sin and promise .

“I’ve always loved you,” I gasp against her throat. “Even when you didn’t love yourself.”

Her hips arch into mine, frantic, pleading. I reach between us, rub her exactly how she likes, and she comes apart with a cry that shatters something inside me. She clenches around me, milking every ounce of control I’ve been fighting to keep.

I follow with a broken groan, emptying into her, losing myself and finding myself in the same breath.

I collapse over her, our chests slick, heaving. My hands cup her face. I kiss her again, soft this time. Reverent.

“You’re mine,” I whisper. “Even if you leave, even if you marry him…you’re still mine.”

She doesn’t answer.

I wait. I count the seconds. Her silence stretches like a noose.

And then, finally, barely audible?—

“Calum will be back soon.”

The words are icewater in my veins.

I go still.

Her body’s still beneath me, but the warmth is gone. She looks up at me with wide, wet eyes—and guilt so sharp it cuts.

One name. That’s all it takes.

She’s just murdered me.

I push off the bed. Step away. Tug my jeans up. She watches me, but doesn’t reach for me. Doesn’t call me back.

And I realize, in that moment, I will never be enough for her.

Not when he already owns the world she’s chosen.