Page 228 of Marrying the Savage

“I came back because I understood Grigori had cleared the house for you,” I say. “But before that, before the proof, I came back because I couldn’t breathe with you alone there.”

She looks at me for a long moment. Then she asks, “Because of the baby?”

I shake my head. “No.”

Her fingers tighten in her lap.

I turn fully toward her on the bench. “Because I love you.”

The room goes very still. Sofia stares at me like she has heard the words in a language she knows but didn’t expect from my mouth.

“I loved you before I knew about the baby,” I say. “I loved you when I stood in Sergei’s home with my hand around his throat and didn’t kill him because I thought of what you would see when I came back. I loved you when I let Anya lie because you looked too shaken to have your truth dragged out in public. I loved you when you were gone, and I tore the city apart pretending it was only duty.”

She breathes in once, unsteadily.

I don’t touch her.

I want to. I don’t. Not until she chooses it.

She looks down at the black thread still tied around her finger, the ring too large for her hand resting against her skin. She turns it once with her thumb, then looks back at me.

“I loved you when I should have been planning another escape,” she says.

My chest goes tight.

Her mouth trembles, but she forces the words out. “I think I started loving you before I understood what it was. Maybe in the car. Maybe when you asked instead of ordered. Maybe earlier, and I was just too angry to admit it. But I love you, Damir, and I hate that you made it so difficult.”

I let out a breath that feels like it has been trapped in my chest for two weeks. “I will do better.”

“You will do much better.”

“Yes.”

“And if you ever lock me in a room again, I will leave you.”

“I know.”

“I mean it.”

“I know.”

She studies my face, searching for the part of me that wants to argue. She doesn’t find it because it’s not there.

Then she reaches for me.

That’s all it takes.

I pull her into my lap, and her mouth meets mine before I can say her name. The kiss is soft for half a second, then not soft at all. Sofia kisses with her whole body when she stops pretending she wants distance. Her hands slide into my hair, her knees settle on either side of my thighs, and the small sound she makes against my mouth turns the last of my restraint into something useless.

Still, I keep my hands careful. Her waist. Her back. Her hips.

She notices. Her mouth curves against mine. “You’re thinking too much,” she whispers.

“I’m trying not to make mistakes.”

“Make different ones.”

That almost makes me laugh, but then she rolls her hips over me, and the laugh becomes a low sound in my throat. She feels it and does it again, slower this time, watching my face while my body hardens under her.