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He had learned my body in the six weeks we had spent together. He knew the pressure I liked and the rhythm that made my breathing change. He knew the small circling motion that made my hips move before I meant them to. He used all of it now without needing to ask.

His fingers worked me slowly while his mouth stayed against the back of my neck.

"That's it," he murmured. "There you are. I've got you."

Each time he said it, the tension in my lower belly pulled tighter.

I reached behind me without looking, found his cock, and closed my hand around him. He jerked against my palm and groaned, and the sound went through me so sharply that my own hand tightened.

"Like this," I whispered. "Stay like this. I want you like this. Please."

He shifted behind me.

He drew my panties down over my hips and legs, lifted my knee carefully, and settled it forward across his thigh so that I opened for him without putting pressure on my shoulder.

Then the head of his cock pressed against my wet pussy.

He pushed into me slowly from behind, taking his time and letting me adjust to each inch before giving me the next. His arm stayed firm across my stomach, holding me securely against him, and a sound came out of me that I did not recognize as my own.

Behind me, Silas shuddered.

When he was fully inside me, he stopped.

For several seconds, he did nothing except hold me, his forehead resting against the back of my neck while his breathing came hard and uneven.

"All right?" he whispered.

"Yes." I caught my breath. "Don't stop. Don't you dare stop."

He started moving.

He kept the pace slow and steady, drawing back and pressing deep into me again while one arm held me close. His other hand came around the front of my body, found my clit once more, and began circling.

The rhythm of his fingers settled into the rhythm of his hips, and the pleasure built with each movement.

Then I looked down.

The silver thread around my wrist was glowing where my hand rested over his on my stomach.

Usually, its light was faint enough that I could miss it unless I was looking directly at it. Now it was bright. With each slow movement of Silas's body behind mine, the silver deepened until it lit the space beneath the blankets and shone across his scarred knuckles and my skin.

"Silas," I whispered. "Look."

He lifted his head and looked over my shoulder.

I felt the moment he saw it because his breathing stopped.

"That's us," he said quietly, with wonder in his voice. "That's you and me."

Something in me opened at the sound of it.

This time, the pleasure built slowly and without fear. There was no part of me waiting to apologize for wanting it. I had asked for this. I had chosen it. I wanted his hands on me and his body inside mine, and for once that wanting did not feel like something I needed to defend.

When I came, I buried my face against his forearm and said his name into his skin.

My body clenched hard around his cock again and again, and Silas groaned against the back of my neck. The thread around my wrist flared so brightly that I could see the light through my closed eyelids.

He held me through all of it.