The trash TV flickered—some Housewives franchise Ivy had already forgotten the premise of—but the amber glow of the lamp caught the edge of his jaw, the silver at his temple, and she'd been watching him more than the screen for the last ten minutes.

Flynn felt her gaze. His arm tightened around her shoulder. "What?"

"I don't want to hide."

His thumb stopped its slow stroke along her upper arm. The silence stretched, filled only by some woman on TV shrieking about a wine glass.

Ivy turned in the curve of his body, her thigh pressing against his. "I can't do it, Flynn. The way I look at you—someone's going to see. Someone already has, probably. Janice at the library definitely clocked something when we walked out of there."

He exhaled. Not a sigh. Something heavier. "I've been thinking about it too."

"Then think with me." She pushed herself up, tucking one leg beneath her so she could face him fully. His green eyes tracked the movement, then found her face. "I graduate in May. That's what—four months? There has to be a way to make this right before someone makes it wrong for us."

Flynn was quiet for a long moment. The couch creaked as he shifted, turning toward her, his knee bumping hers. "You could request a different thesis advisor. Someone in the department who's not me. It would remove the direct supervisory relationship."

"Would that be enough? For the university?"

"It would help. It's not a guarantee." His hand found her knee, palm warm through her leggings. "Ivy, I've been at this institution for twelve years. I know the policy. I know what they'd say. But I also know every professor on that floor has met you, and not one of them would doubt your work is your own."

She bit her lip. "You've thought about this."

"Since the first time you answered a question in my lecture and I forgot what I was saying." His voice was gravel, low and rough. "I've been thinking about it for three years."

"And you never said anything." Ivy's voice cracked on the last word. Not accusation—wonder. Three years of stolen glances across lecture halls, and he'd been burning the same way she had, right there in the front row.

Flynn's jaw worked. The lamplight caught the silver threading through his hair, the lines around his eyes that deepened when he was choosing words carefully. "What was I supposed to say? 'Miss Castellano, I've been mentally undressing you since your first essay on Middle Kingdom burial practices'?"

"Would've saved us some time."

He didn't laugh. His hand was still on her knee, warm and heavy. "I could lose everything. Do you understand that? Not just my position—my access. The dig sites. The rare books room. Twelve years of building something that matters, and the university would shred it overnight if someone filed a complaint."

Ivy's chest tightened. She'd known. Of course she'd known. But hearing him say it—the concrete weight of what he was risking—made her throat close. "Then let me take the hit."

"No." The word came fast, sharp as a door slamming.

"Flynn—"

"I'm not letting you torch your career before it starts. You're too good. You see things in those texts that tenured professors miss. The article you're drafting on determinatives in feminine-gendered funerary inscriptions? That's publishable work. In a real journal. Not a student review." His green eyes held hers, fierce and unblinking. "I will not be the reason that doesn't happen."

She wanted to argue. Her mouth opened, the rebuttal already forming—but he was right. About the article. About what it could mean. She'd worked too hard to have her name permanently attached to a scandal instead of a byline.

"So what do we do?" Her voice came out smaller than she meant it to. "Because I can't go back to pretending, and I won't let you destroy yourself for me. There has to be a middle ground between hiding and catastrophe."

Flynn exhaled slowly. His thumb traced a small circle on the inside of her knee. "I've been working on something. Hasnain at the Oriental Institute in Chicago—he owes me a favor from the Theban Mapping Project. He's been looking for a research assistant for a dig next season."

"Chicago."

"It's not a solution. It's an option. If you had an external advisor for your thesis—someone with no connection to me beyond a professional recommendation—the university would have a harder time framing this as exploitation." His voice dropped. "But it means months apart. It means your work belongs to another institution. And none of it changes what happens if someone reports us before May."

Ivy shook her head before he'd even finished. "Chicago." The word tasted like ash. "You want me to go to Chicago."

"I don't want you to go anywhere." His voice was low, rough at the edges. "I want you here. In this house. In my bed. In my life. But I'm trying to find a way that doesn't cost you everything."

"I've been alone for three years, Flynn." Her voice cracked, and she didn't try to stop it. "Three years of sitting in your lectures thinking if I just answered one more question, if I just wrote one more paper good enough to make you see me—" She pressed her palm flat against his chest, felt his heartbeat under her hand. "And now you're asking me to leave."

"I'm asking you to consider—"

"No." The word came out sharper than she meant it to, and his jaw tightened. "I'm not going to Chicago. I'm not spending four months in a different city pretending I'm not counting the days until I can come back to you. I did the waiting. We both did." She pulled her hand back, twisted her fingers together in her lap. "There has to be another way."

Flynn was quiet. The television flickered blue and gold across his face, some reality star screaming about a betrayal Ivy couldn't track. His thumb had stopped moving on her knee. "Tell me what you're thinking."

"What if I get someone else to review my thesis? Not Chicago. Here. Someone in the department you trust." She leaned forward, the words tumbling faster now. "There has to be someone—a colleague who's known you long enough to understand. Someone who'd keep it quiet until after I graduate."

Flynn's brow furrowed. "There are people I trust. But asking them to keep a secret like this—"

"I'm not asking them to lie. I'm asking them to look at our situation and see what's actually happening. Two people who fell in love. Not a professor taking advantage of a student. Not a student sleeping her way to a degree." She bit her lip, hard enough to hurt. "Ivy Castellano, the fat girl who got her master's because she fucked her advisor. That's what they'll say, isn't it? If it gets out."

Flynn's hand moved from her knee to her jaw. Gentle. Deliberate. His palm was warm and rough and she leaned into it before she could stop herself. "No one who knows your work would say that."

"People who don't know my work will say it plenty loud." She met his eyes. "So we get ahead of it. We put someone else in charge of my thesis. We document everything—every meeting, every revision. And we wait until May."

"And if someone reports us before May?"

Flynn's hand was still on her jaw, his thumb resting just below her cheekbone. The weight of his question hung between them—and if someone reports us before May—and Ivy could feel the shape of it pressing against her ribs, the thing neither of them had said out loud. She held his gaze and didn't blink.

"Then marry me before May."

The words landed. She watched them hit—the slight widening of his green eyes, the way his fingers stilled against her skin. The television chattered on behind them, some commercial for car insurance, and Ivy didn't look away from him. She didn't fidget with her glasses. She didn't bite her lip. She let the sentence sit in the amber lamplight between them, solid and real.

Flynn opened his mouth. Closed it. His brow furrowed, and for a long moment he looked less like a man who'd decoded ancient tombs and more like a student who'd just been handed a text in a language he didn't recognize. "Ivy." Her name came out rough, scraped raw. "You're asking me to marry you."

"I'm telling you." Her voice was steadier than she felt, but only just. Her palm was still flat against his chest, and she could feel his heart beating under her hand—faster now, a hard rhythm that matched her own. "You said you've been thinking about this for three years. So have I. Not just the—" She gestured vaguely between them, the sex, the rug, the stairs. "The rest of it. Breakfast. Arguments about whose turn it is to make coffee. You teaching me how to read the really annoying cursive on Eighteenth Dynasty stelae without wanting to throw something at my head."

A sound escaped him—not quite a laugh, something closer to a breath punched out of his lungs. His hand slid from her jaw to the back of her neck, fingers threading into the loose strands of hair that had escaped her bun. "You're serious."

"I've never been more serious about anything in my life." Ivy leaned into his touch, let the warmth of his palm anchor her. "You're worried about the university. About someone reporting us. About me losing my career before it starts. But if we're married—" She took a breath, the words coming faster now, the argument she'd been building in the back of her mind for weeks finally finding its way out. "It changes the narrative. We're not a professor and a student having an affair. We're two people who fell in love and made a commitment. The timeline gets blurry. Who's going to prove we didn't get engaged the day after I graduated?"

"That's—" Flynn stopped. Swallowed. His thumb traced the line of her spine, slow and deliberate, like he was grounding himself in the feel of her. "That's not nothing. Legally, if we're married, the university's conflict-of-interest policy gets complicated. Spousal relationships aren't treated the same as—" He broke off, shook his head. "I can't believe I'm analyzing the administrative merits of your marriage proposal."

"You're a professor. It's what you do." Ivy's mouth curved, just slightly. "Analyze things. Tell me if it's a viable argument."

Flynn stared at her. The lamplight caught the silver at his temples, the lines around his eyes that deepened when he was thinking hard. His jaw worked, and she watched him turn the idea over—not dismissing it, not laughing it off, but actually considering it, the way he'd consider a difficult translation or a fragile artifact. "You'd marry me. To protect us from the university."

"I'd marry you because I've been in love with you since I was twenty-two years old and didn't know what to do with it." Her voice cracked, finally, and she didn't try to hide it. "The university thing is just a bonus."

His hand tightened on the back of her neck. His eyes were wet, and he didn't blink them clear. "Ivy Castellano." Her full name, spoken like a prayer. Like a vow. "Are you sure?"

Ivy didn't answer with words. Not yet. She held his gaze for one heartbeat, two—watched the question still trembling in his green eyes, the wetness he hadn't blinked away—and then she smiled. Slow. Certain. One eyebrow lifting in the expression he'd come to recognize as her particular brand of defiance.

She slid off the couch.

Her knees met the worn Persian rug—the same rug where she'd ridden him hours ago, where he'd come inside her with her name breaking apart in his throat. The lamplight caught the chestnut strands escaping her bun, turned them copper and gold. She didn't fidget with her glasses. She didn't bite her lip. She reached for his hands—those callused, artifact-roughened hands that had held papyrus and limestone and her—and folded them inside her own.

"Flynn Ashworth." His full name, spoken like the opening line of a translation she'd been working on for years. "I have been in love with you since I was twenty-two years old and too scared to say it. I have dreamed about you—not just your body, not just your hands, but your stupid puns and your terrible coffee and the way you argue with me about determinatives like I'm actually worth arguing with." Her voice wavered, and she let it. "I don't want to hide. I don't want to wait. I don't want Chicago or loopholes or careful administrative distance. I want you. In this house. In my life. On paper, in ink, in front of whatever gods and university boards need to see it."

Flynn's breath caught. His hands tightened around hers, and she felt the tremor in his fingers—the great, steady hands of a man who'd excavated tombs and dated fragile limestone to the exact dynasty, shaking in her grip.

"Marry me," Ivy said. Not a question. A translation. The hieroglyph she'd been tracing since her first lecture, finally rendered into language he couldn't misread. "Not to protect us from the university. Not to blur the timeline. Marry me because I want to argue with you about Eighteenth Dynasty stelae at three in the morning. Because I want to be the one who makes your coffee too strong and steals the last piece of toast and falls asleep on your chest while you're trying to grade papers." She squeezed his hands, hard. "Marry me because I have spent three years loving you from a distance, and I am done with distance."

A sound broke from him—half laugh, half something raw and unguarded. His eyes were still wet, and he didn't look away from her. Didn't try to hide it. "Ivy." Her name, spoken like a man who'd just found oxygen after drowning.

"I'm still on my knees, Professor." The old title, softened now, something closer to a private joke than a formality. "This is the part where you answer."

Flynn pulled his hands free of hers—not to pull away, but to frame her face. Rough palms against her cheeks, thumbs tracing the curve of her jaw like she was something fragile and precious and his. "Yes." The word came out broken and absolute. "Yes, Ivy Castellano. Yes." He leaned forward, pressed his forehead to hers, and laughed—that surprised, boyish sound she'd heard for the first time on the hearth rug, the sound of a man who'd forgotten he was allowed to be happy. "Get up here."

He didn't wait for her to move. His hands slid under her arms, and he pulled her up—off her knees, onto the couch, into his lap. Her thighs bracketed his hips, and his arms wrapped around her, and she could feel his heart hammering against her chest, or maybe that was hers, maybe they'd stopped being separate rhythms hours ago.

"You just proposed to me," he said against her mouth. "On my living room rug. While reality television was playing in the background."

"I'm a romantic." She was laughing now too, or crying—maybe both, the tears hot and salt-slick on her cheeks, mixing with his. "Is that a yes?"

"That's a yes." He kissed her, and it wasn't careful or restrained or appropriate. It was a kiss that tasted like whiskey and salt and something that had been waiting four thousand years to be translated. "That's a yes, Ivy. Yes."

The kiss eased, softened, and Ivy pulled back just far enough to see his eyes. The green was still wet, still unguarded, and she felt her own cheeks hot and salt-streaked. The television chattered on—a woman in a sequined dress was screaming at a man in a too-tight suit—and Ivy didn't care. She pressed her palm flat against Flynn's chest, felt his heart still running hard beneath her hand.

"We should tell Emma first," she said. "Before we figure out the rest of it. Before the department, before the paperwork." She watched his brow lift, the question forming, and she answered it before he could ask. "She's your family. She's the one person who's going to be happy for us without needing to see the administrative fine print."

Flynn's hand was still on the back of her neck, his thumb tracing slow arcs against her skin. "You think she'll be happy."

"I think she'll be thrilled." Ivy's mouth curved, the smile coming easier now, something loose and warm settling into her chest where the panic had been. "She's been giving you those looks all week. The ones that say 'Uncle Flynn, you're an idiot and you're clearly in love and why haven't you done something about it.'"

"She has not."

"She absolutely has. I caught her watching us at dinner. She sees it." Ivy shifted on his lap, settling her weight more firmly against his thighs, and Flynn's hands slid to her hips—automatic, possessive, like they'd been doing this for years instead of days. "You're her favorite person. She wants you to be happy. And I think—" She paused, bit her lip for the first time since the proposal. "I think she might want me to be happy too."

Flynn was quiet for a long moment. His eyes moved over her face—brow, cheekbones, the bridge of her nose where her glasses usually sat, the mouth he'd kissed raw. Then he nodded, slow and certain. "Tuesday. We'll tell her at dinner."

"Before we tell anyone else."

"Before we tell anyone else," he agreed. His voice was steadier now, the gravel smoothing into something closer to his teaching cadence, but softer—the version of it she'd heard in the rare books room, the one he used when he was speaking just to her. "She'll interrogate us. Fair warning. Emma has strong opinions about how people should be treated, and she's been watching me be alone for a long time. She's going to have questions."

"Then she'll ask questions." Ivy shrugged, the oversized sweater slipping off one shoulder. Flynn's fingers brushed the exposed skin before she could fix it—just his knuckles, a feather-light touch that made her breath catch. "I'm not scared of a twenty-something with good instincts."

"She's twenty-five. Same as you."

"Then we'll get along fine." Ivy grinned, and it was her real grin now—the one that crinkled the corners of her eyes and made her look, Flynn had told her once, like she was about to get into trouble. "Let her interrogate me. I've been defending my thesis arguments against you for three years. Your niece is not going to be the thing that breaks me."

Flynn laughed—that surprised, boyish sound that still made her chest ache every time. He pulled her closer, one arm wrapping around her waist, the other hand coming up to brush a strand of chestnut hair from her temple. "Tuesday," he said again. "But first—" His thumb traced her cheekbone, and his eyes grew serious. "First I'm going to call the department chair in the morning and ask about the process for transferring thesis supervision. Quietly. No names."

"Good." Ivy leaned into his touch. "And I'm going to email Professor Okonkwo. She's head of the graduate committee. If anyone can help us navigate this, it's her."

"That's two people who'll know before Emma."

"Two people who need to know before Emma." She met his eyes, steady, unblinking. "We do this right. Step by step. No hiding, no lies, no pretending. Just—careful. Deliberate. The way you'd handle a fragile artifact."

Flynn's mouth found hers again—soft this time, not the desperate collision of before but something sweeter, something that tasted like promise. When he pulled back, his forehead rested against hers, and the television chattered on behind them, and somewhere in the house a clock was ticking toward midnight.

"Ivy Castellano," he murmured. "My fiancée."

His hands were still on her hips, her thighs still bracketing his, but the word hung between them—fiancée—and Ivy felt his breath catch at the sound of it.

She leaned in, her lips brushing the shell of his ear. The television light flickered across the side of his face. "My fiancée," she whispered, the word a secret against his skin. "My Flynn. My professor."

Flynn turned his head, his mouth finding the corner of hers, a soft, open kiss that tasted like surrender. His thumb stroked the denim over her hipbone.

"Do you remember," she breathed into the space between their mouths, her voice dropping to something low and private, "in the stacks? When you touched me?" Her hands came up to frame his jaw, her thumbs tracing his stubble. "Not inside. Past. That place no one else has touched. That place that made me see stars." She pressed her forehead to his, her eyes closed. "Can we explore that some more? Now? Please."

Flynn went very still. The hand on her hip tightened, his fingers digging into the soft curve of her waist. The memory moved behind his green eyes—the library shadows, her back against the shelf, his fingers tracing higher, past her clit, past her entrance, to that secret, swollen place behind it all. The sound she'd made. The way her whole body had bowed.

"Yes," he said, the word rough. He shifted beneath her, his erection straining against his trousers, a hard, undeniable line against her inner thigh. "Show me."

Ivy didn't hesitate. She slid off his lap, her knees meeting the rug again. She looked up at him, her dark eyes steady in the lamplight, and began to unfasten his belt. The buckle clicked open. The zipper hissed down. She hooked her fingers in the waistband of his trousers and his boxer-briefs and pulled them down just enough to free him. His cock sprang out, thick and flushed, already leaking at the tip.

She didn't take him in her mouth. She didn't stroke him. Instead, she guided his hand with hers, bringing his broad, callused palm to the front of her jeans. She was still fully dressed, the oversized sweater, the denim, the cotton of her underwear beneath. She pressed his hand firmly against herself, right over the seam. "There," she whispered. "That's the spot."

Flynn's breath shuddered out. He let her guide his fingers, tracing the shape of her through the layers, finding the heat even through the fabric. His index finger pressed, just so, and Ivy gasped, her head falling forward against his knee.

"God," she breathed. "Just like that."

He worked the button of her jeans open, the zipper down, his movements deliberate, almost reverent. He pushed the denim and her underwear down her hips, just far enough. She helped him, shoving the fabric to mid-thigh, baring herself to the amber light and his hungry gaze. He didn't touch her clit. He didn't slide inside. He followed her silent instruction, his fingers tracing higher, past her slick folds, to the sensitive, hidden skin behind her entrance.

His touch there was a question. A slow, circling pressure that made her thighs tremble. She was already wet, her arousal slicking his fingers as he explored, mapping a territory he'd only glimpsed before.

"Flynn," she whimpered, her hands gripping his knees. "Harder. Please."

He increased the pressure, a firm, insistent rhythm against that secret place, and Ivy's vision whited out for a second. A broken sound tore from her throat. Her hips jerked against his hand, seeking more, chasing the sharp, bright pleasure radiating from that single point of contact.

He watched her face, his own breathing ragged. "Tell me," he growled, his voice wrecked. "Tell me what it feels like."

"It's—" She gasped as he changed the angle, his thumb now applying a perfect, maddening pressure. "It's like you're touching somewhere no one's ever been. It's like you're inside me but you're not. It's—oh, god—" Her words dissolved into a moan as he pressed harder, circling, stroking, owning that patch of skin until she was shaking, her knuckles white where she gripped him.

He leaned down, his mouth close to hers. "Come for me, Ivy. Just from this. Just from my hand right here."

She did. The climax didn't build slowly; it detonated, sharp and shocking, rolling through her in a series of violent, helpless pulses. She cried out, her body bowing, her cunt clenching around nothing, wetness flooding between her thighs. Flynn held her through it, his hand steady, his eyes locked on hers, watching her completely unravel from a touch that hadn't even entered her.

When the last tremor subsided, she collapsed forward against his chest, boneless and panting. His arms came around her, holding her up. His cock, hot and hard, pressed against her stomach.

"My professor," she mumbled into his shirt, her voice slurred with pleasure. "My brilliant, filthy professor."

Flynn gathered her closer, his laugh a rumble against her cheek. "Your fiancé," he corrected softly, and kissed the top of her head.

She lifted her head from his chest, her dark eyes finding his in the amber lamplight. "I want to go upstairs."

Flynn's eyebrow arched. "You're asking?"

"I'm—" She stopped. A slow grin spread across her face, the one that crinkled the corners of her eyes. "No. I'm not asking."

She shoved herself off his lap, her jeans and underwear still tangled around her thighs, and stood. The movement was graceless, unselfconscious—she hooked her thumbs in the waistband and shoved the denim down her calves, kicked it free of one ankle, then the other. Her underwear followed, a damp scrap of cotton landing somewhere near the coffee table. She stood bare from the waist down in the lamplight, her oversized sweater still hanging off one shoulder, and held out her hand.

"Pants off," she said. "Now."

Flynn's laugh was low and surprised, but his hands were already moving—working his trousers and boxer-briefs the rest of the way down his legs, his cock springing free again, thick and flushed and glistening at the tip. He kicked the fabric aside and reached for her.

She grabbed his hand and pulled. "Up. Come on. Hurry."

He let her haul him to his feet, and she didn't wait—she was already backing toward the stairs, tugging him after her, her bare feet silent on the hardwood. The staircase was narrow, the old wood creaking under their combined weight as she climbed backward, her eyes locked on his, her breathing shallow.

"You're going to trip," he said, his voice rough with amusement and hunger.

"Then catch me." She didn't slow. Her shoulder brushed the wall at the top of the stairs, and she pushed open the bedroom door with her hip, pulling him through. The room was dark except for the streetlight bleeding through the curtains, striping the unmade bed in silver and shadow.

She let go of his hand and climbed onto the bed, settling against the pillows with her knees bent, her thighs falling open. The sweater still clung to her curves, but beneath it she was naked, the dark thatch of hair at the apex of her thighs glistening with the evidence of her earlier climax. She reached down and drew herself open with two fingers, exposing the slick, swollen flesh.

"Here," she said, her voice dropping to something low and commanding. "Your thumb was here. Now I want your cock."

Flynn stood at the foot of the bed, his chest heaving, his cock jutting toward her like a compass needle finding true north. The streetlight caught the silver in his hair, the green fire in his eyes, the way his hands gripped the footboard like he was anchoring himself to the earth.

"Ivy." Her name was a prayer, a plea, a promise all at once.

"Now," she said, and crooked her finger toward her.

The mattress dipped under his weight as he knelt, the old springs groaning in the dark. He was still in his shirt, the sleeves rolled to his elbows, and the contrast of the rumpled oxford against his bare hips was obscene. She watched him settle between her legs, his broad shoulders blocking the streetlight, his face falling into shadow. She could smell him—sweat and sandalwood and the faint copper of her own arousal still on his fingers.

His palm found her thigh. Warm. Rough. The calluses catching on her skin as he pressed her open wider, his thumb denting the soft flesh just below her hip. He didn't push inside. He didn't reach for his cock. He just held her there, spread and waiting, his eyes tracking from the dark thatch of hair to the slick folds to the place where his thumb had made her come apart downstairs.

She could feel herself clench. Could feel the wetness cooling on her inner thighs. He was close enough that she could see the pulse beating in his throat, the way his lips were parted, the glint of his eyes still fixed between her legs.

"Flynn," she whispered.

His gaze lifted to her face. The green of his irises was almost black in the dark, but she could see the question there. Waiting. Always waiting. Three years of waiting in the way he held completely still, his breath shallow, his cock bobbing just inches from where she was slick and open and aching.

She reached down and wrapped her hand around him. He was hot, the skin velvety and stretched tight, and she felt the answering jerk of his hips, the sharp hiss of air through his teeth. She guided him forward, notching the head of his cock against her entrance, letting him feel the heat, the wetness, the way she was already swollen and ready for him.

"Here," she said, her voice steady even though her heart was slamming against her ribs. "Right here."

He didn't move. His hands were braced on either side of her hips, his arms trembling, the tendons in his neck standing out like cables. She could feel him right there—the pressure, the promise, the single thin membrane of restraint that was all that separated them from everything they'd been building toward since that first afternoon in the library.

"Ivy." Her name was gravel and broken glass. "If I start, I don't know if I can be gentle."

"Good," she said, and hooked her ankle behind his thigh, pulling him forward. "I didn't ask for gentle."

He didn't move. The head of his cock stayed notched against her, hot and slick, and she could feel the throb of him right there, the way his pulse beat against the most sensitive part of her. Her ankle was hooked behind his thigh, her heel pressing into the hard muscle, but he was stone. Immovable. His breath came in rough, uneven pulls, his chest rising and falling under the rumpled oxford, and his eyes—those green eyes she'd been drowning in for three years—were fixed on her face with an intensity that made her stomach drop.

"Say it again," he said.

Her throat tightened. "What?"

"You know what." His voice was gravel and command, the professor stripped away, the man laid bare. His hips didn't shift. His cock didn't push. He held himself at the very edge of her, and his hand came up from her thigh to cup her jaw, his thumb tracing the corner of her mouth. "Call me your fiancé. Again. Before I move."

The word hit her square in the chest. Fiancé. Not professor. Not Flynn. Something permanent. Something she'd never let herself imagine outside the privacy of her own pillow at three in the morning. Her lips parted, and she felt the wetness on her lashes before she could stop it. "My fiancé," she whispered.

His eyes closed. Just for a second. The relief that crossed his face was a physical thing, a loosening of the jaw, a softening around the mouth. When his eyes opened again, they were wet. "Again."

"My fiancé." Louder this time. Her voice didn't crack. She reached up and covered his hand with hers, pressing his palm flat against her cheek, turning her face to kiss the center of his callused palm. "You're my fiancé. You're mine. Now stop making me wait."

He pushed forward.

The stretch of him was exquisite—a slow, burning pressure that made her gasp and grip his shoulders, her nails digging into the damp cotton of his shirt. He didn't stop. Didn't pause to let her adjust. He sank into her inch by inch, his jaw clenched tight, a low groan tearing from his throat as her cunt gripped him, slick and hot and impossibly tight. The streetlight caught the sweat beading on his forehead, the corded muscle in his neck, the way his lips pulled back from his teeth.

"Jesus, Ivy." His forehead dropped to hers. His hips were flush against her now, buried to the hilt, and she could feel him everywhere—the thick heat of him filling her completely, the coarse hair at the base of his cock pressed against her clit, the way her inner walls fluttered and clenched around him like her body was trying to pull him deeper. "You feel—I can't—"

"Then don't." She hooked her other ankle behind his thigh, locking him against her. "Don't talk. Just fuck me."

He pulled back and thrust in again, hard, and the sound she made was something between a sob and a moan. The old bedframe knocked against the wall, a steady rhythm that matched the slap of his hips against her thighs, the wet, obscene sound of his cock driving into her again and again. She gripped his shoulders, her nails raking down his back through the shirt, and he growled against her throat—a low, animal sound that vibrated through her chest and settled low in her belly.

"My fiancée," he gritted out, the word a brand on her skin. "My Ivy."

The rhythm broke and became something else—desperate, jagged, a chase without a finish line in sight. He drove into her with a force that should have hurt but didn't, her body opening for him, welcoming him, her inner walls gripping his cock like a fist on every withdrawal, refusing to let him go. The wet sounds filled the room—the slap of his thighs against hers, the slick slide of him buried deep, the low, guttural noises tearing from his throat that he couldn't have stopped if he tried.

She was babbling. Words she couldn't control, falling from her lips between gasps—yes and please and Flynn and harder and right there right there right there. Her ankles were locked behind his thighs, her heels digging into the hard muscle, pulling him deeper with every thrust. The sweater had ridden up, exposing the soft curve of her belly, and his hand found it—palm flat, possessive, pressing down like he was claiming the territory of her body inch by inch.

"Look at me." His voice was wrecked, barely recognizable. "Ivy. Look at me."

Her eyes opened. She hadn't realized they'd closed. His face was above her, sweat dripping from his temple onto her cheek, his green eyes glassy and wild and fixed on her with an intensity that made her chest crack open. He was still fucking her—hard, deep, relentless—but his gaze didn't waver. It was like he was memorizing her. Like he was trying to brand this moment onto the inside of his eyelids so he'd never lose it.

"I love you," she gasped, the words punched out of her with every thrust. "I love you, I love you, I—"

His mouth came down on hers. Not a kiss—a devouring. His tongue pushed past her lips, and she tasted salt and sweat and the faint copper of her own arousal still on his breath. He swallowed her words, her moans, the sob that clawed its way up her throat when his cock hit a spot deep inside that made stars burst behind her eyes. Her cunt clenched around him, a warning flutter, and he broke the kiss with a ragged groan.

"Come for me." His forehead pressed against hers, his breath hot and uneven. "Come on my cock, Ivy. Let me feel it."

The command was all she needed. The orgasm hit her like a wave, crashing through her belly and radiating outward—through her thighs, her spine, the soles of her feet. She cried out, a sound she didn't recognize, her back arching off the mattress and her nails raking down his back through the sweat-soaked cotton of his shirt. Her cunt clamped down on him in rhythmic pulses, and she felt him feel it—felt the jerk of his hips stutter, felt the broken curse that ripped from his chest, felt his cock swell and throb inside her.

"Fuck—Ivy—" He slammed into her one last time, buried to the hilt, and came with a groan that sounded like it had been torn out of him. She felt the heat of it, the pulse of his release flooding her, marking her, and she held him there—her ankles locked, her arms wrapped around his shoulders, her mouth pressed against the hinge of his jaw. He shuddered against her, his whole body trembling, and for a long moment there was nothing in the world but the sound of their breathing and the feeling of him still inside her, still hard, still hers.

He collapsed slowly, carefully, his weight settling onto her in increments. She didn't push him away. She wanted the weight—wanted the press of his chest against hers, the damp cotton of his shirt, the way his heart was slamming against his ribs in a rhythm that matched her own. His face was buried in the curve of her neck, his breath hot and uneven, and she felt his lips move against her skin.

"My fiancée," he whispered, the word slurred with exhaustion and wonder. "My Ivy. My love."

She turned her head, pressed her lips to his temple, tasted salt. "My fiancé," she whispered back, and felt his arms tighten around her. "Mine."

The streetlight through the curtains painted silver stripes across the bed, across the tangle of their bodies, across the place where they were still joined. The room smelled of sex and sweat and sandalwood, and somewhere downstairs the clock on the mantel was chiming an hour she didn't care to count. She traced the shell of his ear with her fingertip, then the line of his jaw, then the silver at his temple. He made a sound—something between a sigh and a hum—and pressed a kiss to the hollow of her throat.

"Don't pull out yet," she murmured, her voice thick with approaching sleep. "Stay."

"Wasn't planning on it." His voice was barely audible, slurred and content. "Staying here. Forever. This is my life now."

She laughed—a soft, exhausted sound that didn't quite make it to a snort—and felt him smile against her skin. Her hand found his hair, her fingers threading through the dark strands, and she let her eyes close. The ache was gone. The wanting, the three years of hunger and silence and stolen glances across lecture halls—it was all still there, transmuted now into something else. Something permanent. Something that felt like a key turning in a lock she'd forgotten she'd closed.

"I love you," she whispered into the dark, and felt his lips curve against her collarbone.

"Love you too," he mumbled, already half-gone, already dreaming. "Fiancée."