Her wrists were still bound above her head, leather against skin, and she could feel the pulse in her fingers — the throb of blood still racing from what they'd just done. The ceiling swam above her, amber light catching the edges of her vision, and she let out a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding. Her body was a foreign country tonight, mapped by his hands, claimed inch by inch until she didn't recognize the borders anymore.

Her mind drifted, unbidden, to Lisa. She owed her a thank-you. Somehow. Without making it weird.

Beside her, Liam shifted, and she felt him slowly slip out of her. Her breath caught at the sudden emptiness, even now, when she was still spent and boneless. His warmth withdrew, leaving a cooler trickle of wetness against her thighs. She felt it with a strange, possessive clarity, and Lisa's words came back to her, spoken with that knowing look.

And when he comes… There's nothing like it.

Elena almost had to laugh. Lisa had been right. She was going to have to find a way to thank her.

Now she understood. It was proof. He was still inside her, in a way — a claim that lingered after the act, a warmth that didn't know it was supposed to end.

Liam rolled onto his side, and his arm came around her, pulling her against the solid heat of his chest. His breath was still rough, still catching, and she felt it stir the hair at her temple. His hand found her hip, fingers splaying wide, possessive even in tenderness. She turned her head into the curve of his shoulder and breathed him in — cedar and sweat and something darker, something that was just him.

"You okay?" His voice was low, roughened, the voice of a man who'd just spent himself and was still finding his way back to words.

She nodded against his skin. "Mm."

His thumb traced a slow circle on her hip. "Need to hear it, Elena."

She lifted her head enough to look at him. His blue eyes were dark in the lamplight, studying her with that assessing intensity that never quite switched off, even now, even wrecked. "I'm okay," she said. And then, because she felt the truth of it in her bones: "I'm more than okay."

Something flickered across his face — relief, maybe, or something softer she didn't have a name for. He reached up and worked at the leather cuffs around her wrists, his fingers deft and careful, and she felt the pressure release one at a time. Her arms came down slowly, stiff from being held above her head so long, and she flexed her fingers, feeling the blood rush back.

He took her wrists in his hands and rubbed them gently, thumbs working the ache out of her joints. The gesture was so tender it made her chest ache in a way the sex hadn't. "Too tight?"

"No." She watched his hands on her skin, the way his calloused fingers moved so carefully now. "It was — exciting. I liked it." The admission came out smaller than she'd meant it to, softer, and she felt heat climb her cheeks even though he'd already seen every inch of her.

His mouth curved — not quite a smile, but close. "I could tell."

She should have been embarrassed by his certainty, by how easily he seemed to read her. Instead, something warm settled in her chest, deeper than the satisfaction of the moment, even as his cum continued to leak from her. He saw her—all of her—and he wasn't going anywhere.

They lay in silence, her head on his chest, his arm wrapped around her. His heartbeat slowed beneath her ear, steady enough to match her breathing. In the dim light, with shadows stretching across the silk sheets, she wanted to memorize every detail—the weight of his arm, the scent of him, the quiet intimacy of being here with him.

His expression softened, the mask of businessman and predator slipping just enough to reveal the man beneath. He pressed a slow kiss to her forehead, and she felt it linger long after his lips were gone.

Elena sank into the warmth of him, her body heavy and pleasantly sore. She should get up, clean herself up, do something. Instead, she stayed where she was, reluctant to leave this little pocket of peace.

But her mind wouldn't let her rest. Sooner or later, it always returned to what she'd been avoiding all night.

The question she'd asked him in the corridor. And the answer he'd given.

Liar, she'd called him. Because she knew he'd given her only part of the truth. He'd pushed her away to protect her, yes, but there was more to it, something tied to the Underworld that he couldn't tell her. Now she understood why he'd held back. It hadn't been a lack of trust or a refusal to let her in. Some truths weren't his alone to share.

She didn’t give him time to explain before she'd kissed him, cutting off whatever he might have said next. She'd believed him, at least enough to stop asking questions. She'd let him tie her up, take her apart, fill her with his cum, and she'd done it willingly, gladly, because for one shining moment she'd let herself set aside everything she knew about the world he inhabited.

But she couldn't forget it now. She knew about the Underworld—the five families, the treaty, the trafficking, the drugs, the violence flowing beneath the glittering surface of their world like a river of blood. She knew Liam was part of it. She knew the man who held her so tenderly had killed people, ordered deaths, and built his empire on bones and secrets.

And now she understood that his silence had been its own kind of protection. It didn't make the truth any easier to live with, but it made it harder to hate him for keeping it from her. He'd meant it when he said he'd pushed her away to protect her. She'd felt the truth of it in the way he'd kissed her, desperate and hungry, like she was the only solid thing in a world falling apart around him.

But she knew it wasn't the whole truth. There was more—there was always more with him—and she could feel it pressing against the edges of her mind, a question she wasn't ready to ask, a secret he wasn't ready to give.

She closed her eyes and let herself be held. The warmth of him seeped into her bones, and she felt something loosen in her chest—a knot she hadn't even known she'd been carrying. She still didn't know the whole truth about Marco, the Underworld, or the man holding her so tightly it was almost painful.

But she knew him. The boy he'd been, the man he was, the way he held her like she was precious even when he was covered in blood. And she wanted to understand. She wanted to learn what had turned that boy into this man — what had made him hard and cold and dangerous, what had taught him to bind a woman's wrists and command her body and still hold her like she was the only thing keeping him tethered to the earth.

She wanted to know all of it. Every dark corner, every hidden scar. And she had a feeling it would take her the rest of her life to learn it all.

"Liam?"

"Mm."

"Thank you."

His hand stilled in her hair. "For what?"

“For tonight. For—” She struggled to find the words. “For letting me in. For not pushing me away.”

He was quiet for a moment, his gaze resting on her. Then he pressed a kiss to the top of her head and drew her a little closer, holding her against him as though he couldn't quite bring himself to let go.

“You make it very difficult to keep you out,” he murmured.

There was something in his voice she couldn't quite place. Affection, certainly. But something else, too, something that made her wonder what it had cost him to let her this close.

Something in her chest cracked, just a little. She didn't have words for it — the ache of that admission, the weight of it. She just held him tighter and let the silence speak for both of them.

Eventually, the warmth and the weight of him lulled her toward sleep. Her body was heavy, satisfied, wrung out like a cloth left to dry. She felt the pleasant ache between her thighs, the sticky evidence of what they'd done, and instead of being embarrassed, she felt a strange pride in it. She'd given herself to him. Freely, completely, without the armor she'd worn her whole life. And he'd taken her apart and put her back together with his hands and his mouth and his voice, and she felt more whole than she had in years.

She was on the edge of sleep, drifting in that warm haze between waking and dreaming, when she felt him move beside her. His arm slipped away, and she made a small sound of protest, reaching for him blindly.

"Shh." His voice was low, soothing. "Just getting the light."

She heard the click of the lamp, and the room fell into darkness. Then the bed dipped as he settled back beside her, and his arm found her again, pulling her close. She curled into him, her head finding its spot in the hollow of his shoulder, her hand splaying across his chest.

"Stay," she murmured, half-asleep. "Don't leave."

His hand tightened on her hip. "I'm not going anywhere."

She believed him. In that moment, warm and safe and held, she believed him completely. The doubts would come back in the morning — she knew they would. The questions, the secrets, the weight of his world pressing down on her. But for now, in the dark, with his heartbeat under her ear and his arms around her, she let herself believe.

She fell asleep like that, wrapped around him, and she dreamed of nothing at all.

She woke to the absence of warmth.

It was the first thing her body registered, before her eyes even opened — the cool space where his chest had been, the empty hollow of the bed beside her. She reached out blindly, her hand finding only sheets, still faintly warm but already losing the heat of him. Her eyes blinked open to grey morning light filtering through the curtains, and she saw that she was alone.

The panic came before the thought. Quick and sharp, a needle of it in her chest. He left. He left again, like before, without a word—

Then she heard the water running in the bathroom, followed by the soft clink of a cabinet opening and closing. Beneath it all came a low, almost tuneless hum. Not quite singing, but close enough to make her pause. She'd never heard that sound from Liam before.

The needle withdrew. She sank back against the pillow, her heart still beating too fast, and let the relief wash over her. He hadn't left. He was right there, just beyond the open archway, doing something as ordinary as brushing his teeth or shaving. The simple domesticity of it made her chest ache in a way she hadn't expected.

She pressed her thighs together, aware of the dried evidence of last night against her skin, the lingering reminder of how thoroughly he'd claimed her. She should get up, clean herself off, find her clothes, and face the day—with all its complications, secrets, and unanswered questions. But her body felt pleasantly heavy, and she wanted to stay in this moment a little longer. In this strange, fragile morning when he'd woken beside her and hadn't run.

The water stopped. She heard the faucet click off, followed by the rustle of a towel. A moment later, Liam appeared in the archway, a towel slung low around his hips, his damp hair falling dark against his forehead. He was still wiping his face with another towel when he caught sight of her. His expression softened, just slightly—a look she'd only seen in the dark, in the quiet aftermath of their nights together, when the mask finally slipped.

"You're awake." His voice was rough with sleep, or maybe just morning, and it rumbled through her in a way that made her want to pull him back into bed.

"You're still here." The words came out before she could stop them, and she heard the surprise in her own voice, the vulnerability she hadn't meant to show.

He lowered the towel, his blue eyes meeting hers. For a long moment, he just looked at her — taking her in, sprawled across his sheets, bare and tangled and unmistakably his. "I told you I wasn't going anywhere."

"I know. I just —" She stopped, not sure how to finish. I was afraid you would vanish as you did before, without a word, leaving me to wonder if I'd imagined all of it. "I’m glad you’re here."

He crossed the room, the towel around his hips doing nothing to hide the long, lean lines of his body, the muscle and sinew she'd mapped with her hands and mouth last night. He sat on the edge of the bed, and his hand found her ankle, warm and rough, his thumb tracing a slow circle over the bone. "Where else would I be?"

She didn't have an answer for that. Or rather, she had too many answers — the Underworld, the treaty, the dead man whose name he hadn't spoken since it happened, the secrets he carried like stones in his pockets. She wanted to ask. She wanted to press him, to use her second question, to demand the truth he was still holding back. But she could feel the fragility of this moment, the thin ice of this unexpected morning, and she didn't want to crack it.

Liam let out a breath, his hand still resting on her ankle. "We've got work today. Real work. Meetings I can't put off." He paused, something almost apologetic flickering across his face. "And I'm afraid if you came to the study with me, neither of us would get anything done."

Heat climbed her cheeks, and she smiled. "That bad, am I?"

“Worse.” His thumb traced her ankle once more. “Use the day as you need to. If you want to get ahead on your own business, the workstation in your room is there.” He hesitated, his thumb still resting against her skin. “If you need anything, tell Presley or send word.”

She nodded, pulling the sheets up tighter around her chest. "I'll manage."

He stood, and her eyes followed him to the closet, lingering on the broad line of his shoulders and the effortless confidence in his movements. She'd seen every inch of him last night, had felt him beneath her hands, but seeing him in the daylight was no less distracting. If anything, it made him harder to look away from. There was something unfair about how easily he could hold her attention without even trying.

He dressed with the same quiet efficiency he brought to everything else, pulling on a shirt and trousers before shrugging into his blue suit jacket, leaving off the tie. She watched longer than she meant to, taking in the transformation as the familiar, commanding presence settled over him. When he turned back to her, he was Liam Thorn again, the softness of the morning tucked away behind the mask she knew so well.

He crossed back to the bed and leaned down, one hand cupping her jaw. His kiss was slow, deliberate, a promise she could feel in her bones. "I'll find you tonight."

"You'd better."

His mouth curved, almost a smile, and then he was gone, the door clicking shut behind him. She listened to his footsteps fade down the hallway, and the house settled into a silence that felt too large suddenly, too empty.

She lay there a moment longer before finally pushing herself up. The lingering evidence of last night clung to her thighs, a reminder of what they'd shared that made her stomach flutter all over again. She needed a shower, needed to wash him from her skin, even as a part of her wanted to hold on to every trace of him a little longer, as though it were a secret mark only she could feel.

The water was hot, nearly scalding, and she stood under it longer than she should have, letting it beat against her shoulders. She scrubbed herself clean with a soap that smelled like him — cedar and something darker — and tried not to think about how easily she was already learning his scent.

She found her clothes from yesterday, crumpled on the floor where they'd been discarded. She pulled them on, the fabric feeling strange against her freshly washed skin, and padded barefoot up the stairs to her own room.

Once in her room, she changed into jeans and a cute blouse, grateful to be back in clothes that felt like her after weeks of gowns and borrowed dresses. She grabbed her phone and started scrolling through messages as she headed downstairs, checking emails out of habit. Work. She needed to focus on work, something to keep her occupied and stop her thoughts from drifting back to him every few minutes.

In the kitchen, Marta was at the stove, and she slid a plate of eggs and toast toward Elena without being asked.

“Thank you,” Elena said warmly, genuinely grateful as she set her phone aside long enough to take a bite.

“Of course, dear.” Marta gave her a small smile, one that lingered a little longer than necessary, her eyes following Elena with a knowing warmth that made her cheeks threaten to heat.

Elena kept her attention on her breakfast, pretending not to notice. Whatever Marta might have guessed, she wasn't about to give her an opportunity to ask questions. She picked up her phone again, grateful for the excuse, and threw herself into her messages and emails.

Work. She could focus on work.

She ate standing up, phone in one hand and fork in the other, making calls between bites—a gallery owner in Portland who owed her a favor, an artist whose pieces were ready to show. The familiar rhythm steadied her, giving her something to focus on besides the feeling that Marta knew more than she was letting on. For a few hours, she could be just Elena Rossi, business owner, not the woman tangled up in a Thorn.

But no matter how hard she tried to focus on work, her thoughts kept circling back to the same questions. The Underworld. The five families. The treaty that held it all together. She'd seen the map in Sebastian's office and traced the route to New Haven, but that had only given her a glimpse of how much she didn't know. The more she thought about it, the more she wanted answers.

By early afternoon, she could no longer ignore the pull of her curiosity. If she was going to understand the world Liam belonged to, she needed somewhere to start. The library seemed as good a place as any, and it offered a welcome excuse to escape the rest of the house and the possibility of more knowing looks from Marta.

The room was cool and dim, the tall shelves stretching up into shadow. Elena wandered between them, running her fingers along the spines as she searched for something that might help make sense of it all. History books, biographies, leather-bound volumes with titles she barely recognized. She wasn't entirely sure what she was looking for, only that she needed to find something that would help her understand the world she'd found herself tangled up in.

She was nearly at the end of the row when her fingers caught on a book that felt different from the others. Dusty, heavier than she expected, with a worn leather binding. She pulled it free, and her breath caught when she saw the Thorn logo stamped into the spine—the same emblem she'd seen on the journal she'd hidden behind other books upstairs.

This one was different, its cover blank, with no title or name to identify it. She turned it over in her hands, studying the familiar emblem before carefully opening it. The spine creaked with age, and as her eyes fell to the first page, she froze. The handwriting was unmistakable.

On the front inside cover, in faded ink, was a single number.

Her heart hammered. She'd found the first journal hidden on a bookshelf in the cottage on the island. This had to be the second volume, written in the same familiar hand, telling the story of the same woman. She glanced around the library, half-expecting someone to appear and take it from her. But the room remained empty and silent, dust motes drifting through the late-afternoon light as she stood there, holding a piece of the past she hadn't known existed.

She quickly carried it to the nearest chair, settled in, and opened the journal across her lap, eager to discover what was written inside.