Chapter Seven

Danielle POV

I try to laugh, to play it off, to hide the fact that my skin feels too tight and my lungs won’t expand all the way. “Okay, okay, dramatic much?” I joke breathlessly, forcing a smile. “You made your point, caveman, now put me down.”

But he doesn’t even glance at me.

Instead, he murmurs, “You walked in here in that dress, thinking you were proving something to someone who doesn’t even see you anymore.”

He turns down a hallway I hadn’t noticed before, one dimly lit and far quieter than the rest of the bar. My pulse pounds louder than the bass outside.

“I see you.”

My throat works around a lump I didn’t expect. “Knox—”

He kicks a door open with his boot and steps inside. There’s a bed. A real one. Not some dirty mattress on the floor like I half-feared. The room smells like leather and cedar and heat. My breath stutters.

“Please,” I whisper, and I don’t even know if I’m asking him to stop or to keep going.

He lays me down on the bed like I’m something fragile, and that alone nearly undoes me. I sit up quickly, legs curling beneath me, arms wrapped around my waist like they can hold in all the fear and confusion building under my skin.

His eyes stay on me, steady and unreadable.

“You’re panicking,” he says, voice softer now, not quite gentle, but low enough to cut through the buzz in my head.

I nod once, swallowing hard. “A little.”

“I won’t touch you unless you ask me to.”

I blink at him. “Then why bring me here?”

He leans down slowly, one hand braced beside my head as he brings his mouth close to my ear.

“Because I wanted you to hear it from my lips,” he murmurs. “I’m going to make you scream, Danielle. And when I’m done with you, you’ll remember exactly how good it feels to be wanted.”

My breath catches and every nerve in my body goes tight.

He pulls back just enough to look at me again.

“But only if you say yes.”

Just like that, the power shifts.

My panic is still there, crawling under my skin, making it hard to breathe, but so is the heat. So is the ache. So is the wild, reckless part of me that left the apartment in red tonight instead of black. The part that let herself walk through that gate. The part that wanted to remember what it felt like to be looked at like this.

Wanted, desired and seen.

He doesn’t touch me again.

Not yet, he just waits, and I know, whatever I say next will decide everything.

The silence stretches.

His eyes are still on me, steady, dark, and unwavering. I can feel my breath scraping its way in and out of my lungs like I forgot how to breathe properly. Every second that passes feels heavier than the last, the weight of it pressing down on my chest, curling like smoke in my throat.

Say it.

It should be simple, right? Just open my mouth and say yes.

But nothing comes out.

Not a sound, not a word and not a whisper.

My lips part, then close again. I press my hands against the bedspread, grounding myself in the rough texture as panic claws higher.

God, I hate this. I hate that I freeze when I want to speak. That the fire I walked in with, the one that got me through the damn gate, is suddenly buried beneath layers of fear and doubt.

And he knows it.

Knox smirks, slow and sharp like he’s been waiting for this moment.

“You were all fire at the gate,” he murmurs, voice rough velvet, full of challenge. “Stormed up like a queen ready for war. Demanded what you wanted.”

His hand lifts, two fingers brushing lightly against the underside of my chin, tilting it up until I have no choice but to meet his gaze.

“So where’s that fire now, Red?” he asks, quiet and coaxing. “If you want this, say it.”

I open my mouth again, desperate to give him what he’s asking for, but nothing comes out. It’s like my voice is caught behind the knot in my throat, thick with nerves and longing and some kind of ache I don’t have the words for.

I should speak. I want to speak, but I don’t.

Instead, I move.

My hands slide up his chest, slow and trembling, until they reach the back of his neck. His hair is soft under my fingers, and I grip it as I pull him down to me, heart hammering like it might crack open my ribs.

And then I kiss him.

Hard, hungry and terrified with a little bit of hopefulness.

He doesn’t hesitate.

His mouth crashes against mine like we’ve been circling each other for hours instead of minutes. He tastes like whiskey and smoke and heat. His hands come down on either side of me, bracing against the bed, holding himself back even as he returns the kiss with something that feels dangerously close to a growl.

He laughs, low, warm, a rumble against my lips that makes my toes curl.

I reach down with shaking fingers, fumbling with the waistband of his jeans, desperate to just feel something. To lose myself in him, in this, in the want that’s been choking me for months. For years.

But he pulls back too fast.

His hands wrap around mine, firm but not unkind, stilling my movements before I can do more than unhook a single button.

“Hell no,” he whispers against my mouth, voice thick with something dark and hungry. “We’re not skipping straight to the good stuff, sweetheart.”

I blink up at him, confused, breathless, and aching.

“You don’t just walk into this bar, crawl into my lap with that kiss, and think I’m going to skip the teasing,” he says, letting go of my hands and dragging his palms slowly up my arms. “No, Red. I’m going to take my time with you.”

He leans down, lips brushing my jaw, then lower, until his mouth is hot against the side of my neck.

“You’re going to beg me,” he murmurs, voice a rasp that makes my skin break out in goosebumps. “Out loud. Clear. No hiding behind kisses and touches. I want to hear you say what you want. All of it.”

His hand slides over the curve of my thigh, slow, maddening, deliberate.

“You think your boyfriend knew how to make you feel wanted?” he asks, his mouth brushing mine again, barely a whisper of contact. “He doesn’t know the first fucking thing about it.”

My chest is rising and falling too fast, my fingers curled in the sheets like they’re the only thing anchoring me.

I can’t speak, not yet.

But I’m not sure I want to anymore, not if this is what he does when I’m silent.