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Chapter 4 The Stranger In The Dark

  • She couldn’t take it anymore.
  • Her body burned from the inside out, as if every nerve was on fire. Sweat coated her skin, dampening the thin silk clinging to her like a second skin. Her lips parted in a whimper, and her back arched off the bed.
  • The man—tall, dark, and brooding—stood at the edge of the room, watching. His jaw clenched. The doctor had said the drug would take hours to wear off. He hadn’t expected it to get this bad.
  • He stepped forward when she gasped again, her hands tearing at the neckline of her dress. "It's hot… I can’t—please, someone… help me…” she cried, barely coherent.
  • His pulse thundered.
  • He didn’t even know her name. She had stumbled into his life hours ago, drugged, trembling, beautiful beyond reason—and now writhing on his bed, lost to a fevered haze of need.
  • “Damn it,” he muttered under his breath. He grabbed a cold cloth and wiped her face, but it only made her moan louder. Her thighs shifted under the sheets, rubbing together, chasing relief.
  • “I need—” Her voice cracked. She looked at him through hazy eyes. “Please… touch me.”
  • He went still.
  • She didn’t know who he was. He didn’t know who she was. Everything in him screamed to walk away, to leave the room and close the door. But her voice… her trembling body… the way she pleaded—it wrecked him.
  • He moved beside her on the bed. “You’re not thinking straight,” he said, more to himself than her. “You don’t know what you’re asking for.”
  • She reached for him, her fingers brushing his chest, his jaw. “Then… help me. Please… help me stop this feeling. I can’t take it—”
  • He swore under his breath.
  • Every inch of her glistened with heat, her dress twisted and soaked, nearly translucent. Her breath came in shallow pants, and her thighs shifted again.
  • “I’ll stop if you say no,” he said, voice rough, shaking. “You only have to say the word.”
  • She didn’t.
  • Instead, she reached up, pulled his face down to hers, and kissed him.
  • The dam broke.
  • He kissed her back, deeply, hungrily, tasting her desperation and fire. She clung to him as he stripped the soaked silk from her body, revealing flawless, fevered skin. He trailed kisses down her throat, her collarbone, her trembling stomach, until she gasped his name—
  • A name she didn’t even know.
  • He paused when he felt it—a barrier.
  • He pulled back in shock. “You’re…”
  • She blinked up at him, tears gathering in her eyes, but not from fear. “Don’t stop. Please. I trust you.”
  • God help him.
  • He was no savior, and yet tonight, he would be hers.
  • He moved gently, slowly, giving her time to adjust as their bodies met in a storm of heat and motion. She cried out, her voice high and broken, and he held her through it, brushing her hair back, whispering things he didn’t realize he felt.
  • They moved as one—fire and desperation, pleasure and surrender—until she shattered in his arms with a cry that echoed in his chest.
  • When it was over, she curled against him, breathing slowly now, her fever easing. Her fingers clutched his arm, and her head rested on his shoulder.
  • Still nameless. Still strangers.
  • But something had happened here tonight—something neither of them could undo.
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