MAILAH COULDN’T SLEEP.
Not really.
She dozed for minutes that stretched like hours, waking to the sa weight pressing against her chest. Liora’s words had lodged in her mind again, sharp and unavoidable.
When that restraint finally collapses—and it will—the bond won’t crush you. It will devour you both.
Even as the villa slumbered, Mailah’s thoughts road the corners of mory. Grayson—his face softened in ways he would never allow anyone to see, touched by a youth and innocence she knew had been stolen long ago.
By three in the morning, she gave up. Quietly, so as not to wake the others, she slipped out of bed. Her bare feet brushed against the cool marble of the corridor, her pulse thrumming with restless energy.
The kitchen lights were already on when she arrived.
Grayson stood at the counter, hands braced on either side of a steaming mug, eyes shadowed with exhaustion. He wasn’t wearing a shirt—just soft drawstring pants that hung low on his hips. The firelight from the stove outlined every hard line, making him look almost like he’d stepped out of a painting.
He didn’t turn to her, but his voice carried easily in the quiet kitchen.
"I could hear your heartbeat."
"That’s creepy," she murmured, unable to stop herself from smiling despite the weight in her chest.
"It’s comforting," he countered quietly. "When it’s you."
Her chest tightened. Sothing raw and tender twisted in her chest, and she moved closer. Brushing the back of her hand against his, a small, grounding touch.
"You couldn’t sleep either?"
He huffed a laugh, quiet and ragged. "Sleep is difficult when I’m replaying every way I might fail you."
"You won’t fail ."
"I could have protected Lailah."
"You didn’t know."
"I should have." He swallowed, throat working. "I don’t want to repeat that mistake with you."
Her hand lingered on his arm, and she spoke softly, gently, like offering sothing fragile.
"You’re not going to lose ."
A muscle jumped in his jaw. "You can’t promise that."
"I’m promising I’m trying." She leaned closer. "And that matters."
For a long, quiet mont, neither of them moved.
Then very quietly, almost reluctantly, Grayson admitted:
"I’m afraid."
"Of what?"
"You. Losing you. Hurting you. Being wrong about sothing important again." His voice roughened, and the vulnerability sent heat racing through her. "I could destroy you without aning to."
Mailah lifted a hand to his cheek. "I could hurt you too."
"You wouldn’t."
They stood there, inches apart, the kitchen seeming to shrink around them, becoming its own intimate world.
Mailah couldn’t help it.
The longer she stood there, the more impossible it beca to look anywhere but at Grayson’s bare chest—broad, sculpted, and rising with slow, controlled breaths that betrayed how tightly he was holding himself together.
Grayson noticed.
Of course he noticed.
A slow, teasing smirk curved one corner of his mouth, so faint it barely existed—but on him, it was scorching.
"You’re staring," he murmured, voice dipping into sothing darker, warr.
Her face heated instantly. "I’m... not"
"No?" he asked, turning slightly—deliberately—to give her an even clearer view. "Because it feels more like you’re admiring."
She opened her mouth to deny it.
Nothing ca out.
He stepped closer, the air warming with his presence. "Mailah."
Her na in his voice—low, rough, edged with hunger—unraveled sothing inside her.
Grayson didn’t close the distance all at once. He let the tension stretch, the way he always did, like he wanted her to feel every inch of gravity pulling them together. And when he finally moved—really moved—it was with a controlled, predatory grace that made her breath catch.
His hand slid to her waist.
Mailah gasped as her body leaned into him before she could think, as if she’d been waiting for him all along.
"Grayson—"
Before she could finish, he swept her up in one smooth, effortless motion. Her gasp broke into a soft, startled moan as her legs wrapped around him automatically—instinct, mory, hunger all tangled together.
He held her as if she weighed nothing.
As if she belonged there.
With a gentle, but irresistibly firm press, he set her on the kitchen counter. Her breath hitched; he stood between her knees, the heat of him radiating into her skin.
They were so close she could feel the slow, steady thrum of vibration under his skin.
Mailah placed both palms on his chest.
The contact jolted through her like a shock—hot, sharp, intoxicating. She gasped and snatched her hands back as if burned.
He laughed quietly, a low, sinful sound.
"Too hot?" he murmured.
"You’re—your chest is hot," she stamred, flustered and breathless.
"Incubus," he reminded her, leaning in, lips brushing her ear. "We run hot when we’re... tempted."
Her pulse fluttered.
His fingers trailed up her thighs, slow, deliberate, reverent. "Touch again."
"I—Grayson—"
"Mailah." His voice dropped even lower, velvet and command. "Touch ."
She did.
This ti, she didn’t pull away. Her hands flattened against the heat of his chest, feeling the strength beneath, the way his breath shuddered under her touch. He angled his face toward hers, their noses nearly brushing.
His lips hovered—a breath apart.
Then without hesitation, without restraint, Grayson kissed her.
It wasn’t soft.
It was hungry—steamy, deep, consuming. The kind of kiss that pulled sound from her throat, that stole the air from her lungs and replaced it with him.
Her fingers curled against his chest, sliding upward to his shoulders. His hands anchored at her hips, pulling her closer, closer, closer still.
The kiss deepened, pressure tightening, heat rolling through both of them like a storm.
Grayson’s mouth moved with a desperate restraint, like he was holding back sothing fierce and wild, giving her passion edged with danger—because he always held just enough control not to break her.
A soft, involuntary moan escaped her.
He swallowed it in a deeper kiss.
His lips traced her jaw. Her breath trembled. Her fingers threaded into his hair.
His body pressed against her, fitting against her perfectly, overwhelmingly.
He whispered her na against her throat.
She shivered.
The tension coiled tighter, hotter, seconds from snapping—
And then—
A thump.
A dragging sound.
A soft, smug-sounding mrrrp.
Grayson’s body went rigid, every ounce of lethal control coiling like a spring. He was three seconds from summoning hellfire.
Mailah whispered, "Is the house... making noises?"
"No," he said grimly. "That’s Shadow."
Another thump, then the unmistakable scrape of woven wicker on tile.
Mailah’s eyes darted to the foyer, curiosity and unease warring in her chest. She rounded the corner and stopped dead.
Shadow sat proudly in the center of the entryway, tail curled neatly around her paws, guarding...
A bread basket.
A familiar one.
The sa shape, the sa weave, the sa faint sll of rosemary and olive oil that made her stomach tighten.
Grayson walked up beside her, exhaling slowly.
"That is from the neighbors," he said, his voice low.
"Marco’s basket," Mailah confird, kneeling to inspect it. "But why would she bring it here? Did they leave it at the door?"
Shadow mrrp’d again.
Mailah lifted the cloth draped inside. Fresh loaves, still warm.
She extended the basket toward Grayson. "This looks... deliberate."
He took it, scanning quickly. His expression darkened—focus sharpening, concern radiating from him in quiet, dangerous waves.
"It seems," he said quietly, "we might find out soon who scried you."
Mailah’s mind raced. "You think Marco—"
"I don’t know what I think," he said, voice low, controlled. "But this? This is not normal neighborly behavior."
Shadow flicked her tail, pleased with herself.
Mailah looked from basket to Grayson. "Maybe we should—"
"Pay our neighbor a visit?" he finished, straightening with that unshakable certainty that always made her heart thrum.
"Yes," she breathed.
He took her hand. "First thing in the morning."
The road to Marco’s house was lined with cypresses, tall and shadowed, whispering against the wind. Mailah held Grayson’s hand tightly, aware of every inch of him, of the warmth and control he radiated. Her chest fluttered, equal parts anticipation and dread.
"What do you think this ans?" she asked quietly, letting her words hang in the night.
Grayson’s thumb brushed her knuckles. "That soone is watching more closely than we imagined. And Shadow knows. Sohow, she always knows."
Shadow andered ahead, alert, tail swishing like a banner in the moonlight.
The white house with blue shutters ca into view—familiar, deceptively calm.
Grayson slowed, senses humming. "Stay close."
Mailah’s heartbeat spiked, her nerves tense with that delicious, excruciating combination of fear and excitent that always ca when they approached the unknown together.
He rapped on the door with a asured precision. Almost imdiately, it swung open.
Marco stood there, hands gripping a loaf of bread as if ready to defend it. His khaki pants and linen shirt, casual and disarming, seed almost ridiculous against the intensity radiating from Grayson. The graying temples and laugh lines made him look trustworthy—too trustworthy.
"Buongiorno!" he said cheerfully, unaware of the tension threading through the air.
Mailah noticed the slight twitch in his jaw when his gaze flicked past them, as if checking for sothing unseen. Shadow darted past her, leaping to rub against Marco’s legs.
Grayson’s eyes didn’t leave him. "We saw this earlier. Delivered to our villa. By Shadow."
Marco’s smile faltered, but only for a fraction of a second. "Ah... yes. A gift. I thought you might enjoy it."
Mailah stepped forward, her voice light but asured. "We appreciate it, Marco. But Shadow brought it... herself."
He laughed, warm but forced. "Ah, she is a clever gatta. Very clever."
Grayson’s jaw tightened.
Marco’s face remained calm, but there was a subtle shift—an almost imperceptible tightening around his eyes.
Mailah lifted the basket. Marco’s eyes flicked to it, the warmth in his expression cracking ever so slightly.
He cleared his throat. "I... can explain."
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