No. Keep it together.
This isn’t anything more than a duty.
The sweatpants follow. Same hesitation. Same tension. I feel the weight of them in my hands, heavy with the knowledge that she’ll wear them and—like it or not—think of me. Think of me as the man who caged her, who promised her safety, and who stirred something she doesn’t want to feel.
I bundle the clothes, careful not to crease them. My mind races. Do I leave them on the bed? Do I hand them to her? Will she recoil if I touch her again? Every choice feels loaded, every movement a potential misstep in a dance I’ve never allowed myself to learn.
I take a breath, steadying the storm inside me. The ache is still there. Desire, frustration, guilt, obsession—they twist together like a fist in my chest. I swallow it down, lock it away behind the cold, hard wall I’ve built over seventeen years. Duty first. Survival first. Control first.
And then I step into the doorway of her room.
Chapter 7 – Raelyn
The door opens, and Konstantin walks back in with the clothes.
I’m standing in front of the bathroom, exactly where I’ve been for the past five minutes, staring at the handle like it might vanish if I look away. I wasn’t sure he would come back. I told myself not to care. I failed at that almost immediately.
Something tight and sharp unfurls inside my chest when I see him.
I don’t name the feeling. I don’t examine it. I don’t give it space to grow teeth.
He crosses the room in silence and sets the folded clothes on the bed—dark gray shirt, black sweatpants. Simple. Thoughtful. Infuriating. He doesn’t look at me while he does it, and somehow that makes everything worse.
My lips still tingle.
The kiss replays in my mind without my permission—soft at first, hesitant, like he was testing a line neither of us had agreed to cross. Then deeper, rougher, charged with something raw and unspoken. And then soft again, as if he’d pulled himself back at the last possible second.
I hate that I want it.
I hate that a part of me wants more.
I don’t have much experience with this—any of it. I’ve kissed before. Once. I let one boy touch me over my clothes, clumsy and eager and nervous, and panic had slammed into me so hard I’d nearly cried. I’d pulled away and never looked back. Fear had drowned everything else.
But this—this is different.
Now, as I watch Konstantin turn toward the door, already preparing to leave, my body reacts before my mind can catch up. My pulse quickens. My skin feels too tight, too aware. There’sa strange, aching pull low in my stomach that makes me inhale sharply.
I say it before I can stop myself.
“Wait.”
He freezes, hand on the knob, his back to me. The pause is absolute, like the whole room has gone still with him.
My pulse roars in my ears.
I hurry to the bed and grab the clothes, pulling them on with clumsy fingers. Fabric slides over skin that feels too sensitive, too awake. I clear my throat, needing the sound to anchor me.
Slowly, Konstantin turns.
Our gazes collide.
He doesn’t mask it in time—the flare in his eyes, sharp and bright, like something struck steel inside him. I sit on the edge of the bed, still holding his gaze, my spine straight, even though my hands tremble in my lap.
I swallow.
Then I say the words I never thought I would. Never planned. Never wanted to need.
“I need you.”