Emily’s POV
I didn't sleep a wink after that shadow moved away from my door.
By the next evening, a massive summer storm had rolled over Charlotte. Heavy rain lashed violently against the floor-to-ceiling glass of the penthouse, the fifty-fourth floor engulfed in dark grey clouds and flashes of distant lightning.
The air inside Penthouse 54A was suffocatingly thick.
Ever since morning, Daniel and I had moved around each other like two charged particles in a vacuum. Every shared glance was loaded; every time he walked past me in the hallway, the heat radiating off him felt like a physical slap.
At seven in the evening, my phone buzzed on the marble kitchen island.
I picked it up. A text from Ethan Reed flashed across the screen:
Picked up a bottle of wine for tonight. Roof lounge in 20? Let me know, neighbor.
I stared at the screen, my heart beating a erratic rhythm against my ribs. Ethan was safe. Ethan was normal. Looking at his text was supposed to bring me back to reality.
Instead, the soft, heavy sound of a bathroom door opening down the hall made my entire body go rigid.
I turned around.
Daniel had just stepped out of his master bathroom. Steam billowed into the dark hallway behind him. He was dripping wet, dark water droplets glistening across his broad, sculpted chest and tracing the deep grooves of his six-pack. His dark hair was slicked back, damp and messy.
He wasn't wearing a shirt. He wasn't wearing pants.
The only thing covering him was a white bath towel wrapped loosely around his low hips, hanging dangerously by a thread.
My mouth went bone-dry. My breath hitched in my throat as my gaze traced the broad span of his shoulders down to the dark hair V-ing down his stomach into the towel.
Daniel stopped dead in his tracks. His storm-gray eyes locked onto mine, then flicked down to the glowing phone screen in my hand.
"Who is texting you?" he rumbled. The voice was low, rough from the steam, and dripping with an dark, possessive danger that made my knees tremble.
"No one," I whispered, holding the phone tightly against my hip.
In three slow, predatory strides, Daniel closed the distance between us. He towered over me, the heat of his freshly showered skin washing over me in waves, smelling of raw iron, dark amber, and pure male power.
He reached out, his massive, warm hand clamping over mine on the phone. His thumb slid across the screen, unlocking it instantly.
His eyes scanned Ethan's text.
A terrifying, icy stillness settled over Daniel’s features. A muscle in his sharp jaw flexed violently.
"I told you to erase his number," Daniel said softly. The absolute, quiet fury in his voice was far scarier than if he had screamed.
"You don't own me, Daniel!" I shot back, my stubbornness flaring through the fog of arousal. I tried to pull my hand back, but his grip was like a steel vise. "You're living in my space, acting like a jealous lover while my mother is across the ocean! You can't keep pushing me into corners and then pretending you're just my guardian!"
"I am trying to keep you from making a mistake you can't undo, Emily!" he growled, stepping so close his bare, damp chest was inches from mine.
"Liar!" I cried out, stepping right into his space until my chest pressed against his bare torso. The contact sent a jolt of pure fire straight down to my core. "Look me in the eye and tell me you care about Ethan's last name! Look me in the eye and tell me you don't want to rip my clothes off right now!"
Daniel went completely, terrifyingly rigid.
His eyes turned pitch black. Whatever last, threadbare piece of restraint he had been clinging to for eleven years shattered into dust.
"You want to know what I want?" he rasped, his voice ruined, thick with dark, brutal honesty.
His hand shot out, wrapping around my waist and yanking me hard against his chest. I let out a sharp gasp, my hands instinctively flying up to brace against his shoulders to keep my balance.
We collided. Hard.
In the sudden, desperate struggle of limbs and wet skin, my hand slipped off his slick shoulder, my fingers snagging the loose edge of the white towel wrapped around his hips.
With one swift, heavy slide of cotton, the towel unraveled and fell completely to the hardwood floor.
Time stopped.
The rain thundered against the glass windows, but inside the penthouse, neither of us breathed.
My hands were still resting against his wet abs. I slowly tilted my head down, my gaze sliding down his chiseled chest, past his navel, and straight to where the towel had dropped.
Daniel was completely, utterly naked.
And his cock was fully, terrifyingly hard for me.
Heavy, thick, and completely uninhibited, his dark shaft rose straight up between his strong thighs, pulsing with every heavy beat of his heart. The sheer size and power of him took my breath away—raw, imposing, and completely exposed.
My lips parted in a silent, trembling gasp. My mind went entirely blank, flooded with pure, undeniable heat.
"Emily..." Daniel growled above me, a low, guttural sound from the back of his throat.
He didn't cover himself. He didn't step back.
Instead, his large, rough hands slid down my sides, his fingers digging possessively into my bare hips, pinning me right where I was. He pulled me forward until my thin silk top and shorts pressed directly against his burning, fully erect cock.
I whimpered, my back arching as the intense, throbbing heat of him pressed right through my thin clothes into my soaking core.
Daniel leaned down, his dark eyes burning into mine, his hot, heavy breath brushing against my mouth.
"You wanted the truth," he rumbled, his thumbs pressing hard into my hip bones, lifting me slightly off my feet. "No more hiding. No more lies. You walk away right now... or you stay, and let me take what’s mine."