Page 101 of Through the Flames
Again, my lungs seized. “Everything?”
“Everything,” Hunter replied, with no hesitation. “I know the names they called you. I found the posts. I pulled the group chats. Screenshots, archived comments, texts people thought were private … I read them all. I know who fed the rumor mill and how hard they pushed. The weight you carried when you walked into rooms that felt like cages. The parts you think make you unlovable.” His jaw flexed. “And I know they werewrong.”
A wave of heat flushed through me as I suddenly grasped the depth and impossible scope of his observation. My stomach twisted, and I felt panic rising like bile.
“So you really saw all of it.” My voice cracked. “Then you must think I’m …” I couldn’t bring myself to say the rest.
What did he think of me now?
His hand closed over mine on my thigh, grounding me before the spiral could swallow me whole.
“No,” he said, low and certain. “I knew all along, and the only thing I have to say about it is this—”
His glare took on a lethal edge, making my heart stutter. “No one will ever dare treat you this way again. If anyone tries to shame you, gossip about you, or belittle you, I’ll take them apart. I’ll shred their stories, expose their hypocrisy, burn their good names until the people who smiled with them stop answering their texts. I’ll ruin their comfortable little lives so hard they wish they’d never spoken. If words don’t stop them, I’ll make sure their choices come with consequences that’ll follow them forever.”
Those words should have terrified me. Instead, they wrapped around me like armor, sharp and impenetrable.
The panic was still lingering, but underneath, there was a strange sense of safety I hadn’t dared to even imagine.
“You actually mean it?” I asked, feeling both hopeful and anxious.
“Every. Fucking. Word.” His jaw was tight, but an air of quiet certainty surrounded him. “Try me.”
I shook my head slowly, biting my lips to keep from smiling. “Youareinsane.”
“Yeah.” He didn’t grin, and his face was blank. “Foryou, I am.”
Then Hunter leaned across the console without warning, one big hand cupping the side of my neck, the other braced against the seat. His mouth crashed into mine, hungry and claiming.
It was the kind of kiss whose very intensity erased every smart-ass comment I’d prepared and burned every doubt clean out of my head.
By the time he pulled back, I was half in his lap, fingers clutching the fabric of his shirt like it was the only thing keeping me upright. My chest was heaving, and my pulse was pounding in my ears.
Hunter traced his thumb along my jaw. His voice was low and rough, and far too steady for someone who’d just kissed me the way he had.
“Tell them you’re my girlfriend if you want,” he said, gray eyes burning into mine. “But you’re so much more than a girlfriend, Ella. You’reeverything.”
The words hit me hard, tightening my chest and setting off a flurry of butterflies in my stomach.
Maybe I should’ve been scared of how much I wanted them, how much I wantedhim, but fear wasn’t even on the radar.
All I felt was this surge of something wild, something right.
I smirked, because of course he’d drop a line like this and expect me to not ask questions.
“Everything, huh?” My voice wavered slightly, but the way the corner of his mouth curled up told me the response pleased him.
“Yeah,” he said simply. “Everything.”
I kissed him then, because if this was what being claimed felt like,I wanted more. I wanted all of it, and when he kissed me back, when his hands tightened like letting go wasn’t an option, it hit me.
People could whisper, they could tease, they could speculate all they wanted. But none of it dug in anymore. It didn’t sting like it used to.
Because this?This was mine.
And so was he.
***
