Page 77 of The Big Bad Duke

Even though she had no real choice.

She’d been taught to think this way. She was a child when it started.

What had she said? Fourteen?

Gideon fought hard to contain the rage building inside him. She didn’t deserve his anger. He’d save that for the Cardinal.

She needed him calm. Safe. She needed to know that no matter what she said, he would protect her.

The Brotherhood had tried to break her spirit when she was young and vulnerable.

But she still had fire in her. A flame that refused to go out.

And that fire had brought her to him.

By God, he would keep it burning, and he would destroy anyone who ever tried to smother it.

“I have a lot of things to tell you,” she murmured, stifling a yawn.

“You don’t have to say anything you’re not ready to,” he assured her.

“I have to,” she said softly. “Not now, because I’m so tired… the words escape me. But I have to tell you things. A lot of things. And once you know them, then you can tell me if you still wish to doll… to dole out punishment on my behalf,” she said the last sentence with incredible slowness.

She was already half asleep, but he needed her to know. “I don’t think there’s anything you could say that would change my opinion of you or the way I feel about you.”

There was a long pause. So long that Gideon thought she might have fallen asleep. Her breathing was even, and her eyes were closed.

Still, she said, “You’re not thinking hard enough.”

He pulled her closer and stroked her hair. “Sleep. Rest. We can talk about everything tomorrow.”

Chapter 15

Gideon’s eyes opened slowly, a warm breeze ruffling his hair, the sound of birds filtering into his consciousness.

He felt warm. He felt comfortable. And he felt… happy?

Something felt odd. Different, in a way that made him pause before even attempting to move.

There was no heaviness in his chest, no familiar weight of dread pressing down on his ribcage like a stone. No cold sweat clung to his skin, no damp clothes stuck uncomfortably to his body. No pounding in his head, no phantom screams echoing in his ears demanding attention.

Instead, he felt… light.

Rested.

For the first time in longer than he could remember, he actually felt glad to be awake.

He turned his head slightly and found Leila slumbering peacefully in his arms, her dark hair spread across his chest like silk.

The sight of her there, safe and warm against him, made something unfamiliar bloom in his chest—something that felt dangerously close to contentment.

A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth as the memories of last night rushed back in vivid detail: the way she’d responded to his touch, the soft sounds she’d made, the trust she’d shown him in her vulnerability… His heart swelled with an emotion he hadn’t allowed himself to feel in fifteen years.

He drew her closer instinctively, delighting in how perfectly she fit against him. Immediately, his body responded to her nearness—heat coursing through his veins, desire stirring just as it had the night before.

But he didn’t want to wake her.

Not yet.