Roman still remembers that day—the Summer Solstice.

The weather bureau had issued a yellow-level thunderstorm warning.

Driving back from the office, he hit gridlock on the elevated highway after a crash. Wipers lashed back and forth. Through the curtain of rain, he spotted a car pulled over with its hazard lights blinking. Beside it stood a woman, arms wrapped around her shivering frame, drenched to the bone.

Her dark, soaked hair made her skin look bloodless.

Even in the downpour, where the world blurred into gray static, Roman felt the violent trembling of her body.

The traffic was a crawl.

Roman signaled his driver to stop. He stepped out dozens of yards from the accident, shielding her with a black umbrella.

The rain stopped hitting her skin. Violette Ellis looked up, locking eyes with him. Roman didn't ask a single question; he just shrugged off his suit jacket and draped it over her shoulders.

The smell of dry, heated fabric wrapped around her instantly.

Violette clutched the lapels, desperate as if she’d grabbed a piece of driftwood in the middle of the ocean.

The rest was handled by Roman’s driver. The other driver, who had been arrogant and demanding just moments before, instantly became pliable the second he realized the woman had two imposing men in her corner.

Only minutes earlier, that man had been spitting fire, demanding two hundred dollars for a minor scratch that wasn't even visible to the naked eye.

Violette had refused, reaching for her insurance info, but he’d kept drilling into her: "Female drivers are a hazard to everyone on the road," "Your license is a waste of paper," and so on.

The headache was splitting, her phone shattered in the mud during a shove. The stress of the past few days and the online harassment had left her pale, swaying on her feet, arms pulled tight in a pathetic, defensive crouch in the middle of the storm.

Thankfully, Roman had arrived.

Her car was towed to a center for processing.

Roman put her in his black Bentley. The car smelled of light cologne—the same scent as the suit jacket, a clean, pine-needle crispness. She curled into the corner of the back seat, terrified of staining the expensive leather.

He glanced at her once in the rearview mirror before stepping out.

When he returned, he handed her a grey T-shirt.

"I keep it in the car for gym days. It’s the only one I have, but if you don't mind, put it on. I don't want you catching a fever."

Seeing Violette hesitate, Roman added, "It’s clean."

He hit a button, and the partition between the driver's cabin and the back seat slid up, sealing her in complete privacy.

Violette hesitated for a long moment before peeling off her wet dress. The man's shirt was long, falling to her thighs. She folded her wet clothes, tucked them by her feet, and sat in the silence, staring out the window.

Outside, the rainy cityscape bled backward, the roar of the downpour vibrating through the frame.

She didn't know that up front, the partition was cracked open just enough for him to smoke a cigarette. He couldn't see, but he could hear—the friction of fabric, the rustle of movement in the back.

A man's imagination is a self-taught, dangerous thing.

The sound of a zipper sliding down cut through his chest like a blade. In the chaotic rain, he hallucinated her skin, white and flawless, a mental image more stubborn than the storm itself. By the time the car pulled up to her building, the cigarette was long gone, but the ghost of the urge remained, heavy and frantic in his veins.

Minutes later, Roman opened the door with his umbrella.

The woman in the back had fallen asleep amidst the long, slow crawl of traffic. Her brow was knitted tight, her face even in slumber guarded, prepared for a blow.

Without thinking, he leaned in to smooth the tension from her forehead.

Suddenly, her eyes snapped open.

Maybe she was awake, maybe she wasn't. Otherwise, why would she look at him with that dazed, hazy expression? She didn't push him away. Instead, she reached out, her arms winding around his neck.

"Hold me," she whispered.

...

Hell.

How do you break a man with one line?

Once, he would have scoffed at a man with no willpower. But looking into Violette’s clear, vacant eyes, hearing that simple plea—not even a full sentence—he crumbled. He was a Pavlovian dog, and he dove right in.

He scooped her up, his mouth crashing onto hers as he kicked the bedroom door open with frantic, desperate strength.

Gentlemanly manners, restraint, poise—all of it vanished.

The most primitive of positions gave him the absolute control he craved.

Roman loved facing her like this. His night vision was sharp enough to catch the reflection of his own face in her eyes, illuminated only by the faint light from the living room.

They were married.

She belonged to him.

The thought sent an electric jolt through his entire body.

He buried his face against her, his nose pressing into her cheek, his hard features scraping against her softness, catching a smear of tears.

She was tough as iron to the world, but in these moments, she was nothing but fluid.

Roman murmured, "I'm holding you."