The car slid through the rain-slicked streets like a whisper, headlights cutting through the soft fog blanketing the edge of the city. Wesley sat in the backseat of the sleek black town car, his long frame reclined just slightly, fingers drumming a slow rhythm against the curve of his knee. The driver didn't speak. He preferred it that way.

He was too lost in his own mind. Being gone from his god daughter so long, only seeing her in photos and videos her father had sent.

The gown he bought her had looked different on the mannequin. Pretty, but flat. Too pristine. Too untouched.

But when he imagined it on her?

That was the problem. He had imagined it on her.

That pale rose-gold shimmer, sequins catching light like it owed her something. The slit up the leg had felt like an indulgence when he picked it. He remembered standing there in that boutique in Manhattan, running his fingers over the fabric like a pervert, thinking She's not a little girl anymore.

He'd said that to himself so many times lately it had lost meaning. But it didn't make it less true.

Not with the way her birthday crept up on him this year like a dare. She's in her twenties.

He'd told himself he just wanted to get her something nice. Something soft. Feminine. Something that said I still think of you. I still know what you love.

But the moment he saw that dress and those shoes—ribbons that laced up the leg, kissing the skin all the way to the knee—he knew exactly what he was doing.

He'd wrapped them himself. Had the boutique hand-deliver the box to the estate two days before her birthday. No note. She'd know. She always did.

Christ, she used to trail after him with a juice box and a ribbon in her hair, babbling about ghosts in the hallways, little hands clutching his fingers like they were the only real thing in the world. She used to sneak into his suitcase and steal his old t-shirts before he flew back to California.

Now she wore satin like a threat. And he was the one who felt haunted.

The car turned slowly onto the long private drive. Familiar trees blurred past the window—tall, sharp silhouettes in the dusk. The Lincoln estate loomed ahead, all gothic edges and elegant decay, its grandeur refusing to die.

Wesley adjusted his cuff, smoothing the edge of his charcoal jacket. His shirt was black tonight, buttons gleaming faintly under the low light, his slacks pressed to perfection. Not formal. Not casual. He didn't need to impress. He wasn't here for that.

He was here for Ronan's birthday. That was the lie he agreed on.

The car rolled to a stop.

Wes stepped out into the hush of the estate's front entrance, the world damp and quiet around him. The rain had stopped, but the scent lingered—wet stone, wood smoke, the faintest trace of something floral.

He crossed the threshold and stepped into the foyer, breath already tightening in his chest.

And there she was.

The chaise lounge sat just beneath the grand staircase, angled perfectly in the halo of soft amber light from the chandelier. She was sitting there like something painted. Posed. Intentional.

One leg crossed over the other, bare, glowing against the muted shadows. Her dress—the one he chose—spilled over her thighs in liquid sparkles, the slit parting dangerously high when she shifted.

Her back was slightly curved as she leaned over her knee, fingers struggling with the ribbons of her shoe.

Wesley didn't breathe.

She fucking wore it.

She'd chosen it. Not just accepted it. Not just humored him. She put it on.

And she looked like something men ruined themselves for.

The dress clung to her like it missed her when she moved. It sparkled over the swell of her hips, kissed the edges of her chest with a daring neckline that showed just enough to burn itself into his retinas. The slit parted every time she breathed too deep. Every inch of her was tension wrapped in velvet and glitter, and those goddamn ribbons—

His cock twitched in his slacks.

He swallowed hard.

She wasn't a little girl anymore. She hadn't been for a long time. And he was a fool for pretending that realization was new.

He walked toward her without thinking, boots silent on the marble, his body heat rising with every step. She didn't look up. She didn't have to.

He knelt in front of her slowly. Deliberately. One knee to the floor, the other bent, like he'd done it before in a hundred dreams he wouldn't dare say aloud.

Her hand was still on the ribbon, fingers fumbling just slightly, like the bow refused to obey. Wesley didn't speak. He just reached forward, slow enough to let her stop him if she wanted—she didn't—and took the satin from her fingers.

His skin brushed hers. Her ankle was warm, her calf smooth under his palm as he adjusted the angle. The hem of the dress rode up further as she shifted.

Holy fuck.

He kept his eyes on the task, even as heat crawled up the back of his neck. Even as blood surged low and heavy.

He wrapped the ribbon tight, tied it with practiced precision, fingers smoothing the bow just below her knee. He let his thumb linger a second too long on her skin. Felt the way she tensed. Not pulling back. Just... feeling it.

She doesn't even know what she does to me. Or maybe she does. God help me if she does.

The other shoe waited at her side. She hadn't put it on yet.

His gaze dragged up her legs slowly, hungrily, shamelessly—past the slit in the dress, past the place where the sequins stopped and skin began, up to the soft swell of her hips and the barely-there line of her waist.

Then her face.

Still hers. Still the girl who used to fall asleep on his chest in front of late-night sci-fi reruns. But not innocent. Not anymore. There was something in the way she watched him now. Curious. Measured. Dangerous.

You shouldn't be here, his mind warned. You shouldn't be kneeling between her legs with a hard-on and a memory of how she used to beg you not to leave.

But he stayed.

His voice, when it came, was low. Smooth. Controlled by the thinnest thread of self-discipline.

"I'll do the other one too," he said. "If you want."

And he reached for the second shoe like he already knew the answer.