The tent was too small for the tension between them.

Rain drummed against the canvas while lightning flashed outside, illuminating Wusuowei's face in harsh, silver bursts. He stood before her, armor discarded, wearing only loose black trousers slung low on his hips. His muscles rippled with each deliberate movement as he stalked closer.

She'd been recovering for two weeks since taking that blade meant for him. Two weeks of his suffocating presence at her bedside. Two weeks of him feeding her with his own hands, changing her bandages with torturous slowness, watching her sleep like a starving man.

"Stand," he ordered.

No honorific. No mercy. Just command.

She pushed herself up on trembling legs, wincing at the pull of her healing wound. Before she could steady herself, his enormous hand wrapped around her throat, not tight enough to hurt—but enough to remind her exactly who held power here.

"You think I didn't know?" His thumb brushed her pulse, feeling the wild race beneath her skin. "From the first day, I saw you. The way you move. The way you fight like you've got everything to lose."

He backed her against the wooden support beam, body pinning hers completely. Outside, thunder roared. Inside, his breath scorched her ear.

"I've wanted to do this since that first battle," he admitted, pressing his thigh between her legs, his free hand ripping open her tunic without preamble. "Every time you saluted me. Every time you called me 'General.' Every time you lied about who you are."

His fingers cupped her breast roughly, squeezing until she gasped—a sound that made his eyes darken with something dangerous.

"Do you have any idea what you've done?" he growled, nipping her earlobe hard enough to sting. "You made me want something I can't have. Something that would get us both executed if anyone found out."

She tried to turn her face away, but his grip on her throat tightened.

"Look at me," he commanded. "When I'm fucking you, you'll look at me."

Her tunic hung in tatters around her waist now. His calloused hands mapped her curves like enemy territory, claiming every inch as his own. When his fingers brushed the bandage over her healing wound, she whimpered.

"Does it hurt?" he murmured, his voice a contradiction of tenderness and cruelty. "Good. Remember this pain when you try to hide from me again."

He ground his hips against hers, letting her feel exactly how much he wanted her—how hard, how desperate, how long he'd been waiting.

"You belong to me now," he whispered, his lips brushing hers before claiming them in a kiss that was more possession than affection. "Body, mind, and secret. I don't care about the Emperor or the war or any of it anymore."

His hand slid down to the waistband of her trousers, fingers already pushing beneath the fabric.

"I want you. All of you. And I always get what I want."

Lightning flashed again, illuminating the raw hunger in his eyes as his fingers found their target, making her arch against him despite the danger, despite the consequences, despite everything except the overwhelming need he'd awakened.

"Tell me you want this," he demanded, his voice rough with desire. "Tell me you're mine."

The thunder masked her answer as his mouth crashed against hers again, and the world outside their little tent ceased to exist entirely.