Chapter 2: Marked Territory
Dawn didn’t arrive so much as it seeped in, a slow bleed of pale, watery light around the edges of the blackout curtains. Jessica woke to its insistent gray, the unfamiliar weight of an arm flung across her waist, the solid warmth of a back pressed against her side. She blinked, the events of the night assembling themselves like scattered puzzle pieces: the open door, Ridge’s haunted eyes, the decision that wasn’t a decision at all, just a gravitational pull.
Then she registered the silence. Not the quiet of sleep, but an active, listening stillness. The arm across her was heavy, but the body behind her was tense.
She turned her head slowly on the pillow. Ridge’s side of the bed was empty, the satin sheets cool where he’d been. A jolt, cold and thin, shot through her. Here we go, she thought, the old script readying itself in her mind. The sneak-out. The morning-after ghost.
But then she heard it. A soft, deliberate breath. Not from the door, but from the foot of the bed.
She lifted her head.
He was there, kneeling on the floor beside the crumpled mountain of discarded duvet. The faint neon glow from the window, now competing with the gray dawn, painted a stripe of pink and blue across his bare shoulders. His head was bowed, his profile sharp in the low light. Her crimson silk robe was in his hands. He wasn’t putting it on. He was methodically, almost reverently, winding the long sash around one wrist, then the other, not tying them tight, but creating loose, intricate bindings. The sight was so unexpected, so utterly outside any narrative she’d prepared for, that she just watched, her breath caught in her throat.
He finished with the silken ties and looked up. His eyes found hers immediately, as if he’d sensed her wakefulness. There was no guilt in his gaze, no panic. Just a deep, unsettling focus.
“You’re up,” she said, her voice raspy with sleep.
“Couldn’t sleep,” he replied. His voice was quiet, rough. He didn’t move from his knees.
“What are you doing down there?”
He didn’t answer with words. Instead, he leaned forward, his body unfolding in a slow, controlled motion. He placed his hands on the mattress on either side of her ankles. Then he lowered his head and pressed his lips to the inside of her calf.
The kiss was warm, firm. It traveled upward, a slow pilgrimage along her skin. His mouth was hot, his breath cool. He kissed the delicate hollow behind her knee, making her shiver. He moved to her thigh, his lips tracing a path along the sensitive skin. He was heading, with a purposeful tenderness, toward a faint, bluish mark just above her hip bone. A souvenir from Mara’s enthusiastic mouth the night before.
Understanding dawned, bright and shocking. He wasn’t ignoring the marks left by others. He was seeking them out.
His mouth found the bruise. He didn’t suck or bite to claim over it. He covered it with his lips, held the kiss there for a long moment, as if trying to absorb the memory through her skin. A low, involuntary sound escaped her, part sigh, part gasp. Her fingers twisted in the sheets.
He lifted his head, his eyes dark in the dim light. “Does that hurt?”
“No.”
“Good.” His voice was a gravelly whisper. He shifted, his mouth moving to another place, a faint red blotch on the opposite hip from Leo’s stubble. He kissed that one too, a soft, lingering apology. A re-contextualization.
“Ridge,” she said, his name feeling strange in her mouth.
“Hmm?” He didn’t stop. His journey continued, up the slope of her stomach, his lips brushing her skin with a devotion that felt like penance and possession all at once. The silken ties around his wrists brushed against her, a whisper of constraint.
“You don’t have to… do this.”
He paused, his forehead resting against her ribcage. He looked up the length of her body, his gaze traveling over the landscape he was mapping. “I know.”
“Then why?”
He was silent for a long moment, his breathing uneven. When he spoke, the words were forced out, rough and honest. “Because I saw them.” He swallowed. “I saw their hands on you. Their mouths. And all I felt was this… this fucking fire in my gut. Jealousy, yeah. But something else, too. Awe.” He met her eyes again. “You let them see you like that. You chose them. And last night, you chose me. But these…” He gestured vaguely at the faint marks on her skin with his bound wrists. “These are proof I wasn’t the first. That this… this incredible thing… it wasn’t made for me. It existed before I walked in.”
He lowered his head again, his lips finding a spot on the underside of her breast. “So I’m not erasing them,” he murmured against her skin, the vibration going straight through her. “I’m… acknowledging them. Including them. They’re part of you. So they’re part of this.”
The logic was twisted, beautiful, and intensely his. It wasn’t about dominance. It was about integration. About making the past night a part of their present. Her throat tightened.
“You think too much,” she whispered, but the usual teasing edge wasn’t there.
“I know.” He kissed his way to the center of her chest, right over her sternum, where her heart hammered against his lips. “But right now, I’m not thinking at all. I’m just… worshipping.”
The word hung in the air, too raw, too true. She should laugh it off, make a joke about corny dialogue. But she couldn’t. A flush spread across her skin, deep and warm. She reached down, her fingers finding his hair. She didn’t pull, just let her hand rest there, a connection.
He took that as permission, or maybe a command. His mouth moved lower, his kisses becoming more urgent, less ceremonial. The silk ties trailed over her thighs as his hands slid beneath her, lifting her hips. His touch was sure, but there was a reverence in it that made her feel both fragile and powerful.
When his mouth finally found her, it wasn’t with playful teasing. It was with a direct, hungry focus that made her back arch off the bed. A sharp cry tore from her lips, her fingers tightening in his hair. He didn’t vary his rhythm, didn’t play games. He applied himself with a single-minded intensity, as if this was the most important task he’d ever undertaken. As if he could, through sheer devotion, make her forget every touch that had come before his.
And, God, he almost could.
The pleasure built not in waves, but in a steady, relentless crescendo. It was grounded, deep, rooted in the startling vulnerability of his admission. This wasn’t just sex. It was a conversation in a language she’d never been spoken to in before. Her hips rocked against his mouth, her control unraveling. The neon light swam in her vision.
“Ridge,” she gasped, a warning, a plea.
He made a sound against her, low and affirmative, and doubled his efforts. The world dissolved into sensation: the slide of the silk ties on her skin, the pressure of his tongue, the scrape of his stubble, the impossible heat coiling tighter and tighter at her core.
She came apart silently at first, a seismic shudder that locked her muscles, followed by a raw, ragged cry that echoed in the quiet room. He held her through it, his mouth gentle now, soothing, until the last tremor subsided.
He crawled up her body, his own breathing harsh. The pink and blue light played over his face, which was etched with a desperate wonder. He hesitated, his body poised above hers, the question clear in his eyes.
She answered by hooking her legs around his hips, pulling him down into her. He sank in with a groan that was half relief, half surrender. The silk ties were still looped around his wrists, brushing her shoulders as he braced himself above her.
This was different from the night before. Last night had been about discovery, about the shock of the new. This was about claiming, about deepening. His movements were slower, deeper, his eyes locked on hers. She watched the conflict play out on his face—the awe, the lingering insecurity, the dawning, terrifying hope.
“Jess,” he choked out, his rhythm faltering.
“I’m here,” she said, her voice surprisingly steady. She wrapped her arms around him, pulling him closer, eliminating the last sliver of space between them. “I’m right here.”
It was what he needed. His eyes squeezed shut, and he buried his face in the crook of her neck. His release was a silent, violent thing, a full-body tremor that she felt in her own bones. He collapsed onto her, his weight a comforting anchor.
For a long time, the only sound was their struggling breath mingling with the distant hum of the city waking up. The neon sign outside finally flickered and died, leaving the room in the flat, gray light of morning.
She could feel the damp of his tears on her shoulder. She didn’t mention it. She just ran her hands up and down his back, over the tight muscles, until his breathing evened out.
Finally, he shifted his weight, rolling to lie beside her but keeping her gathered against him. The silk ties were still tangled around his wrists. He stared at them, then at her, a faint, bewildered smile touching his lips.
“So,” she said, tracing the line of his jaw with her finger. “A fetish for bondage robes. Good to know.”
He let out a shaky laugh, the tension breaking. “It’s not the robe.” He brought his bound wrists up, studying them. “It was… I don’t know. A reminder. To myself. To be present. To not just take.”
“You didn’t take,” she said softly. “I gave.”
He looked at her, his eyes clear now, and full of something that made her chest ache. “Thank you.”
She snorted, breaking the mood deliberately. “Don’t thank me. You still owe me for the robe. That’s real silk. From a very disreputable market in Bangkok.”
He laughed again, a real one this time, and started picking at the knots. “I’ll buy you a new one. Ten new ones.”
They lay there as he worked his hands free. The room was coming into focus now: the empty whiskey glass on the floor, her copy of Dune on the nightstand, the general chaos of the night. Normalcy, or something like it, was pushing its way back in.
“I should go,” he said, not moving. “You probably have things…”
“I have a shift at four,” she said. “You have to open the bar at eleven. That’s…” she glanced at the clock, “six hours from now. You’re going somewhere?”
He was quiet. “I just… I don’t want to assume.”
“Assume what? That I don’t kick all my one-night stands out before dawn?” She shrugged a shoulder. “I usually do. You’re messing up my system.”
He propped himself up on an elbow, searching her face. “Is that what this is? A system?”
She met his gaze, her humor fading. “I don’t know what this is, Ridge. But the door’s not open anymore. You’re inside. So you might as well stay for breakfast.” She poked him in the chest. “You’re making pancakes. As penance for the overthinking.”
The smile that spread across his face was slow, genuine, and brighter than the morning light now spilling into the room. “I’m a terrible cook.”
“Even better. It’ll be funny.” She sat up, the sheet pooling around her waist. The marks on her skin were faint now, almost invisible. He saw her look at them, saw the thoughtful expression cross her face. Before he could say anything, she leaned over and kissed him, a soft, closed-mouth kiss that tasted of salt and sleep and something new.
“Come on,” she said, swinging her legs out of bed. “I’m starving. And you need to learn your way around my kitchen if this is going to be a thing.”
“A thing?” he asked, hope and caution warring in his voice.
She stood up, stretching her arms over her head, utterly unselfconscious in the gray light. She looked back at him, a sly smile on her face. “Yeah. A thing. Now get up. The story’s past the fade to black. Time for the morning-after scene. It’s always the most awkward part.”
He watched her walk toward the bathroom, the graceful, confident line of her back, the swing of her hair. The silk robe ties lay discarded on the floor at the foot of the bed. He picked them up, the fabric still warm, and followed her.
He followed her into the bathroom, a room smaller than the closet at the bar he managed. It was all cool white tile and the faint, clean scent of her soap, a stark contrast to the perfumed dark of the bedroom. She was already turning the chrome knobs on the shower, a sharp, metallic squeak breaking the quiet. Steam began to plume, fogging the mirror above the sink.
“Your water pressure is legendary for all the wrong reasons,” she said, not turning around. “It’s either a sad drizzle or a scalding needle spray. There is no in-between.”
“Sounds like a challenge.” He leaned against the doorframe, the silk ties still dangling from his fingers. He watched the muscles move in her back as she tested the temperature with her hand.
She glanced over her shoulder, water droplets already beading on her skin. “You coming in, or are you just going to watch from the doorway again?”
The reference to last night, to his initial voyeurism, landed with a sharp, intimate precision. It wasn’t an accusation. It was a leveling. He dropped the ties on the toilet tank and stepped forward.
The shower stall was a tight fit for two. Their bodies brushed as he entered, a slide of wet skin on wet skin. The water chose its sad drizzle setting, a lukewarm cascade that did little to rinse away the night. He took the bar of soap from her hand. It smelled like almonds and vanilla, nothing like the jasmine and sweat scent clinging to the air outside.
“Let me,” he said, his voice echoing softly off the tiles.
He started with her shoulders, working the soap into a lather between his palms. His touch was methodical, practical. He washed the salt from her skin, the lingering perfume from the club, the ghost of his own mouth from her neck. She stood with her eyes closed, head slightly bowed, letting him.
This was new, this silent service. His hands moved over her back, down the taper of her spine. He soaped her arms, each finger. He turned her gently, and she obliged, her eyes opening to watch him. He washed her stomach, the suds catching in the fine blonde hair there, then moved lower with a clinical detachment that felt more intimate than anything that had come before.
“You’re very thorough,” she murmured, her voice almost lost in the patter of water.
“I’m a bartender,” he said, not looking up. “Cleanliness is next to godliness. Stops the spread of germs.” He rinsed her carefully, his hands guiding the weak stream of water. “And other things.”
She knew what he meant. The other lovers. The marks he’d kissed. He was washing that away, too. Not with anger, but with a quiet, determined care. It was his own kind of acknowledgement.
She took the soap from his hands then. “My turn.”
Her approach was different. Less ritual, more exploration. She washed his chest, her fingers tracing the old, faded tattoo on his ribs—a nautical star, badly done. She soaped the dusting of hair leading down from his navel, her touch firm and unchallenging. He stared at the tile wall ahead, his jaw tight. When her hands moved lower, he let out a slow breath.
“Just getting the job done,” she said softly, echoing his bartender logic. Her fingers were slick and efficient. There was no seduction in it, only a blunt, caring cleanliness that left him feeling both exposed and strangely comforted.
He turned to face her finally, water running down his face. He cupped her cheek, his thumb wiping a drop from her eyelash. “Jess.”
“Yeah?”
“Last night…”
“Is over,” she finished for him. “It’s morning now. We’re clean.” She gave a small, wry smile. “Or as clean as this terrible water will allow.”
He kissed her then, under the lukewarm spray. It was a slow, searching kiss, different from the hungry ones in the dark. This one tasted of tap water and almond soap. It felt like a beginning, and an end.
He pulled back, resting his forehead against hers. “Pancakes, then.”
“Pancakes,” she agreed. She turned off the water. The sudden silence was loud, broken only by the drip of the faucet and the soft sound of their breath in the steam-filled space.
The sudden silence was loud, broken only by the drip of the faucet and the soft sound of their breath in the steam-filled space. She reached for a towel, wrapped herself, and tossed another at his chest. “Kitchen’s a disaster. Consider yourself warned.”
He followed her down a short hallway, past framed prints of Metropolis and The Maltese Falcon. The kitchen was indeed a testament to single-living, a galley of clean clutter: a stack of paperbacks by the microwave, a dying succulent on the windowsill, and a distinctly sticky-looking patch of floor near the fridge. Morning light, harsh and honest, cut across the linoleum.
“Pans are under the stove,” she said, gesturing vaguely as she rooted in the refrigerator. “I have eggs. Possibly bacon. The bread might be more science project than food at this point.” She emerged with a carton of eggs, a half-empty package of bacon, and a dubious frown. “Okay, we have sustenance. Don’t judge my condiment collection.”
He found a cast-iron skillet, heavy and well-seasoned. “I’m a bartender who lives on shift drinks and pretzels. I’m in no position to judge.” He turned on the burner, the click-click-ignition a familiar sound. The bacon sizzled as it hit the hot metal, the smell immediate and grounding. It was a normal sound, a normal smell, and it made the enormity of the last twelve hours feel almost manageable.
Jessica leaned against the counter, watching him. He moved with a focused economy, nudging the curling strips with a fork. The steam rose, clouding the window over the sink. “You look domestic,” she said. “It’s weirding me out.”
“It’s weirding me out, too.” He glanced at her. “I usually just stare at a wall until the coffee kicks in.”
“Speaking of.” She busied herself with a coffee maker, dumping grounds into a filter. The mundane ritual of it—the scoop, the pour, the hiss and gurgle—built a fragile bridge over the chasm of everything unsaid. They moved around each other in the small space, a careful, unspoken choreography of hips and elbows.
He piled the cooked bacon on a paper towel and cracked eggs into the glossy fat. The edges bubbled and crisped. She set two mismatched plates on the small table by the window, then two mugs. The coffee scent merged with the bacon. For a few minutes, there was only the sound of cooking.
He slid two sunny-side-up eggs onto each plate, added bacon, and brought the skillet to the table, setting it on a trivet shaped like a cartoon cat. “No pancakes. Your bread had a confirmed fungal civilization. This is the best I can do.”
“It’s perfect.” She sat, pulling her knees up to her chest. She took a bite of egg, the yolk running. “So.”
He looked up from his plate. “So.”
“The door thing.” She said it softly, watching his face.
He put his fork down. “Yeah.”
“We should probably talk about that. The watching. And the… other thing. The robe.” She kept her tone light, but her eyes were sharp, observing.
“I shouldn’t have stood there,” he said, the words coming quickly. “It was a violation. Full stop.”
“It was,” she agreed, nodding once. She tore a piece of bacon in half. “But you didn’t barge in. You didn’t throw a fit. You just… watched. And then you left. Until I followed you.”
“Why did you?” The question burst out of him. “Follow me?”
She considered, swirling a piece of bacon in the egg yolk on her plate. “Curiosity. And because you looked like someone who’d just seen a ghost that punched him in the gut. It was a compelling combination.” She took a sip of coffee. “The robe thing, though. That was new.”
He flushed, looking down at his food. “I don’t know what that was.”
“I think you do.” She waited until he met her gaze. “It was about control. But not over me. Over your own reaction. Tying your own hands. It was a pretty fucked-up, weirdly poetic way of saying you were trying not to grab.”
The accuracy of her reading stunned him into silence. He just stared.
“I’m not an idiot, Ridge. I read people for a living, too.” She set her mug down with a soft click. “Here’s my boundary: no more watching from doors. If the door is open, you walk in. If it’s closed, you knock. Or you leave. But you don’t just… haunt the hallway.”
He nodded, a tight, quick motion. “Okay. Yes.”
“And you don’t get to be jealous of Mara or Leo. Or anyone else. That’s non-negotiable.” Her voice was firm, but not unkind. “What I do with my time, and with my body, when I’m not with you, is mine. They’re my friends. That doesn’t change because of this.” She gestured between them.
“And if I can’t handle that?” he asked, the challenge quiet, real.
“Then this ends right now, with breakfast.” She didn’t blink. “It’ll suck, but it’ll be clean. I like my life. I’m not dismantling it.”
The air in the kitchen tightened. The coffee machine hissed a final sigh. He looked at her, at this woman in a towel, laying down the law with yolk on her chin, and he felt a surge of something so potent it hurt. It wasn’t just want. It was respect.
“I’ll handle it,” he said. The words felt like a vow. “I don’t like it. But it’s part of you. So I’ll handle it.”
“Good.” She relaxed incrementally, picking up her fork again. “Your turn. Boundaries. Lay ‘em on me.”
He hadn’t expected that. He thought for a moment, pushing his eggs around the plate. “Don’t lie to me. Even if it’s to spare my feelings. Just… no lies of any kind. Omission, white lies, the whole spectrum.”
“That’s fair. And brutal. I can do brutal.” She pointed her fork at him. “Next.”
“Tell me if this is too much.” He gestured between them again, his movement echoing hers. “If I’m too much. The overthinking, the… intensity. Just say it. Don’t just freeze me out or vanish.”
She chewed thoughtfully. “I can do that. But you have to promise to believe me if I say it’s not too much. You don’t get to decide what I can handle.”
He let out a short, surprised laugh. “Okay. Deal.”
They ate in silence for a minute, the agreements settling between them like settled dust.
“This is a weird breakfast,” she said finally, a grin breaking through.
“The weirdest,” he agreed.
“I have to work tonight.”
“I know. I open in…” he checked the clock on the microwave, “an hour and a half.”
“So.” She stretched her legs out, her foot brushing his calf under the table. “What does this thing look like today? After the boundary summit?”
He captured her foot between his, holding it there. “Today, I go open a bar. You go read your book. Tonight, you do your job. I do mine.” He took a deep breath. “And maybe tomorrow, if you want, I bring over groceries that aren’t experimental fungus. And I make you actual pancakes. And we see what that’s like.”
The simplicity of it, the ordinary progression, was more intimate than anything that had happened in the boudoir. It was a plan. A fragile, tentative next.
Jessica nodded slowly, a real smile touching her eyes. “I’d like that.” She pulled her foot back and stood, gathering the plates. “Now get out of my apartment. I need to attempt being a human before my shift.”
He stood, and for a moment they just faced each other in the cluttered kitchen, the ghost of the silk robe ties and the neon dark replaced by sunlight and the smell of grease. He didn’t kiss her goodbye. He just brushed his knuckles against her hand, a fleeting, solid touch.
“See you tonight, Jess.”
“See you tonight, Ridge.”
He let himself out, the door clicking shut behind him with a sound both final and promising. Jessica listened to his footsteps fade down the hall. She looked at the empty plates, the skillet on the cat trivet, the world that was exactly the same and completely, irrevocably altered.