Chapter 60
1368 Words
✨ Careful With You✨
Ari Darven
He hadn’t expected the word to follow him.
Virgin.
It lingered in Ari’s mind long after Elena had said it, spoken softly, almost apologetically, as if she were confessing a flaw instead of offering him something fragile and rare.
The night had shifted after that.
Subtly.
But completely.
She had told him she’d dated before. That there had been someone once. And he hadn’t thought twice about it—hadn’t imagined there was a line she hadn’t crossed. Not with the way she responded to him. Not with the way she looked at him like she felt everything just as deeply as he did.
But she hadn’t.
And he hadn’t realized.
That realization sat heavy in his chest now.
Ari exhaled sharply, dragging a hand through his hair as the memory replayed—her on the yacht, the way she had leaned into him, trusted him, followed him without hesitation. The way he had almost taken that step with her without knowing what it truly meant.
He could have kicked himself.
Not because he didn’t want her.
But because he did.
Too much.
And that kind of want… it demanded control.
He had always been a man who understood boundaries—his own, and other people’s. But with Elena, everything blurred too easily. She disarmed him in ways he didn’t expect, made him forget to slow down, to ask, to read beyond the surface.
And that bothered him.
Because she deserved more than assumption.
More than momentum.
She deserved intention.
Ari leaned back, jaw tightening slightly as he stared ahead, his thoughts still circling her voice—soft, unsure, vulnerable in a way he hadn’t seen from her before.
She had trusted him enough to tell him.
And he had almost missed it.
Almost taken something from her in the heat of a moment that should have meant everything.
That wasn’t who he was.
Not with her.
His expression hardened—not with anger, but with resolve.
If there was one thing he was certain of now…
It was that when that moment came—
it wouldn’t be rushed.
It wouldn’t be accidental.
And it sure as hell wouldn’t be something she felt she had to apologize for.
The firelight in the living room of his penthouse flickered against the floor-to-ceiling windows, the city glittering far below like a scattered field of stars. Elena sat tucked into the corner of his long cream-colored sofa, her shoes abandoned on the rug where he had left them after rubbing her tired feet. Her hair fell loose around her shoulders now, slightly tousled from his fingers. She looked smaller than usual, wrapped in one of his throw blankets, though her spine remained straight—brave.
Ari stood near the window, one hand in his pocket, the other wrapped around a glass of untouched whiskey.
He hadn’t answered her immediately when she’d told him.
He had simply looked at her.
Not with judgment.
Not with disbelief.
With calculation.
And that had frightened her more than if he’d laughed.
Now, in the quiet that followed, he set the glass down without drinking and turned toward her fully.
“You don’t owe me that,” he said at last, his voice steady, controlled.
He crossed the room slowly and lowered himself onto the coffee table in front of her so their eyes were level.
Elena searched his face. “I just thought you should know,” she said. “If we’re… moving forward.”
Forward.
He studied her as if the word itself were a contract.
Ari had had women. Many. Carefully compartmentalized, convenient, forgettable. He didn’t lie about that—he simply didn’t elaborate. His past was irrelevant. None of them had ever sat in his living room discussing health tests and vulnerability.
None of them had asked for safety.
He leaned forward, resting his forearms on her thighs. “We will get tested,” he said firmly. “If that’s what you need to feel secure.”
“It’s not that I don’t trust you,” she added quickly.
“I know.”
And he did.
That was the unsettling part.
Silence stretched again, but it wasn’t tense. It was thoughtful.
Elena twisted her fingers in the edge of the blanket. “You’re quiet.”
“I’m thinking.”
“About whether this is too complicated?”
His jaw tightened faintly. “No.”
He reached out then, slowly, deliberately, and took her hands, stopping the nervous movement. His thumbs brushed across her knuckles.
“I’m thinking,” he clarified, “about how careful I need to be with you.”
Her breath caught.
That wasn’t what she had expected.
Ari wasn’t a gentle man by nature. He was decisive, commanding, used to being obeyed. But with her—he felt something different. Responsibility. Not ownership.
Responsibility.
He rose from the table and moved beside her on the sofa instead of returning to his usual dominant stance. That choice alone made her heart steady.
“I don’t want you making decisions like that,” he continued quietly, “because you think it’s what I expect.”
“I’m not,” she said. “I’m with you because I want to be.”
His hand slid up, brushing her hair back from her face in a much softer gesture than he was known for. His knuckles traced her cheek briefly before he let them fall.
“It’s been a week,” she said with a small smile. “You sent your car like I’m some diplomat.”
“You don’t answer when I call during the day,” he replied. “I adapt.”
She laughed lightly at that.
The tension dissolved inch by inch.
He shifted closer. Close enough that his knee pressed against hers. Close enough that he could see the faint shimmer of nervousness still in her eyes.
“Tell me about college,” he said, surprising even himself.
Her brows lifted. “Why?”
“You said you dated once.”
“It wasn’t dramatic,” she admitted. “We went out a few times. He wanted more than I did. I wasn’t ready.” She shrugged. “I’m still not sure I am.”
“For him,” Ari corrected quietly.
The way he said it made her pulse stutter.
He didn’t ask about the boy’s name. He didn’t ask what they’d done. That restraint meant more than interrogation would have.
Instead, he took her hands again and guided them into his lap, grounding her.
“You don’t rush this,” he said. “Not for me. Not for anyone.”
“And if I decide I want to?”
His eyes darkened slightly—not with impatience, but with contained heat.
“Then it happens because you’re certain,” he replied. “And because I know I can give you what you deserve.”
She searched his expression again, trying to read what he wasn’t saying.
He didn’t tell her that he hadn’t been with anyone since her.
He didn’t tell her that the idea of touching another woman now felt unnecessary.
He didn’t tell her that something about her innocence made him want to protect rather than conquer.
Those were things he was still understanding himself.
Instead, he leaned forward and pressed his forehead briefly against hers. The gesture was intimate in a way far deeper than the kiss he’d greeted her with at the door.
“You’re safe with me,” he said quietly.
It wasn’t possessive.
It was a promise.
Elena exhaled slowly, the tension leaving her shoulders. She slid closer until she fit naturally against his side, her head resting just beneath his collarbone. His arm came around her automatically, holding her—not tightly, not to control her—but securely.
They stayed like that for a long time.
No urgency.
No pressure.
Just the steady rhythm of two people adjusting to the fact that whatever this was between them—it was no longer casual.
And for the first time in a very long time, Ari Darven didn’t feel the need to control what came next.
He was willing to let it unfold.
Carefully.
- Writer
