Page 76 of A Castle in the Sky: Fern & Connor
The man looked like he used reinforced concrete to make his protein shakes.
He was built like a tank—massive shoulders, boulder arms, and a barrel chest. His armchair looked just about ready to give up the ghost. His dark beard was neatly trimmed, framing a dark face that would have been intimidating if not for the warm, steady, deep-set eyes behind his delicate glasses. There was a gentleness in the way he nodded, an attentiveness that softened his sheer towering physical presence.
He wore a charcoal sweater that strained around his upper arms and a pair of immaculate trainers. When he sat back, the chair groaned but held—barely.
If someone told Fern that this man could bench-press half a small car, she would have believed them without blinking.
"Take your time, Connor," he said, as if he had all the time in the world. And somehow, in that room, Connor did.
He untangled years of things Fern had only guessed at—loneliness, confusion, mistrust, loyalty twisted into guilt, the suffocating neediness of his mother, the way Matilda had both clung to him and crushed him.
Fern didn't realize she had reached for his hand while her heart was breaking. She wasn't seeing Connor, the man who had failed her. She was seeing Connor, the boy whose family had failed him.
It softened her in places she had barricaded for survival.
One thing became unavoidably clear: he was willing to change. And she had already seen the change in him.
So, she kept going with him for alternating sessions. She felt he needed to have some on his own to be able to open up about things he may not be able to tell her.
Sometimes she stayed silent. Sometimes she added a quiet comment that made Connor glance toward her like her words were water in the desert.
But outside the sessions was where she noticed the change in him.
On the day her period cramps were so bad she had to take a day off, Connor had shown up, armed with a huge tin of coffee fudge swirl ice cream, a heating pad, and fluffy socks. Then, without hovering or making it about him, he kissed the top of her head and whisked Coral away for the whole afternoon—but not before promising to come back for a snuggle if she wanted one. She had ended up crying a little. And when he came back, he had been the big spoon to her little one andrubbed her belly while telling her she was looking sexy in those pyjamas.
The house sold at a profit. Connor tried to insist she keep the bulk of it, but she refused. He tried again, and again, she refused. Finally, they settled on a sixty-forty agreement in her favour.
She would catch him looking at her strangely, like he was trying to figure something out.
And then she started catching him doing... odd things.
Connor with earbuds in, listening to something.
Connor sneaking glances at her like he was studying her.
Connor watching her walk across a room like she was a film reel he was memorising, frame by frame.
She didn't understand it until the day he was getting ready to go to his flat.
At the doorstep, he paused as if making up his mind about something. Then, before she could guess what he was up to, he curled a firm, confident hand around the back of her neck and pulled her close before crushing her lips to his and sliding his tongue into her mouth. Just the feel of his large hand holding her neck in an unrelenting grip to drag her close a switch being flipped. The one that activated the 'climb Connor like a tree' mode.
This was not a respectful, close-mouthed kiss. His tongue demanded entry and proceeded to explore her mouth like he was on a mission.
Her back hit the wall, and he followed to press her against it. His other hand found her waist, fingers pressing just firmly enough that her breath caught. He kissed her like a drowning man discovering that air had a taste.
Her knees gave out, and he caught her. Held her. Worshipped her with his mouth.
When he finally pulled back, his golden eyes gleamed—hot, hungry, and nothing restrained about them.
Chiara stood wide-eyed in the hallway, eating straight from the ice cream tub while blinking like she'd witnessed a National Geographic mating documentary in the wild.
"Get a room, you two," she said flatly. "There are children here who don't need a masterclass on where babies come from."
Not that she moved an inch.
Fern didn't even have the breath to be embarrassed. Because Connor's grip on her nape did something to her.
After that, it was like something had changed in him, too.
