The cave had grown quiet. Ethan, though restless in his fitful sleep, was stable now, his breathing even. The glow from the fire had dimmed to embers, and shadows flickered lazily along the stone walls.
She swallowed hard, turning back toward the blossoms so he would not see her trembling.
"Quite the surprise," she murmured, forcing levity. "Do all minotaurs keep secret gardens in their caves? Or just the particularly arrogant ones?"
His deep laugh warmed the space. "Arrogant? I call it practical. A man must have somewhere to think." His gaze lingered on her, softer than his teasing words. "And sometimes… to be found."
Her chest tightened. Found. The word lanced through her like an arrow.
She tried to scoff, brushing a strand of hair from her flushed face. "If you're hoping I'll praise your horticultural skills, don't count on it. I'm still deciding if you deserve compliments."
He stepped closer, and the teasing air thickened into something weightier. "Then decide quickly, little one. You've been staring at me since we arrived."
Her lips parted, caught between protest and truth. Heat rose to her cheeks, betraying her. "I have not."
"Liar," he said softly, with the grin of a man who knows he has already won.
Ann turned sharply, pretending to study the blossoms. But her body betrayed her again—her breath shallow, her fingers twitching at her sides, aching to touch something she shouldn't. The air itself seemed charged, humming between them.
He closed the distance in slow, deliberate steps. His presence pressed against her before his body ever touched hers. She stiffened, caught between flight and surrender.
"Ann," he said, her name low, reverent.
She turned—and there he was, so close that her chest brushed his when she inhaled. His hand lifted, broad and sure, to tuck a strand of golden hair behind her ear. His fingertips lingered against her temple, trailing down the curve of her cheek.
Her knees nearly buckled at the gentleness of it.
"I shouldn't—" Her voice broke, thin as paper.
"Then don't speak."
His mouth claimed hers before she could argue.
The kiss was not rushed, not brutish. It was slow, molten, like honey poured from a jar. His lips coaxed hers open, drawing out the tremble she had fought to hide. Her hands, helpless at first, found his chest—hard and warm beneath her palms. His heartbeat thundered against her skin, steady and anchoring, while her own raced out of control.
When he finally drew back, her breath came ragged, her lips tingling.
"You…" She tried to gather words, but they scattered like startled birds.
"Yes?" he teased, nuzzling close to her ear.
"You're impossible," she whispered, shivering as his breath traced her skin.
"And yet," he murmured, lips grazing her jaw, "you're not pulling away."
She hated that he was right. Or loved it—she couldn't tell anymore.
Her hands slid up of their own accord, over the ridges of his shoulders, along the powerful slope of his neck. He groaned softly when her fingers brushed the base of his horns, the sound vibrating through her like a secret meant only for her.
The garden seemed to pulse with their closeness, light bending around them.
He cupped her waist, drawing her against him fully now. The press of his body left no illusions about the hunger coiled beneath his restraint. His other hand trailed down her arm, rough palm against delicate skin, until he found her hand and laced his fingers through hers.
"Tell me no," he said, though his eyes burned with the hope she wouldn't.
Her heart pounded. She should. She knew she should. But the words stuck in her throat, strangled by the ache in her chest.
Instead she whispered, "Don't you dare stop."
Something in him broke at that. With a growl half-savage, half-plea, he lifted her easily, cradling her as if she weighed no more than air. She gasped, instinctively clutching his neck. He carried her to the moss-soft ground beside the pool, laying her down as though she were the most precious thing in his world.
She stared up at him, breathless, golden hair fanned across the moss. His shadow loomed over her, not menacing but protective, immense and impossibly tender.
Her voice wavered, half playful, half terrified: "If you crush me, Mino, I'll haunt you forever."
He laughed, deep and warm, even as desire flickered in his eyes. "Then I'll take my chances."
When he lowered himself to her, his weight braced on strong arms, she wrapped her legs around his hips almost without thought, pulling him into her. Their laughter melted into gasps as heat flared, bodies aligning in a rhythm older than any myth.
Every brush of his hand was reverent, tracing her waist, her ribs, the curve of her hip, as though memorizing her. His lips explored her neck, her collarbone, down to where her pulse fluttered like a trapped bird. She arched into him, helpless against the pull.
"Ann," he groaned, her name a prayer and a plea.
She silenced him with a kiss fiercer than the first, her fingers digging into his back, her body yielding even as her heart fought to keep pace. Each breath, each touch, blurred the line between surrender and triumph.
When he moved deeper against her, she gasped into his mouth, torn between shock and desperate need. He froze, searching her face with fierce tenderness.
"Do you want this?" he asked, voice raw.
Her answer came not in words but in the way she lifted to meet him, the way her hands trembled but clung, the way her eyes—wide, vulnerable, blazing—said yes more loudly than any voice could.
And then there were no more questions.
The garden itself seemed to exhale around them. Light rippled across the pool, blossoms shivered as if in sympathy, and time folded into something timeless. Their bodies moved together in a rhythm of urgency and wonder, laughter dissolving into gasps, gasps into moans, moans into whispered names.
It was not merely passion—it was recognition. A sealing of something neither of them could name but both felt burn into their very bones.
When the frenzy gentled, when their breathing slowed, Ann lay tangled against him, cheek pressed to his chest. His heartbeat thundered beneath her ear, steady as the earth itself.
She closed her eyes, the scent of moss and blossoms wrapping around them like a veil. For once, there was no hesitation, no doubt gnawing at her edges. Only certainty.
She wanted him.
Not as myth. Not as monster. Not as mistake.
She wanted Mino.
And for tonight, that was enough.