joined with her was so powerful, my entire body hummed in pleasure.
Her silky, clenching core stroked and rippled around me as her hips rose to meet my every stroke. Her skin was damp, and there was a wildness to her, an abandon I hadn’t felt from her before.
My own release was already threatening, electricity sizzling at the base of my spine as my balls felt heavy, drawing tight against my body when I sank into her yet again. I reached between us, resting my weight on one elbow as I found her swollen bud.
“I can’t come again,” she murmured in a ragged gasp.
I held still, staring into her passion-drowsed gaze. “Come for me.”
I clung to my control, so, so close to the edge of my release. I dipped my head and pressed kisses along the side of her neck. I nipped at her earlobe, savoring when she arched into me like a cat, letting out a ragged whimper.
I teased my fingers in a slow circle where we were joined, glancing over her. I felt it when she trembled and rippled around my shaft.
“That’s my girl,” I murmured when she moaned.
My name was a tattered cry, and I felt her climax coming. Drawing my hips back, I slid into her again, savoring her keening cry as I shuddered. I finally let go, my release breaking as if a dam had been opened, crashing through me so hard I lost my breath.
It was all over then, but for the feeling of being cast ashore after a storm as I fell against her. Rolling quickly to my side, I wasn’t ready to lose our connection, so I was relieved when she rolled with me. Straddling me, she rested against my chest, and I could feel the warm gusts of her breath against my shoulder.
My heart was stumbling in my chest, emotion threatening to overtake me. I’d come to terms with my heart—I loved Nora, and I didn’t want to lose her again. Yet even facing that truth hadn’t prepared me for how it would feel to be intimate with her when I knew it.
I’d meant what I said earlier when she said I was always in control. I’d never been in control with her, yet I’d been able to fool myself into thinking I was. She’d slipped through the walls I’d built around my heart, and now they were nothing but piles of broken kindling. I felt exposed and raw and was relieved she didn’t seem inclined to talk at the moment. All the same, I would’ve been devastated if she were to pull away.
I slid my fingers through her silky hair, my heartbeat gradually slowing, and a sense of calm settling inside me, finally. When I felt her lift her head, I thought I was prepared, that I wouldn’t let the tears that had threatened moments earlier take over. I wasn’t a man who cried easily. Perhaps I’d known if I ever fell it would be hard to keep the depth of my emotion at bay. Nothing could’ve prepared me for this, though.
She rose up, and I opened my eyes, shifting slightly to prop some pillows behind my back with one arm. Sitting astride me, she looked like an earthy angel. Her dark hair was falling around her shoulders, half covering one of her breasts. Her lips were kiss-swollen and pink, and her dark eyes, like rich espresso, blinked at me.
We stared at each other, and my heart began to kick hard again, making a racket in my chest. I saw a worried flicker in her eyes, and I hated it, hated the hurt she carried. Most of all, I hated that I actually added to the hurt she already held inside. I let my hands slide down her sides, then over the sweet dip of her waist.
“I love you.”
She blinked again, her eyes going wide and her breath catching in a startled hitch in her throat. Her eyes flicked down, and she spread her palm on my chest. I knew she could feel the unsettled rhythm of my heart under her touch, and I didn’t care.
When her lashes lifted again, she looked bashful. “I’m not ready to say that,” she said carefully.
“I know,” I whispered.
What she said next surprised me. “But I feel it.”
We regarded each other quietly, and I slid my hands up her waist again and back down to rest on the silky smooth skin of her thighs. “Can I stay tonight?”
When she nodded, I felt as if I’d