tongue mated with mine as he pumped his hips. He broke the kiss to take a breath, his eyebrows together, his lips peeled over his teeth.
“God,” he said, and it sounded reverent rather than blasphemous. I put my hands on his face and his eyes popped open, his focus unwaveringly on me.
What I saw in his eyes floored me. Naked vulnerability. I didn’t want to lose him. Not for a second.
“Look at me when you come,” I instructed, holding his jaw.
He smirked. “You first.”
He pushed into me harder. Deeper. I cried out.
“Rena.” My name rolling off his lips was as good as any three-word pronouncement. I was still shaking from my climax.
I focused on his dark blues as fireworks exploded between us. His lips on mine, he continued stroking into me. I wrapped my ankles around his back and held tight, feeling the orgasm climb his body.
When his release hit him he tensed, his eyes on mine, my name on his lips, and I knew.
He belonged to me.
Chapter Seventeen
Devlin
After the best sex of my life, I used the last of my energy to burrow beneath my comforter, Rena’s ass against my front, my arm wrapped around her waist, her breast in my hand. I slept so hard that a seismic earthquake wouldn’t have woken me.
By morning, her hair was tickling my nose, and her nose rattled with a soft snore.
“Hey,” I whispered, laughing.
She barely stirred. “Mmph.”
“Hey.” I smoothed her hair out of my face, and she rolled away, mumbling incoherently. I lay facing her, my smile glued on. She’d come to mean a lot to me in a short time. A novelty for a guy like me. So was sharing my bed with someone.
Warmth unfurled in my chest despite the cooler air of the bedroom.
Eyes still shut, Rena asked, “Why are you awake?”
Her grouchy-slash-sleepy voice was even cuter than her waking one. I’d morphed into a romantic sap overnight, apparently.
“Because the bedroom is filled with sunshine,” I answered.
Her lashes fluttered and then she pinned me with bourbon-colored eyes. My heart lurched like a drunk hobo. She was more beautiful this morning than I’d ever seen her. Her petal-soft lips parted and then I knew it wasn’t her that had changed.
It was me.
This morning a future stretched out in my mind. I couldn’t see the end, didn’t want to, and had no idea where the path might lead. But I knew where it didn’t lead.
I wouldn’t end up like Sonny—washed up. Lonely. Claiming to help people while breaking the law. I couldn’t go back to that life. Not when a new one waited for me.
I tickled my fingertips along Rena’s arm. “We did my second favorite activity in this bed last night.”
She smiled sleepily. “Did it involve me holding on to the headboard?”
Deadpan, I replied, “Okay, we did my third favorite activity in this bed last night.”
“And what was that?” Her light laughter made me feel ten feet tall.
“Sleep.”
For a long while we simply smiled and looked into each other’s eyes. Until her smile faded. “Sonny said you walked away.”
I didn’t want to talk about Sonny. About any of it.
“I’m worried about you.” She grasped my hand. “Are you in danger?”
“Don’t worry about me.” I kissed her palm and started to get up, overwhelmed by the conversation. I didn’t want her to spend a second worrying about me. And I didn’t want to share my “feelings,” especially since I wasn’t sure how the fuck I felt about anything.
You know.
Okay, I didn’t want to acknowledge how the fuck I felt about anything.
She squeezed my hand and whispered, “Try, Dev. Try not to run away when emotions run deep.”
Was she not paying attention last night? I’d been drowning in emotions. Drowning in her. And I’d stayed curled around her in this bed all night. And all morning. That was big for me. Huge.
But I couldn’t say any of that so instead I said, “I like when you call me Dev.”
Her smile was cute, knowing. “Come here.”
She held up the blankets. Her naked body was a good way to get me to comply. I caved, pulling the blankets over both of us and facing her, my head on my pillow. I was as ready as I’d ever be for this discussion.
“You left Sonny,” she prompted.
I swallowed and forced my answer through numb lips. “Yeah.”
She touched my chest. Comforted, I rested my hand over hers.
“For me?”
Yes, for her. For us. For a future that involved us building the life my parents never got to live.