her undone. She cried his name. Softly at first. Then louder, not caring one iota if the neighbors heard them. Let them listen. Audrey was high on the feelings gathering inside her, on the delicious pressure building like a storm.
She was close, and he slipped a finger inside her. Oh yes. Yes, yes, yes. The shaking started, and without any restraint at all, she came hard against his mouth.
She barely had a moment to catch her breath as she came down, and he was standing in front of her. “Wait right here.”
The running water masked the sound of him in the bathroom, but he was back in an instant, rolling a condom down his length. Then he grabbed her hands and slid them up the tile until they were pinned above her head. Audrey’s eyes fluttered shut. She held her hands in place, suspended above her, even when he released her to use his hands elsewhere. He found the crook of her knee and lifted her leg up, opening her.
“Ready?” he whispered, lips brushing over her ear.
“Yes.” Her leg came around his waist, and he rubbed against her, shifting into position.
When Ronan pushed inside her, Audrey gasped, her eyes flying open and catching his unwavering blue stare. She felt so seen. So treasured. Her body melted as he buried himself, and in that moment, Audrey felt completely whole.
A woman reborn. A woman with a life that was her own.
“Oh, Ronan,” she sighed.
His lips pressed against hers, and she urged him on by rocking her hips. Matching him. Finding a rhythm between them. They clung to each other—fingers digging into flesh and muscles tightening. She could feel his orgasm gathering in the way his movements became jerkier, more desperate. His eyes never left hers, and his palm came to cup her face. He didn’t shy away from connection, and she loved that about him.
This isn’t love.
But it was something. More than like. More than sex. More than basic instincts.
When Ronan pushed into her for the last time, seating himself deep, the sound he made rocked Audrey to her core. It echoed in her head as she held him close, eyes closed and face pressed against his chest, wishing she could stay with him, here, forever.
Chapter Nineteen
Ronan and Audrey fell into a routine over the course of the next few weeks. He’d visit her most mornings at Kisspresso, and she’d leave messages on his takeout coffee cup. Sometimes it was a word she found interesting or a quote she liked. If she had time, she wrote out a question to test his knowledge.
Twice a week, she stayed late at his place, always creeping out at some obscene hour to make sure she was home when her siblings woke. He worried about her driving so late at night, but Audrey had made it clear she wouldn’t stay. It was a boundary between them, but he respected it and her devotion to her family. Those nights kept him going through long hours of classes, reading academic papers, and toiling over his book. She brought her notes with him, and he shared his lessons with her.
No woman he’d ever dated previously had ever been so interested in the same things as him, but Audrey was a sponge for information.
And it killed Ronan that she wasn’t taking classes at the college anymore, even if that did make it a hell of a lot easier—and less risky—for them to be together. She deserved to do what she wanted with her life, and it was clear that study and learning were the things that excited her most in the world.
He wanted to help her with that.
A knock at the front door snagged his attention, and he gave his pasta sauce a quick stir before setting the heat down low. Audrey wasn’t supposed to be here for another fifteen minutes, since she was finishing her shift at Game of Stones on the hour. And the last time she’d come to visit him, he’d surprised her by giving her a key.
Maybe it seemed crazy. They’d barely been together a month.
Perhaps he’d spooked her. Ronan’s brow furrowed as he went to the door. She’d seemed delighted at the time, but—
As he yanked the front door open, his muscles turned to stone.
“Hi, Ronan.” It wasn’t Audrey at all.
“Merrin.” He couldn’t help the remote tone.
Ronan’s mother stood on the landing outside his apartment, wearing her trademark “artsy” clothing—long, billowy pants and sandals, a linen tunic, beads around her neck, and a resin bangle