“I made certain everyone understood that I’d stand between you and any punishment of death.” She hadn’t known that.
“I wanted to give you more though.” His voice softened further. “You can open your eyes now, Jess.” She opened her eyes. Her lips parted in shock. There, by the edge of a mountain lake that she had always loved to sketch beside, sat the vision of a house she had sketched so many times.
The house wasn’t large. It wasn’t ostentatious like the one her parents had once possessed. The cabin-style home blended well with the other cabins in the compound, but with a few noticeable differences.
There was a red tin roof rather than plain aluminum. It was a little larger, three bedrooms rather than one. For the children she had dreamed of having with Hawke. She’d dreamed of two. A boy and a girl.
It was exactly as she had described it to him, as she had drawn it so many times.
There was a porch swing on the front porch and areas for flowers along the edge of the porch, and it had been built between the gorgeous oak and pine trees that bordered the lake.
It was breathtaking. Just as she had always envisioned it.
“Hawke.” She turned to him, her lips trembling with emotion.
“I didn’t just know you were my mate, Jessica.” His leather covered hand framed her face. “I knew I loved you. Just as I still love you.”
And he had. Everything he had done, every sacrifice he had made, proved he loved her.
“I never stopped loving you,” she whispered as a tear fell from her eye.
She leaned forward, an irrevocable decision made, one she knew she couldn’t regret, would never regret. This was Hawke. She belonged to him. He belonged to her.
Her lips touched his as his hands gripped her arms in surprise. Her tongue touched his lips as a flare of fear tore through her. What if this wasn’t what he wanted? What he meant?
But it had to be. She couldn’t accept losing him now. She couldn’t accept never having taken this chance.
She licked over his lips with her tongue. As they parted she turned her head, controlling the kiss with experimental passion, her tongue stroking tentatively against his, the spicy-sweet taste of wild lust and desperate hunger exploding against her tongue.
As though the taste of him against her tongue exploded inside him as well, she felt his hand at the back of her head, his tongue pushing against hers as he groaned against her lips and pure erotic need began flashing between them.
Within seconds he had pushed his seat back, pulled her across his lap and taken control of the kiss. His tongue pressed between her lips as she closed them around it, sucking it into her mouth. Her tongue stroked against his, the narcotic taste of him whipping through her system, sizzling through her senses.
The taste of the kiss was as erotic as hell. It was the feel of the kiss, his hand pushing beneath her clothes, the feel of his erection beneath her rear, his tongue stroking against hers. Sensual, sexual. The feel of his body heating against hers, the feel of his heart racing in his chest, his heavy breathing, the deep, dark groan of male need.
It all combined and mesmerized her even before the mating hormone sizzled into her system. She was captivated, arching to him, aching for him even before the sizzle and the heated flames of mating heat began to overtake her.
And then things really got interesting.
SEVEN
Jessica wasn’t certain how they made it into the house. J She remembered him carrying her, his lips on hers, deep, desperate kisses filled with the spicy taste of the mating hormone and the even hotter hunger that had been flaring between them since the day they met.
Love at first sight. And second. And third. And on and on. As though a part of her had known that they were meant to be together, that they were meant for this moment.
She didn’t see much of the house. There were stairs. Most of the cabins were single story; this one was two. The upper story was a loft, she thought. In the center of it was a huge bed covered with a dark, quilted spread. A thick, heavy blanket that cushioned her back as he laid her against it.
She could look at the house later, she told herself. Hopefully much later.
Lying back, she watched as he rose from the bed, his expression dark and drawn with lust as he got to his feet.
His boots were the first to go. He reach down, pulled them off, one after the other, and never took his eyes from her.
Golden eyes locked with hers, eyes filled with promise and passion.
His shirt came next. The buttons were undone quickly, efficiently, revealing his impressive chest as Jessica felt her heart rate increase.
Her entire body was burning now. That was the mating hormone, that burn just under her flesh that only his touch, his kiss, would ease. It was a touch and a kiss that would soon be hers. All hers.