Take the Chance (Top Shelf Romance #9) - Brittainy Cherry Page 0,201

and coaxing and touching inside me came apart like an explosion. My entire body stiffened; I arched into him, opened my body to him, a scream wrenched out of me as the orgasm rocketed up from where we were joined.

“Yes,” he groaned, his thrusts slower now, hard and deep. “Come for me, Darlene. Just like that…Christ, you’re so beautiful.”

And in my ecstatic delirium, I realized I was going to be his first orgasm in almost a year.

He waited until me.

I held his face in my hands reverently, kissed his broad mouth deeply. “Now you,” I whispered against his lips. “Come for me, Sawyer. Come inside me.”

I felt his own body tense, every one of his taut muscles drawing tighter. His hipbones ground against mine, he was so deep in me. I pressed myself into his last thrusts, nails digging into his ass to hold him tight. He let go of my leg to brace himself on the bed, his other hand gripping my hip to push into me. His mouth found my neck, and he bit down, danced the line between pleasure and pain, and came against me, inside me, the masculine sounds of his release breathing hotly against my throat.

I wrapped my arms around him as he shuddered, wound my fingers in his hair, and held him as the tension in him ebbed and our chests met and retreated, over and over, like a tide, as we caught our breaths together.

“Holy hell,” Sawyer groaned into my neck.

“I know,” I said. My fingers curled in his hair. The aftershocks of the orgasm made me shudder against him. “Oh my God, feel that?”

He nodded against my shoulder. “Everywhere. I feel you everywhere.”

I held him tighter, his beautiful body that was warm, soft skin, over hard muscle and power he had unleashed against me so magnificently.

After a time, Sawyer lifted his head to look at me blearily, drunk with the pleasure and utterly spent. I was sure I looked the same—my hair a tangled mess with strands falling over my face and billowing with my breath. Sawyer’s eyes sharpened as his hand came up to brush them away.

“Darlene…”

He fought for more words but found none.

“Just kiss me,” I said, and he did.

And in that kiss, I felt his emotions he still hadn’t found the words for, but knew that he would. We had time now, and the freedom to be happy. His heart that he had kept locked away for so long was mine. He gave it to me in every soft look, and touch, and in the trust he placed in me to care for his little girl.

And in return, I gave him my entire self; I didn’t know how to give less. I loved him with all of me, even the tarnished parts that would always bear the bruises of my past.

“I love you, Sawyer.” I stroked his cheek. “Always. I won’t ever stop loving you.”

“I love you,” he whispered. “I love you, Darlene. God, I love you. I don’t want to stop saying it. I can’t say it enough.”

His eyes were dark and beautiful in the dimness, and I loved how I look reflected there. And it was real, his love; not something my lonely heart had manufactured to hold on to, and I knew I’d feel this way, like I did in that moment, forever.

Chapter 29

Sawyer

Again and again, I had her.

We spent the night making love, ravenous like wild animals, and everything in between. We stopped to catch our breath; I brought us water, we talked a little and laughed a lot, but inevitably, the gentle touches of Darlene’s hand in my hair, or mine gliding down the softness of her skin would make us greedy. Like a flare sparking to life, we’d fall back in a sweaty tangle of arms and legs, grasping at skin, her nails raking down my back, my mouth kissing her everywhere. I couldn’t get enough of touching her body or listening to her come undone beneath me, over and over again. It was a celebration of our victories that lasted long into the night, and finally ceased when dawn’s first light filtered in through the window.

And, miracle of miracles, Olivia slept through the whole thing.

As we lay in the drowsy silence of the morning, my body heavy and spent, I heard Olivia make a little sound in her sleep, through the baby monitor, but she didn’t wake.

“She usually wakes up at least once per night,” I said. “This is a first. Not