because I want it too much to let it go.
I swallow against a dry throat, “Say it, Clara.”
“Alexander,” she murmurs my name like an incantation and then casts her lovely spell, “I love you.”
I break at her words, erupting into her as she shatters on my cock.
“I love you.” Another surge.
“I love you.” Another.
“I love you.” I collapse at the final spurt, dragging her onto the bed with me, our bodies still entwined. She says it again and again until the spell fades to a whisper and finally gutters out.
A strange sensation grips me as I hold her. I will it to take shape. I carve each letter in that vacant hole in my chest. I bid them to travel up my throat. But they don’t spill out. Others do.
“I will never have my fill of you.” The words are halting and slow—the wrong words. “I crave you, Clara. I crave your body, your taste. Without you…” I can barely bring myself to consider it because I’m in love with her.
I’ll always be in love with her.
“I…I…”
I thrust into her. Once. Twice. Three times. Saying with my body what I can’t with my lips. Clara’s arms twine around me, clinging to my shoulders, as she lifts her mouth to mine, saving me from my efforts. Her sex tightens around my cock, claiming me again. I empty with a roar, pouring all I am into her, giving her every last piece of me.
Hoping it will be enough.
Knowing it never will be.
Clara lies in my arms, our skin slick with sweat. I press a kiss to her shoulder as her stomach grumbles.
“You need to eat,” I murmur.
She twists around, sighing, as she nuzzles my neck. “We already had dinner.”
“I think we might have burned through that already,” I say wryly.
I hesitate before sliding out of bed. We’ve left it a few times. More than once, I’d convinced her to stay, naked and waiting, while I dashed down to the kitchen for water. The truth is that I want to stay here, pinning her to my life, with my cock, with my mouth, with whatever it takes.
Stepping into my jeans, well aware that security teams circle the property on the hour, I start toward the door. As I reach it, Clara shoves back the sheets and gets up. I freeze, dread sluicing through me like icy water. But she tiptoes to the closet and returns wearing nothing but one of my white button-down shirts. Her own clothes are somewhere else. The entry? Stairs? We’d dressed and undressed so many times, I’ve lost track.
She doesn’t bother to button the shirt as she brushes past me with a smile. I don’t relax until she bypasses her crumpled jeans and continues down the stairs. I follow and find her studying the leftover curry from dinner.
“I need to go shopping,” I say, wishing I had more to offer her. “Or we could…”
Her head appears over the fridge door. She holds up a carton. “Do you want some?”
I can’t bring myself to eat, but I nod, worried she might change her own mind if I don’t. She passes me the carton of biryani while I pull two forks from the drawer.
“Do you want to heat it? There’s probably a pan somewhere,” I say.
“This is fine.” She takes a few bites, turning to study the night sky out the window. My shirt falls neatly over her ass, covering more of her from behind. But its hem curves high, revealing the tantalizing swell of her shapely thigh and the curve of her ass.
Her back is to me, so she doesn’t see me abandon the curry on the kitchen counter. I move slowly so as not to startle her and gently place my hand on her hips. Clara releases a contented sigh as I wrap my arms around her.
“What are you looking at?” I ask in a low voice.
“The night. I used to be scared of the dark when I was little. I refused to sleep without a light on,” she admits, leaning the back of her head against my shoulder. “It drove my mother crazy. They went out to dinner one night and came home to every light in the house on.”
“That doesn’t sound unreasonable,” I say, grateful for these tiny glimpses into her life.
“I was fifteen,” she laughs. The sound plants itself in my chest, and suddenly I feel less hollow.
“Oh.” I kiss her ear. “And now? Are you still scared of it?”
She hesitates. “Now? Now, I see it’s