Her breath hitched again, like she was fighting back sobs, and my chest wanted to crack open. She’d come here all alone? Faced this all alone? Of course she had. She’d faced everything in life all alone. It was the only thing she knew.
God only knew what had happened in there. I knew a lot about what was wrong with their mother from what Aidan had told me. Memory loss, health problems, a change in personality—it must be hard for Ava to see. Even though she’d been a mother who had been distant and not very loving, she didn’t deserve to get sick this way. And Ava didn’t deserve this either.
“It’s over now,” I said, putting my hand over Ava’s. “I’ll drive you back to the hotel.”
Ava ignored my tug on her hand. “She didn’t know me,” she said, rain running down her cheeks. “I kept talking to her like an idiot, hoping she would remember. She would tune out, and then she’d ask me who I was again. Then she got angry. She said I couldn’t be her daughter, because she didn’t have a daughter. She said…” Ava wiped the water from her cheeks, but the rain just wet them again. “She said that she never had a second child. She had an abortion instead.”
Jesus Christ. “Ava,” I said.
Ava shrugged again, that gesture that contained so much angry hurt. “In her mind, she’s leading a different life now. One where she got what she wanted. One where I never existed at all.”
This time, she let me tug her hand. I stood up and gently pulled her to standing, then led her to the car. I put her in the passenger side and got in the driver’s side.
“I’m dripping on your nice leather,” she said as I pulled away from the hospital.
“I don’t care,” I said.
She was quiet for the rest of the ride. I drove to the Langham and let a valet take the car as I walked her inside. She didn’t protest, only followed me in silence. I could feel the grief coming off of her, the confusion and exhaustion. She didn’t want to talk, to listen to me try to console her or lie to her about how everything was going to be okay. She didn’t want any words at all right now. I knew what that felt like, so I stayed silent.
In her hotel room, I took her raincoat from her and went to the bathroom for a towel. I came back and dabbed her face, her hair, her hands. I dried off her wet cell phone and put it aside. “Your skirt is soaked,” I said.
In response she slid her arms around my waist and leaned against me, tucking her face against my neck.
In an instant, my body was on fire. Ava smelled like rain and tears and vanilla, and her arms were warm around me, her breath soft against my skin. I could feel the pressure of her breasts against my chest, and all I wanted was her. I wanted to strip everything off of her and feel every inch of her skin, make her breathe and moan and forget every bad thing that had happened to her. Make her forget everything except me and how I felt inside her. She’d just been through hell, and that was the only thing I fucking wanted.
She shivered a little, and I felt it. She was still chilled from the rain. I put my arms around her and rubbed my hand up her back, between her shoulder blades and up the back of her neck. I was trying to be comforting, but there was no way she didn’t feel how hard I was in my jeans. Ava shivered again and I pulled her tighter. She shifted against me, and she pressed her hips against mine. She could definitely feel me, and she wasn’t shying away—instead, she was moving closer.
She pressed in to me again, tilting her chin so she was looking up at me. I stilled with my arms around her, making a last effort to be a gentleman. Ava sighed against my skin, and then with deliberate intent, her hands lifted the hem of my hoodie and T-shirt and her palms slid along my bare back.
I knew Ava. She was hurt and she was damaged, she was looking for comfort, but that wasn’t all this was. She’d never been weak or needy, at least with me. This had been building up for days, and it wasn’t going to be stopped now. She didn’t want it to, and neither did I.
I tilted her chin and kissed her, taking her mouth deep and hard. Ava kissed me back, taking everything I gave her and asking for more as her hands curled against my skin. Her nails scraped me lightly and the blood pulsed thick in my veins at the sensation, the feel of how badly she wanted me. My teeth scraped her lip, she pushed up the hem of my shirt, and then we were on fire.
I was done waiting. I was done playing.
It was time to get what I wanted, no matter what the cost would be.
Seventeen
Ava
* * *
I wanted him, and it was the only thing I cared about anymore. The only thing that mattered was Dane Scotland putting his hands on me. His scent, the feel of him, the scrape o
f his beard on my skin and his big body against mine. The only thing that mattered was that I get naked and get this man inside of me as soon as possible.
He didn’t argue that I was upset, that I wasn’t thinking right. I was thinking right, maybe for the first time in eleven years. The pain I’d just been through, as harrowing as it was, had stripped away a lot of my lies and self-deceptions. It had robbed me of my defenses and rubbed me raw. It hurt—I’d have scars—but alongside the pain came a strange kind of truth. I didn’t just want comfort or a few minutes without the pain. I wanted Dane—only him, all of him. And I was going to have him.
His hands were on my waist, my hips, then my breasts. He paused only for a second as I pulled his shirt and hoodie off over his head, dropping them to the floor, and then he unzipped my dress and let it fall. He took my wrist and led me to the bedroom.
We were naked in seconds, and it was easy. So perfect. Why had I ever thought this was hard? Why had I ever stressed about what my body looked like or wondered whether a man would like it? I couldn’t remember what that felt like right now, with Dane pressing me back against the bed, his big hands moving my thighs apart as he dipped his head between my legs. I couldn’t remember what it was like not to feel sexy, like a goddess. I couldn’t remember what it felt like not to be confident. Dane’s thumbs pressed into my inner thighs and his mouth came down on me, and my fists gripped the sheets as my back arched and I pressed down on him. Pressed against his mouth, wanting more, harder, right now. This man knew every inch of me, and he was proving it right now as his tongue slid over my wet folds and his beard rubbed my skin and his thumbs pressed me. I closed my eyes as the sensation washed over me, and I let go.
It was everything I wanted, everything I needed. Dane knew how fast to go, how deep to go, how to use his amazing fingers. How to make me build until I was gripping his hair and gasping his name. And then, when I was completely lost, he knew how to make me come so hard my whole body shuddered and my back lifted off the bed.
I dropped limp, panting, but we weren’t done. Dane kissed my lower belly, my hipbone, then moved up my body, his tongue tracing a line on the underside of my breast. His mouth fixed on my nipple and I groaned, the sensation almost too much. He moved to my other nipple and then I was wet again, a pulse low in my belly. I was aching for him. I’d been aching for him since he answered the door that first time, but only now was I willing to admit it.
He kissed my neck and then my mouth, and I wrapped my legs around him, pulling him down against me. Dane was bigger now, his body heavier with muscle, his weight pressing me into the bed in the most delicious way. But he was careful with me, keeping his weight on his arms, lowering gently until his hard stomach was against mine, the hairs on his chest rubbing my oversensitized breasts. He broke the kiss and moved his hips against me, his cock rubbing through my wet folds, long and slow. I wrapped my arms around his lean waist, gripping his ass, and our gazes locked.