Because when it was just him and me?
There was nothing but the beat of our hearts.
Nothing but the call of our spirits. It was something louder than all the questions. Something bigger than his past. Something higher than our obstacles.
Something fierce rippled as he looked down at me completely naked on my bed.
“Are you sure?” he grated.
My hands fisted in my sheets, my body arching toward him. Needing him in a way I’d never needed anyone before. “I already told you I’m not afraid. You, Rex Gunner, are a chance I’m willing to take.”
“You shouldn’t be real.” It was rough. Just like the man.
I bit my bottom lip, loving when he let me glimpse under all that hardness. “Yet, here I am.”
“And what happens when you’re gone?” There was something so sorrowful in it, a stab right to the center of my chest.
Slowly, I climbed up onto my knees and stretched out my hand. I brushed my fingertips down the side of his rugged face. “And what happens if I stay?”
For a beat, his eyes dropped closed, and he leaned into my touch before he snatched me by the wrist and pressed my palm to his mouth. “And what if I don’t let you leave?”
God, this man. He pushed and pulled. Taunted and tugged.
Slowly he edged back, eying me with those mesmerizing eyes as he kicked off his boots. Without freeing me of his gaze, he unfastened his belt. His abdomen flexed and bowed as he tugged on his fly and lowered the zipper.
Desire swept through my body.
A battering storm.
Anticipation and need.
He nudged the jeans down his legs and took his underwear with them.
He stood there in the shadows that fell into my room.
Completely naked.
Bare.
So beautiful a downpour of desire soaked me through.
I hadn’t been lying to Macy. This man was what gods were made of. Sleek and defined. Carved in hard, indestructible perfection.
All except for the broken pieces I knew he tried to keep concealed, buried deep inside. I saw them so clearly. Held in the depths of those eyes. Those eyes that were looking at me as if maybe I should run if I didn’t want to be devoured.
But I did.
I so desperately did.
He edged forward an inch, big hand splayed across my chest, nudging me down onto the mattress. I was spread across its width, the man towering over me from the side.
I writhed, hips jutting into the air, not caring for a second that I was desperate.
That I needed him.
His touch and his body and that spirit that had already taken me whole. He ran a fingertip down the inside of my thigh. “Last two times I touched you nearly ruined me. Seeing you like this? Don’t think I’m ever going to be the same. Stealing my sleep. Stealing my breath. Stealing my sanity. Little thief.”
Chills flew. A chaos of sensation.
His hands were on my knees, pulling them apart.
I’d never felt so exposed, and I gasped out a shocked breath when he leaned down and gave one long lick up my slit.
He pulled back, and it was almost a smirk that was riding his sexy mouth as he stared down at me, as if he were looking at the sunrise for the very first time. Shifting his attention to my face, he grazed just the tips of his fingers through my folds. “Stunning. Fucking stunning. Feel like I’m in a dream when I’m touching you this way. Like I’m lost in some kind of fantasy and I don’t ever want to wake up.”
Redness flushed across the surface of my skin
“And you . . . you make me feel like I’ve finally found my reality. Like I finally figured out exactly where I’m supposed to be.” A million emotions flashed across his mesmerizing face. Regret and lust and this consuming affection he couldn’t keep contained.
He crawled over me.
Slowly.
Carefully.
I sucked in a staggered breath when the man was suddenly caging me, hands planted on either side of my head, those powerful thighs wedged between mine.
His cock bobbed against my belly, and a shudder ripped through my body.
He sank down onto his elbows, hot hands framing my face. “I don’t understand this, Rynna. The hold you have on me. But when I look at you? Get this feeling that I’m looking at everything right.”
“Rex.” His name was a tremor.
A plea.
He leaned down and kissed me.
He kissed me carefully.
Gently.
Tenderly.
That energy lapped through the air. A slow, steady build. A current stoked by each pass of his tongue, by the heat that sizzled across our flesh, by our hands that explored. I ran my palms across his chest and over his wide shoulders, down the sinewy muscle of his back to his narrow hips.
I wrapped my hand around him, stroking him slow from the base of him to the tip.
He pulled his mouth away from mine. Head tilting back, he released a long groan. “Rynna . . . fuck . . . Rynna.”