‘You.’
He clenched his teeth, knowing that it was madness but more than willing to lose himself to such a delicious insanity.
‘Then take what you need,’ he growled. ‘Take me.’
The temptation in her eyes inflamed his need, but still she held back.
‘If this is about pity—’
‘Pity?’ he echoed, taking her hand and pressing it against the length of his arousal, so eager for her touch it jumped beneath the heat of her palm. ‘Does that feel like pity to you?’
Freya shook her head, shocked to silence by the feel of him in her hand. Wicked heat crept up her spine, licking and laving its way across her skin. A desperate need built and stretched, filling her so completely there was no thought of anything else.
Take what you need.
Could she? Could she lose herself in him?
No. She could never use him like that, just as he hadn’t been able to consider anything but willing participation the night before. But neither of those things were happening now. She might not want to name it, not be ready to acknowledge the ties weaving between and around them, but it was definitely more than a distraction.
He had offered her solace. A solace that required trust. And she knew in that moment that she trusted Kjell more than anyone else in the world, no matter what had happened in the past.
Her fingers flexed around the deliciously familiar shape in her hand. Because, no matter what she’d told herself during the waking hours, no matter how much she thought she’d removed Kjell from her life, her night-time fantasies had always betrayed the truth. She had never forgotten him.Anyof him.
She felt him tense against the wave of need that rippled through his body. His thigh muscles braced against an instinctive desire to move towards her.
‘Freya.’ Her name on his lips was a prayer, a curse, a warning she paid absolutely no heed to. Instead, it was one she welcomed. He had offered himself to her but, like him, she wasn’t interested in anything less than willing participation.
She gripped him through the soft material of his workout joggers, the heat of him flooding into her skin even through the material, her thighs clenching at the thought of him entering her, sliding deep into her welcoming heat, a thought made even more sensually torturous by the knowledge of the pleasure she knew he could bring.
His hands fisted, knuckles white, and she knew she was pushing him towards a line in the sand. He was only doing this for her. But she didn’t want to be the pyre on which he threw himself. They had both sacrificed enough. And the only way she knew to bring him into this was to push. And push and push. If they were going to break, then it would be the most exquisite way to shatter.
She raised up on her tiptoes and pressed an open-mouthed kiss against his firm lips. Her chest pressed against his, the stiff peaks of her nipples indulging in the delicious friction of her jumper and his T-shirt. Her tongue laved against the thick, full bottom lip and nipped gently at it until his mouth opened for her. But, instead of sweeping into his mouth, just as she sensed his capitulation, she drew back, her body, her soul hating her for it.
‘Why are you teasing me?’ he whispered, her heart nearly crippled by the vulnerability of his question.
She took a breath, hoping to hell that her next words were rally rather than retreat.
‘Because I wantyou.Not the dutiful soldier.’
Just like that the heat in his eyes flamed out and she thought she’d lost him. Until he pulsed in her palm and she gasped. He gave her one more second to luxuriate in the feel of him, the strength of his needfor her,and then batted her hand away, stalking forward and forcing her to step back. Again and again until she was pressed up against the work bench that ran along the edge of the room.
This predatory male was so different from the younger Kjell she had known, but absolutely no less dangerous to her senses. This.Thiswas what she’d wanted. What she’d seen glimpses of in the last few days. This was what made her feel like a woman.
Her heart pounded in her throat as if it wanted to leave her body and meld with Kjell’s. He pinned her with a lethal focus that was nothing short of an adrenaline injection straight to her heart. Her skin was on fire from the layers and layers of outdoor clothing that felt constricting to the point of painful.
Their breaths comingling in the narrow space between them, he reached up to the scarf and slowly slid it from around her neck. She gripped the bench behind her, holding herself up, holding herselfback.
He cocked his head to one side as if daring her to stop him.
She didn’t. She couldn’t.
His gaze dropped to her lips and she bit down instinctively, enthralled when she saw his swift inhalation. One final step brought his chest against hers, her breasts finding purchase against his body and delighting in the friction. Eyes still on her lips, his hands gripped the heavy-duty material of her borrowed jacket, as if torn between using it to pull her to him or pushing it from her body.
And then, finally, as if giving up the fight, his head bent to hers and he feasted on her lips. Her heart soared and her soul cried out for more as she opened to his possession, welcomed it, needed it. His lips demanded it all. This kiss was like nothing they’d ever shared before; it was a rending of the past, the present and the future all in one.
Pulling back from the kiss, he looked as shocked as she felt. Her breath shook in her lungs. ‘I thought I was supposed to take what I needed,’ she said, her voice trembling with desire, a shiver of want rippling down her spine and sheening her skin with need.
‘You were taking too damn long—’ his words short and sharp ‘—I’m just going to have to give you what you need.’