He cupped the back of her head. “Suck me, Rowan.”
She didn’t break eye contact as she took the head of his cock in her mouth. The expression on his face made her womb clench and she took more of him.
“I won’t come in your mouth,” he whispered hoarsely. “I need to be in your pussy. I don’t know...how many I can give you.” He dropped his head back on his shoulders and took several deep breaths. As he returned to watching her, he added, “I needed to see your lips around me, feel your hot mouth, your big blue eyes staring up at me. Another unwritten item on my bucket list, you tempting creature.” He tugged gently and she released him.
Scooting back on the bed, she laid down and pulled her hair from underneath her. He let his eyes roam over her before crawling on the bed between her legs. His mouth was level with her breasts and he spent several minutes sucking and massaging them.
Resting his cheek over her heart, he murmured, “So strong in every way.”
Rowan ignored the tears that slipped into her hair. Instead, she focused on etching every second of the experience into her mind.
Her first and last night with her husband.
“Bennett.” He lifted his head and stared at her. “Is there nothing I can do to keep you with me?”
“Not this time, darling. I’m sorry. I know what I’m asking and I wish I could change the outcome.” He gave her a careful smile. “Losing your virginity and your husband in one night is rough.” She gasped and fresh tears fell. “No more tears, my beautiful girl. I promise this will be the last thing I ever ask you to do for me.”
Laughing despite the pain, she told him, “Your humor is atrocious.”
Bennett winked. “I earned money, not laughs.” She stroked her fingers through his hair. “I love you, Rowan.”
“I love you, too.” She tried to smile. “If-if I can’t talk you out of it, maybe we’ll get a miracle. Your heart has surprised us before…”
Turning his head, he kissed her palm. “I found you, you married me, and I received your brilliance, protection, and love...I think I’ve used up all my miracles. It’s your turn for those, Rowan.”
Crushing down her fear, her sadness, and her need to fight for him, she told him, “Make love to me, Bennett.”
He moved up her torso and settled his hips in the cradle of her body. Placing the head of his cock at the entrance of her pussy, he pushed forward carefully.
The pressure made her grit her teeth: then there was more pressure and pain that forced her to squeeze her eyes shut. She whimpered as she worked to regulate her breathing.
“Rowan?” She opened her eyes and focused on Bennett’s. “I’m sorry it hurts. If I move, it will ease.” She nodded. Wrapping his arms under her body, he held her tightly as he made shallow thrusts with his hips. “I’ve never felt anyone so tight, so hot.” He shook his head. “It’s been so long.”
One muscle at a time, Rowan forced herself to relax so she could let her husband in. It was a foreign sensation to have someone inside her but the pain did begin to ease as he moved.
His expression was tight, stressed. She brought his mouth to hers to distract him as much as herself. They kissed for a long time, his cock shuttling gently in and out of her body.
When he raised his head, he smiled. “Better?” She gave a small nod. “Making love to you at last, Rowan. How I have needed you.”
They maintained eye contact and several minutes later, she felt an orgasm building. Her lips parted at how different it felt coming from inside her. Bennett moved one hand around to fondle her nipple and she moaned as her body took over.
“Bennett...yes.”
“I’m going to fill you up, Rowan. I can’t hold back anymore.” Then he was gasping for air, his muscles tight, as liquid heat flooded her pussy. “More. I don’t want to stop.”
He rolled them and she found herself on top. “Keep going, Rowan. I need to feel more.” Hands on her hips, he showed her the movement and sighed as she settled into a rhythm. “Yes. God, yes.”
His palms cupped her breasts. “A child to love, a brilliant future running an organization that’s already flourishing in your care, and charging into the unknown as fearlessly as you always have. That’s my wish for you, Rowan.”
She noted a breathlessness in his voice but hid her terror.
“A-a life lived passionately where you never settle for less than you deserve...and only do what makes you happy...what serves the most delicate pieces of you that you hide from the world.”
Running her hands over his chest, she whispered, “I wanted you to share it with me.”
“If there’s a heaven, mine will be seeing you embrace knowledge, laughter, and love with every cell in your body.” She frowned. “You’re young and you can’t spend the rest of your life grieving.”
“Bennett…” She wept bitterly even as she worked her body on his cock. Through her tears, she admitted, “I want my heart to stop beating when yours does, Bennett.”
“That would destroy what I love most in the world. Your spark is what drew me to you. I need you to continue to live…and one day love again. You need to give love to survive.” He stroked her skin. “You must go on, Rowan.” She shook her head and cried harder. “Swear you’ll try.”
“No, Bennett. Please don’t ask me.” Her voice broke and her tears fell to his chest.
He sat up and wrapped her in his arms, holding her still. “All of this is going to be hard for you. I know that, Rowan.” He brought her face to his for a kiss and she held him as hard as she could. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”
The truth of what was happening washed over her like a tidal wave and she moaned, “I need you. Don’t you understand how much I need you?”
“Breathe, darling. Ssh. Breathe for me.” They held each other and he rubbed her back. Against her hair, he said, “Be open to love if it comes to you. You’re too young to spend your life grieving. It will give me peace if I know you’ll try.”
She sat up. “No one will ever compare to you.”
“Naturally,” he replied with a wink and she released a watery laugh. He dried her tears, stroked her hair back from her forehead, and smiled. “That doesn’t mean there can’t be a runner up.” Leaning back, she placed her palm over his heart and felt how it raced erratically. “Don’t. Don’t think about it, Rowan.”
Staring into his eyes, she nodded slowly. Nudging him to lay back down, she held herself over him on her arm. He was still hard and she knew it wasn’t natural with the state of his heart and the medications he’d been on for years.
“Bennett?” She stroked her fingers through his hair.
“Yes, darling?”
“Take everything from me as if it isn’t the last time.” She stared into his eyes and started to move again. “Let me give you what you need.”
He put his hand over her breast and settled his fingers of his other over her clit. Moaning his name, she maintained a steady rhythm like she did when she ran. Beads of sweat formed on Bennett’s skin and the color started to drain from his face.
She focused on the way he felt in her, on her, and let the pleasure build and build. The climax felt different in the new position and she gasped from the power of it.
Bennett gripped her hips and released his control, coating her with his seed as he roared her name into their silent bedroom.
Gasping, he said, “Don’t stop, Rowan. Don’t stop.”
She kept going.
His heart was like a hammer in his chest but she kept going because she finally - truly - understood what he wanted. It would break her to give it to him but for the love they shared, for the man who earned her devotion, she would.
“Yes, Rowan. Yes. Love me through it. I’ll take your love with me, darling. It will be like armor around me.” Her tears never stopped but she kept going, kept loving him. “You don’t know how you saved me. You can’t know how I love you.” He came high and hot in her body a third time and it was like a miracle of a different kind.
To let go of his life in her arms.
“I love you, Bennett. I love you more than I love myself.” She could be strong enough to give the man she loved the choice of how and when his life ended. “You’re the best man I’ve ever known and I’ll love you forever.”
His hand shook as he lifted it to her chest. “This heart is big enough to love more than one person, Rowan.” His voice was strained as he stared into her eyes. “I’m not afraid. Thank you for loving me and letting me love you as long as I could. My beautiful, fearless Rowan.”
She kept moving, crying brokenly. He dropped his hands to her thighs and kept his eyes locked on her face.
When his heart stopped, when he exhaled his last breath, there was a smile on his lips.
Chapter Eleven
Rowan dropped over Bennett’s chest, holding him with her entire body and sobbing hard enough that she thought her own heart truly would stop.
“I’m not ready. I’m not strong enough! Don’t leave me, Bennett. I need you. I love you...please.”
Then James was there, pulling a robe over Rowan’s nakedness as he wept, too. He crouched beside the bed.
Her cheek on Bennett’s still chest, Rowan stroked her fingers through her husband’s soft hair and kept her eyes closed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. Come back. P-please don’t leave me alone, Bennett. Please don’t leave me alone.”
After a few minutes, James stood and moved to lift her off of Bennett’s body. Rowan fought him violently.
“Leave me here! No, James!”
“You can’t go with him, Rowan. Bennett wanted you to live and you promised. Remember your promise to him.”
“I’m not ready! No!”
The bodyguard held her shoulders. “Rowan, ssh. Bennett is gone and I need to move you. I swore an oath to protect you. I can’t leave you like this. He wouldn’t want this.”
A shudder so hard it hurt rocked through her and reality filtered through her grief.
Nodding slowly, she leaned forward to kiss Bennett’s lips one last time as she held his head. “I miss you already. No one will ever understand this. I don’t understand this. I love you, Bennett. Despite what I’ve done, I love you.”
Rowan’s soul wrenched in denial as their bodies were separated from one another. She released an agonized wail as James wrapped her tightly in the robe and pulled the blankets over Bennett’s groin as he fully lifted her.
With Rowan in his arms, he walked to the door and tapped it twice with the toe of his shoe. It opened immediately and she thought she glimpsed a sobbing Mary-Margaret behind three men in uniforms.
Hysteria welled up inside Rowan and she started to scream. “I didn’t stop it. I didn’t stop it! I l-let him die. Bennett…”
James walked rapidly to her old room across the hall and held her as she was injected with a sedative by one of the uniformed men.
“Rest, Rowan. You need rest before dealing with anything else. I’ll watch over you. Just sleep.”
* * *
Confused when she opened her eyes, morning sunlight filtered through the sheers in her old room.
The one Rowan slept in before she married Bennett.
Everything from the night before slammed into her brain and she released a keening cry of pain. Shoving back the blankets, she realized she was naked and quickly gathered the robe around her that James had wrapped her in the night before.
Throwing open the door to the hall, she ignored James as he called her name. She stopped in the center of the master suite, shaking violently.
The bed was empty and made with fresh sheets. Their clothes from the night before were gone. The world tilted.
“Bennett…?”
“Rowan,” James said softly behind her. “They took him to be prepared for the funeral.”
Falling to her knees, she released wracking sobs with her hands over her face. “No, no, no…”
Then Miss Jeffries was in front of her. “Sweet girl. It’s gonna be okay. Let me help you, Rowan.”
“I-I let him go. I should have held on. I should have fought for him...he would have fought for me. I k-killed him as surely as if I put a bullet in his brain.”
“No, honey. That’s not how it was. That’s what your mind is tellin’ you in your grief but that don’t make it so.”
James brought a chair and helped Miss Jeffries lower to it. She reached out to take Rowan’s hand.
“Bennett was tired and he loved you so much. He told Mary-Margaret and James that it was his choice and he wanted to be with you when he took his final breath on this earth. He said nobody would see him through to the other side like the angel he married.”
Rowan’s throat felt as if she’d swallowed ground glass. “I’m not an angel...I’m a horrible person.”
“Everyone knows that’s not true and you’ll realize it once some time goes by and the shock of it all fades a bit. We need to get you in the shower and into some fresh clothes. Let me help you, Rowan.”
Her eyes stared at the carpet and her vision blurred. “Miss Jeffries...m-my Bennett is gone.”
“I know it and I’m so sorry. I never saw anybody love as hard as you loved that man. You loved him from the first to the last and he knew that, Rowan. He knew.”
For several minutes, she stared at the floor and tried to form a single rational thought. Nothing came. One thought repeated over and over.
You killed him.
You killed him.
You killed him.
James touching her elbow startled a scream from her. Blinking, she met Miss Jeffries’ eyes in front of her. Turning her head, she stared at the man Bennett had loved like a son.
“Forgive me, James. I didn’t mean it.”
“No, Rowan. You gave him peace. You gave him something only you could have. He refused to back down once he made the decision. He swore me to secrecy - and Mary-Margaret - so he could soak up every minute of the last days with you without his pending death in your mind.”
“I never would have hurt him, James.”
“I know that, sweetheart.”
“I don’t know what to do now.”
“One thing at a time. First, we get you off the floor.” He lifted her easily to her feet. Wrapping her in a hug, he whispered, “One thing done. You can do this, Rowan. Bennett said you were the strongest person he’d ever met. Show the world the powerful will that kept him with us so much longer than we dared to hope.”
She whimpered in pain.
Leaning back, he murmured, “Second, a shower. Miss Jeffries will stay with you. Third, put on some soft, comfortable clothes. Then we’ll go from there.”
Nodding, Rowan walked to the bathroom she’d shared with Bennett in a daze. In her head, she recited one task at a time.
Wash your hair.
Wash your body.
Dry off.
Brush your teeth.
Holding her towel around her, she walked to her closet and selected panties, soft leggings, and a t-shirt. Her body hurt too bad to wear a bra or tie her shoes.
Stepping into fuzzy slippers Bennett bought her to wear on the cold marble floors, she left her closet. Miss Jeffries nudged her into a chair and combed through her hair. She braided two plaits to pull it back from her face.
When the elderly woman patted her shoulder, she stood and walked numbly to the hall. Miss Jeffries stayed with her but Rowan couldn’t speak.
James waited just outside the door for her. “You’re doing so well. Let’s go downstairs and get you something to eat.”
She started to walk to the elevator and gasped. James supported her weight as she half-stumbled down the stairs.
Her tears just fell and fell. She didn’t think they’d ever stop. Mary-Margaret waited for her in the foyer on the first floor.
“I’m sorry, Mary-Margaret. Please don’t h-hate me.”
The tiny woman gathered
her in a hug. “So much grief and now guilt on top of it. I loved Bennett like a little brother but I warned him what this would do to you. You didn’t do anything wrong and we’re going to keep saying it until you believe it.”
Rowan felt like the world was spinning. James and Mary-Margaret stayed beside her, leading her to the dining room. There were other people in the room but she didn’t have the strength to look at them.
Miss Jeffries lowered into a chair beside her as a plate of incredible food was placed in front of Rowan by a member of the staff. She didn’t get the chance to thank them.
Shoving away from the table, Rowan barely made it to the closest bathroom before throwing up the bile in her stomach. James held her hair as she dry-heaved for almost a minute.
“One thing at a time. That’s all we can do, Rowan.”
She nodded and took the glass of water he handed her with a shaking hand, rinsing and spitting several times. He lifted her to her feet and braced her as she washed her hands and face.
“Where is he, James?”
“At the funeral home. They’ll bring him back to be interred on the estate in three days.”
Closing her eyes, Rowan focused on not screaming. The thought of strangers touching her husband’s body made her stomach churn again.
“What do I need to do?”
“I sent your favorite suit. Bennett insisted it be that one. He wanted to be buried with the cufflinks you gave him for your first anniversary and the prayer pendant you bought him in Tibet. He asked that I give you his wedding ring.”
Reaching into his pocket, he removed the simple platinum band Bennett had worn. Rowan took it and slipped it over her thumb but it was still too big.
“I-I’ll need to use a chain. I don’t want to lose it.” Inhaling deeply, she leaned on the counter in the half-bath and thought it was a strange place to discuss such important things. “What else?”
“The lawyers for the organization want to meet with you in a few weeks to transfer authority officially into your hands. Samuel Fields is watching things until you’re ready.”
Coming Home: The Damaged Series - Book Three Page 10