My eyes floated closed. His need for me was so intense it nearly overwhelmed me. But I knew precisely how he felt—the same need drove me. Made me want to smash into him, grind my body against his, bring him close and then closer still. My hands worked open his jeans, unzipping them, freeing his cock. The aching desire to be filled by him spread to every bone, every nerve, every cell. I ran my hand along his hard length, thrilling at the feel—the skin so damn soft, while he was so incredibly hard.
Then his hands grabbed my ass, and I let go of him. In seconds he’d lifted me, wrapped my legs around his waist, and tugged my panties to the side.
“Michael, do I have to be quiet?”
He shook his head as he rubbed his cock against my wetness, sending an electrical charge through me. “I don’t care who knows that you’re in heaven when I fuck you.” He eased inside me, and that current surged, igniting me, crackling through my being. My head fell back, and I moaned. Loudly.
Heaven.
That was precisely what this was. Sex with Michael was a faraway land of ecstasy, of endless fiery pleasure. “It’s so good, there’s no way I can be quiet,” I murmured.
“Then moan. Cry. Scream. It doesn’t matter to me. Fucking you is something only I get to do, and I don’t care who knows how completely consumed you are.”
“I am. I am consumed.”
His fingers dug into my ass as he thrust. Deeper. Harder. Farther.
He pumped, swiveling his hips, pushing, his cock moving in sharp jabs that sent ripples of desire everywhere. Each one was more powerful than the last. He dipped his face to my neck, whispering my name as he fucked me. Whispering kisses across my skin that made me shiver. That made me burn. “You knew it would be like this with us, right?”
I nodded on a breathless pant as he stroked inside me. “Yes, I knew.”
His breath came fast, ragged against my skin. “I can’t hold back from wanting you like this. From fucking you everywhere. From making you come.”
His hips moved in relentless thrusts, and my back slammed against the wood. My body sought more of him, chasing the release. “Michael,” I groaned. “I need to come so badly.”
“Come on me, my love,” he said, and I knew from his pace, from the low timbre of his voice, that his climax was imminent too. I knew also from this deep, exquisite ache in my body, and most of all from the mad fury in my heart, that he was fucking me into falling all the way. That his words and his deeds and his care and his love made it impossible not to fall for him again.
With his dirty voice in my ear, I broke. My orgasm crashed over me, swept through me, stole my senses.
I cried out.
He grunted, with a deep, powerful thrust. His climax followed mine, our bodies shuddering, our hearts beating fast. A minute later he lowered me, holding my waist, letting me find my land legs again.
When I did, I cupped his cheeks and looked deeply in his eyes. “I’m falling.”
He sighed happily, as if I’d taken the weight of the world off his shoulders. His eyes shimmered with something that looked like joy. “Then I’ll catch you.”
I pressed my face to his jawline, rubbing my cheek against his stubble, terrified and elated at the same damn time.
Terrified that now that I loved again, I could lose again, and that my heart couldn’t be put back together a second time.
60
Michael
We crossed the Seine on the walk to my hotel, stopping to gaze at the slate-gray river and the city unfolding on each side. Fog drifted over the water, curling like smoke as night fell on Paris. Streetlamps cast their halo glow on the sidewalks.
My trip only lasted four days, and was fast coming to an end. Too fast. I was quickly learning there would never be enough time with Annalise. I’d booked a hotel room for this first visit, not wanting to presume I’d stay at her place, and we’d spent our nights at the hotel together and our days traveling across the city, our own little vacation.
It was a dream come true.
Especially when Annalise tilted her face to look at me, a sweet smile on her red lips. “How are we going to do this, Michael?”
I brushed a thumb across her cheek. Not touching her was impossible. “Like we’ve been doing,” I said, since I wasn’t going to let time zones be an issue.
“Does the distance scare you?”
I shook my head. “Nothing scares me now that you’re back in my life.”
“I don’t want us to fall apart. I don’t want us to lose touch,” she said, gripping my shirt. “I want a chance with you. A real chance.”
“We’ll make this work. You’ll come see me, I’ll come see you, and we’ll meet in the middle.”
She grinned, her bright smile lighting up her emerald eyes. “We will meet in the middle.”
A glass display case stacked with chocolate tartes, raspberry cakes, and flaky croissants beckoned to me. Across from the hotel, the Roussillon bakery had long lines, but boasted the arrondissement’s speediest bakers, or so Annalise had told me. “The line moves quickly.”
“Good. Because I’m hungry. You keep me working hard all night long,” I said with a wink.
She nudged me. “And you love my workouts.”
“I do. And right now, I’d love breakfast,” I said, my mouth watering as I surveyed the shelves of baked goods, from baguettes and rolls to éclairs and strawberry pastries.
When we reached the cashier, Annalise ordered a baguette and a coffee éclair. The woman stuffed a loaf into a white paper bag, then wrapped an éclair in paper and twisted the ends.
“Pour vous?” she asked me.
“I would like an apricot tarte and a yogurt,” I said in my best French. I was rewarded with a grin and the treat.
Outside, we parked ourselves at a small wooden table.
“Now the test. You hate coffee, but do you like coffee éclairs?”
“Let’s find out.”
As a cool breeze blew by and a hint of gray swelled the sky, she slid the éclair to me. I bit into it, savoring the sweetness. I hummed around the flaky pastry, and wiggled my eyebrows.
“So that’s a yes?”
I nodded. “Big yes. You keeping a list of my favorite things?”
“Perhaps I am,” she said, and my heart thumped harder, simply because she’d truly wanted to know. She’d followed through. She was curious about my everyday wants and wishes.
We traded bites of the tarte, shared the yogurt, and pulled off chunks of bread as Parisians strolled by on a Sunday morning. Soon the sky darkened, and raindrops splashed across the cobbled sidewalk.
We tossed the remnants of our late breakfast into a trash can, and I offered her a hand. “You know what’s good to do in the rain?”
“I do,” she said, cupping my cheeks and kissing me as the world around us turned gray and wet and cool.
I moved my lips to her ear. “You smell like falling rain.”
“Do you like it?”
“I love it,” I said, lacing my fingers through her hair and inhaling her, so glad I didn’t have to rely on a letter to get my fix.
She pulled back to look at me as if she was searching my face, studying my eyes, uncovering new truths about me, and maybe herself too. “I think this is more than falling.”
My heart beat faster, soaring to the sky, and I could hardly believe that life could be so good, so sweet. It was even better when we returned to the room and spent the next few hours in bed, taking our time, discovering even more, falling even deeper.
61
Annalise
A small fire blazed in the fireplace, warming the centuries-old building that housed the tiny restaurant not far from the Eiffel Tower. Framed artwork of eggs, asparagus, and tomatoes lined one white wall. Another wall was red brick. White cloths draped the tables.
It was Michael’s last night here, and already I missed him. The empty ache had started before he even left. I wanted him here. Wanted him to stay. I’d loved every moment with him.
; Right now, I simply loved watching him talk to Patrick, Noelle’s husband. With the dinner plates cleared away and the dessert served, they were discussing French politics and world affairs. It was so sexy to hear him so deep in conversation, a glass of red wine in his hand, his blue button-down shirt revealing a small patch of skin at his throat that I wanted to kiss.
My lips longed to press against his chest. My fingers itched to undress him. My heart ached to have him close.
Especially since he fit in so well with my family.
I understood even better why he’d learned French—to be able to talk like this, to be a part of my life. It was such a heady thing, such a romantic endeavor. I’d marveled at what he’d done, and now I witnessed it. This meal with my sister, my mother, and Patrick was one of the first times I’d heard him speak my language for this long.
He’d talked to my mother too during the meal, and she’d plied him with questions about Las Vegas. Was the Strip larger than life? Yes. Were the hotels as big as they seemed? Absolutely. Was the city full of sin? He’d answered yes to that one too, a sad smile on his face.
I was amazed how much he loved his home, in spite of all the pain he’d gone through there. But that was behind him now that the last man had been taken in. We hadn’t spent much time diving into the details of the final arrests. Michael seemed to want to move on, and I couldn’t fault him for not wanting to dwell on it. Perhaps that was part of why he appeared so carefree again, so much like the man I’d known when I was younger, yet so much like a new man too. Strong, protective, and yet vulnerable. I’d never known someone to put his heart on the line the way Michael had for me.
“He’s a good man.”
I turned to meet my mother’s light-green eyes. Her voice was soft, a whisper just for me.
I nodded. “He is.”
My mother’s hand, wrinkled from years, pressed to my forearm. “I’m glad you’re letting yourself be happy.”
“Me too.”
Her knowing eyes stared back at me. “Have you told him how you feel?”
“Sure. He knows how I feel,” I said.
My mother squeezed my arm. “No. Have you told him you’re in love with him too?”
I froze with the glass of wine on the way to my lips. I was just starting to admit it to myself, but hearing it out loud? Knowing that someone so close to me could see it, had noticed the connection between us? It was becoming real.
“You should tell him,” my mother urged.
I parted my lips, but words didn’t come. I wasn’t sure what to say, or if I could give voice to all these questions stirring inside me. Was I ready to take that final leap?
“Tell him soon,” my mother whispered, then she pressed a kiss to my cheek before continuing. “And I know it’s not a one-way street. I see the way you look at him. I see how you lean close to him. How your world seems to be his world.”
A lump rose in my throat. My eyes welled with tears, but none fell.
After the check came and Michael insisted on paying, my mother announced loudly that Patrick and Noelle would walk her home.
Noelle nodded vigorously. “Yes. We’ll help her up the steps.”
“Go,” my mother said, shooing us along. “Your flat is around the corner.”
We said our goodbyes, and Michael and I turned the other direction. “Do you want to come to my place?” I asked.
“If you’re sure.”
I stopped on the street, reached for his hand, then looked him in the eyes. “I want you to see where I live. You’re not just some man I’m slinking away to a hotel room to be with. You’ve had dinner with my family. I want you in my home. You’re part of my heart. Part of my life.”
He pressed his forehead to mine. His breath ghosted across my skin. His arms looped around me. With him, I felt so much potential, so much possibility, so much future.
I took him to my home.
62
Michael
Annalise unlocked the green door. It creaked open, and pride shimmered in her eyes. Her irises danced as she held out her arm and led me through the narrow foyer into the small kitchen.
“My home,” she said, beaming.
I cataloged the room. Red espresso cups. Sky-blue dishes in the dish rack, and a clean sink.
We wandered into a tiny living room, and before I could look around, she gestured to French doors that opened into a small den.
“This is my office,” she said proudly, and showed me some of the framed photos on the wall, shots she’d taken over the years. There were a few images from the Middle East that had won her awards, but mostly the photos were of simpler things.
A lemon-yellow dresser.
A crowded street-side café.
A leaf blowing across the sidewalk. Even a few of her black-and-white boudoir shots.
“You really are talented,” I said.
Then I spun around and took in her living room for the first time.
My gaze immediately zoomed in on a framed photo on her built-in bookcase of her husband, holding a handful of maps under his arm.
One photo. That was all. But it was enough to remind me of Marseilles.
Her hand ran up my arm. It was warm and comforting, but right now I didn’t want it.
My reaction was emotional, not rational. It was passionate, not thoughtful. I could have devised a million logical explanations to settle my brain and cool my nerves. But I was shaken.
And she noticed. “Does it bother you?” she asked, indicating the picture.
I told the bitter truth. “Yes.” It wasn’t my proudest moment. “And I feel like a complete ass for saying that and feeling that.”
“You’re not,” she said, shaking her head.
"I just wish . . .” I didn’t finish the thought. But filling in the missing words was easy—I just wish you didn’t have a photo of your first husband.
“Michael,” she said, her voice soft. “I have photos of you too. I had an entire photo album of our year together in Las Vegas. I took it to university. I even looked at it the other day before you came here, along with the photos I took of you at Caesars. One of those photos is on my desktop right now until I decide how I want to frame it or crop it.”
I dragged a hand through my hair, and for the first time wondered if Julien had felt this way too. If he’d been crazed enough to want to have this woman all to himself, to erase her history and mark her only with him. I would have wholly understood. Because this intense need to be her only, as selfish and single-minded as it was, gnawed at me.
And I didn’t want to say anything more. I didn’t want to say the wrong thing. My jaw ticked, and I held all these dark wishes inside me.
But Annalise missed nothing. “Michael, I have a past. It’s real, and it’s a part of me. Just like ours is. You and I found our way back to each other, and there’s nowhere else I’d rather be. Just because I cared about him doesn’t mean I can’t feel everything for you.”
Ah hell. I was a complete jerk for feeling this way. I was envious of a dead man. I was eaten up by the fact that she’d had a husband. Who. Had. Died.
I was alive.
What the fuck was wrong with me?
“I’m sorry,” I muttered, though I knew that wasn’t enough. Perhaps I was too stubborn. Too narrow. I knew it was irrational, but this woman—she was it for me. She was all for me. And that feeling inside me, of never wanting to be without her, made me rash.
“Do you still love him?” My throat was raw as I gave voice to my darkest fear.
“Michael,” she said, imploring. “Stop. Just stop. He is gone, and I’m not in love with a ghost. I’m here. And I’m falling in love with you now.”
I swallowed, collecting myself. I drew a deep breath, trying to let it out while taking in what she’d just said. That’s what I should be focusing on. But my chest churned with black and white and gray emotions, and I didn’t know how to wrestle them to the ground and have them make sense.
We left soon afterward, head
ing back to the hotel. Annalise could sense my mood, sense that I needed to get away from memories of the past, back to neutral ground and where we were now. It was my last night in Paris, and I wanted to reconnect with her.
At the hotel, I made love to her, letting the sex blot out the blackness in my heart, the ugly jealousy in my soul. But something continued to nag at me.
I didn’t want to be her second best, and yet I felt like the runner-up. The whole truth of what bothered me boiled down to this—she could have chosen me in Marseilles, and she didn’t.
And so when she asked me once more what was wrong, the dam broke.
In bed, I turned to her, and said it. Cruel, terrible words. “You could have picked me.”
She blinked. “Excuse me?”
“Ten years ago. You weren’t married yet. You could have called off the engagement and run away with me,” I said, and once I saw the expression on her face, I knew I’d said the wrong thing.
She recoiled. “Is that who you want me to be?”
Did I? It was a valid question. “A woman who loved me? Yes.” But that was an emotional answer. Only an emotional one.
She sighed. “Michael, I hadn’t seen or even spoken to you in years. Imagine that. Picture that. Picture our life together like that. If I’d left him for you. I’d made a commitment, and we were at different places in our lives then. I missed you. I loved you. But our time wasn’t then. And if we’re fixed on the past, we won’t live now.”
I clenched my teeth, as she leveled her assessment straight at my heart.
And it was all too true.
I should have said I was sorry.
But what hurt the most wasn’t that she was likely right.
It was that I wished I could go home and ask my father’s advice. Wished things could have been different starting eighteen years ago.
63
My Sinful Love (Sinful Men Book 4) Page 21