The paper cup fell from her hand and landed in the pile of cans. She couldn’t help herself. She grabbed her phone and took a picture. Some people had keepsakes from first dates. This was… well, he wasn’t exactly involved in this moment, but it showed he cared. Right? Her heart sang. Because, yeah, it did. And after the day she’d had, this was what she needed.
She shut the cabinet, backing against the counter with her hand over her mouth. There was a grin hiding behind her fingers.
He’d definitely done that for her.
She pulled out her phone, needing to share how cool this was with the world. Eco-Ella peeps would die, just like she was. They would totally get the moment. Quickly, she typed and loaded the picture, reading back the text for typos.
That moment when HE recycles when you’re not looking. ;)
Tara would go nuts. People would flock to figure out who HE was.
But HE would hate that.
Ella stared. It felt wrong. Too private. Too not him. But he wasn’t actually in the picture… Shoot, no. She hit the delete button instead of publish, watching the message float away.
That wasn’t meant to be a publicity stunt. It was a gift he unknowingly gave her. Ella bit her lip and slipped her phone into her purse.
It was so ridiculous, but she took one more quick peek under his sink. The warm fuzzies came back in full force.
Bishop walked into the kitchen. “Hey.”
She jumped, slamming the cabinet shut and spinning. “Hi.”
He chuckled, eyeing her suspiciously. “You doing okay?”
“Yes, I, um, I like your recycling container.”
He lifted his chin in acknowledgement and went to the fridge. “Hungry?”
She came up behind him and wrapped her arms around his torso. “Thank you.”
“Sure, babe. It was nothing.”
God, now he was downplaying it, only making her hug him tighter. Even if he thought she was crazy, she didn’t care.
He closed the fridge, turning into her hold, which was apparently not as strong as she would’ve guessed. “Ella, seriously.”
Her eyes blurred with tears, and they threatened to escape over crushed beer cans. “I can’t help it.”
“Come on. We’re not hanging out in the kitchen if you’re crying over my trash.”
“Recycling,” she corrected.
“Potato, po-tah-toe.”
“Wait.” She pushed onto her toes and planted a kiss on his lips. “It means a lot.”
He grabbed an orange from the counter then locked an arm around her neck. “You mean a lot to me, babe. See how that works?”
“I see.” Her heart spun in a circle. “What are we doing?”
“Gonna relax and go to bed. We’ll find FB and Brick. Make sure they haven’t killed each other.”
“Brick isn’t going to hurt FB.”
“I’m not worried about my boy. I’m more concerned that your city-dweller dog is going to be led to the wild side of dog food with meat in it.”
She elbowed him. “I feed my dog meat.”
He unhooked his arm. “So it’s just you who’s the tortured vegan.”
“Vegan for life, Muscles. That I can’t change for you.”
He tossed the orange in the air and caught it. “I didn’t change for you. I stomped on some Bud heavies. Brick ate my last trash can, and I thought of you and everything you spout when I went to buy another and was walking up and down the aisle. There’s a shit ton of options, and one looked better than the rest. I don’t want you to change, El. I love all that crazy shit you do. Keeps me on my toes.”
“Really?”
He tore the skin, peeling the orange. “Mostly.”
“Yeah?”
He popped an orange slice in his mouth. “Yup.”
“Have a favorite?”
“When you kissed me at the bar, and I made every excuse in the world just to kiss you back.”
Swoon. Thud. She was so done.
***
Overhead in the dark bedroom, the fan quietly spun. This wasn’t how Bishop had pictured their first time in his bed, but as he gathered Ella under his arm and pressed her to his bare chest, he wouldn’t change that she was here now. Her soft hair tickled his skin, and her quiet breaths fell in time with his fan. They’d been lying in the dark for what seemed like forever. He was just letting her process the day, and there had been little left to say.
More than just a physical attack, there had to be pain associated with that type of disloyalty. No matter that Jay was clearly fucking nuts, psychological excuses or not, it still had to hurt.
Another good-bye.
Not that he compared himself to Jay, and the similarities ended quickly, but he had left Ella, and now Jay had hurt her too. She didn’t deserve this crap.
“We’ve both been awfully quiet,” she whispered.
Guess she wasn’t asleep. “I’m letting you process.”
He had a lot to think about too, like how possessive he was when it came to her. While Titan was a new job, acting as a protector was an old routine. The military had taught him that. Actually, he was born with it, and they’d honed it. His sister’s death had been a catalyst for change in his life, setting the course for him to be a better man, a tougher one.
But was he handling this situation well? He and Locke had both missed how the van was set in motion. That killed him.
Ella shifted to her hip. “Are you processing?”
She wore one of his oversized T-shirts. The cotton swallowed her, and even in the dark, he could make out an outline and see her shadowed face. “Yeah, babe, processing.”
“What’s in your head?” she asked.
“Don’t know. Not much.” Which was bullshit.
“I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.”
He squeezed her. “I go first, huh?”
“Since you just volunteered, that sounds great.”
He chuckled quietly. “All right. Let’s see how this goes.” He rolled his shoulders, shifting as he felt her waiting. “Sucks not to have seen that coming—”
“Angie explained that the park had too many blind ways for someone to come to that lot on foot—”
“Appreciate it, babe.” And noteworthy that Special Agent Angie Byrd was now just Angie. Even if Ella hadn’t wanted to talk about it, it was obvious that her comfort level with her FBI POC had increased. “And logically, I know that. Doesn’t mean I can’t feel like shit for not seeing it.”
“Short of putting me on lockdown, which I won’t agree to, you guys couldn’t have stopped what happened.”
“Better location.” They could’ve been closer. He could’ve insisted on no headphones, that she and Manny face him at all times. He could’ve been a complete dictator in how the production had gone, in how she’d done everything, hovering over every facet of her life, always expecting an incoming assault. But hell, what kind of life was that?
“It’s where I wanted. My favorite place. And I’d still like to show you my favorite place.”
“‘Kay.” Maybe he and Locke needed to gel better. They were two new guys working together, and perhaps that had been the problem. Defenses down because, other than the parking lot, they’d been in the wide-open park.
“I’m serious. I’d like to take you there. Maybe tomorrow. There’s a little hut, and it looks like nothing, but somehow it’s everything. If what it’s seen and been through—”
He wished he had that spark she held onto despite everything that had happened. “You know what is so great about you?”
“Hmm?”
“You get so damn excited about whatever you’re passionate about.” A hut? It was probably cool, in some nature-walk way, but had anyone else on earth gone on about how badass it was? Likely not. Bishop pulled her close. “Your turn. What’s on your mind?”
Ella placed her hand on his bare stomach. “Well…”
It wasn’t a sexual move, but they were in bed together, and he didn’t have a shirt on. H
ell, he was a guy. Everything in life could be construed as a sexual move. But that wasn’t an excuse he’d ever used before. Her simple move pushed at his sanity. Good thing the lights were off, because if he’d been watching her casually tease the shit out of him, the suffering would have been unbearable.
“I should’ve listened when you pressed me on Jay.” Her fingers spread. “I don’t know. It’s weird to think that he would do this.”
“People are weird.” Jay was likely weird before all this, but that was another conversation.
“All of a sudden, it hit me like whoa.”
“Gotta trust your gut.”
“I just don’t get why.” As if her tone hadn’t punctuated her frustration enough, Ella dropped her weight against his arm.
He wanted to wrap her tight, peel her shirt away, and hug them together until she didn’t care about Jay’s reasons. Bishop wished there wasn’t that hurt in her voice or the tinge of confusion in her words. But fuck it, what he really wanted was the scent of her shampoo in his nose, her hair dangling around his head. Instead, he contained an urge to taste her skin. The woman needed comfort, not the start of the erection he was trying to ignore.
Ella’s fingers flexed, her nails lightly grazing above his belly button, and he sucked in his cheeks, ignoring his groan… or trying to.
“Are you okay?” she asked. “I can scoot.”
He tightened his arm around her, refusing to let a micrometer of space come between them. “Don’t.”
She rested her chin on his shoulder. “Good. I didn’t want to.”
The tickle of her warm breath in the dark could drive a man mad. She turned her hand over, letting her knuckles softly drift over his abdomen, and it was too much. His dick jumped at the barely-there touch. His lungfuls were slow, deep, and purposeful. He couldn’t stop how turned on she made him. “El…”
Her hand drifted down, grazing the waist of his boxer briefs. “You smell good.” Her lips hovered next to his cheek.
It was a lethal combination that couldn’t be ignored. He turned his head and took command of her mouth in the dark. Voltage as hot as she was rushed down his spine, igniting in his fingertips as he lifted her on top of him. This is what he was made to do—be with this woman.
Electrified and alive, it was as though emotions existed only when they connected. Everything amplified. Intensified. Wordlessly, he found a way to make everything better. “This. This is what we needed.”
Nodding into his mouth, kissing and moaning, she agreed. “Yes.”
Her knees pinched to his sides and her hands gripped him as though she had been drowning. Bishop flipped them over, sliding her under him and caging her head to his pillow with his forearms. “Everything will be okay.”
“It will.
He reached over and turned on the light. A low, easy light cast over his bedroom, and when he looked down, all was as it should be. The most beautiful woman he’d ever held, the only woman he had ever loved, stared up, trusting, with hair spread over his pillow, while she wore his favorite shirt. This was the kind of thing that made the world go round.
He dropped a kiss to her forehead, her cheek, slid his lips to hers, and sank his tongue deep into the hot cavern of her mouth. She came alive, wrapping her legs around him, rubbing her hands against his chest, flicking her thumbs against the discs of his nipples, and tugging at his chest hair.
“Your heartbeat feels like mine,” she whispered.
He agreed with every gasping word. “How’s that?”
“Needing.”
Bishop inched back, cupping a hand under her chin. “Yeah, babe. I need you.” He slid his thumb down, toying with her lip. “Primal, possessive need.”
She nuzzled into his palm. “I know. I love that about you.”
“Hell, woman, I love you.” He leaned closer. “And after the hell of today, you need to know.”
Shock widened her eyes, and Ella tilted her head. Hell, if she was going to have a disheartening, disloyal revelation about Jay, she could hear one that was the polar opposite.
“Why did you say that?”
He inched closer. “Because you deserve to hear the truth occasionally. Unvarnished, no bullcrap. I’m in love with you.”
Her lips parted.
“Again,” he added. “Some things have a way of coming back.”
Ella ducked under his arm and rolled out of bed. “Give me a minute.”
“Uh…” Not that he had planned this conversation, but that didn’t go how he thought it might. She rushed out of his bedroom, and Bishop had no clue what to say. “Hey…”
A second later, she walked back in with a smile that reached her eyes and a piece of paper in her hand. “Angie asked me to write down the only thing I knew for certain.”
He took the paper she held out and unfolded what had been made into a tiny square. Each move amped his anticipation as he smoothed the paper. On the center of the page, she’d written one sentence in certain block print and underlined it in pen:
I’m in love with Bishop O’Kane.
His heart jumped as his laugh rumbled. “You’re crazy.”
He wrapped an arm around her waist, tugging her into bed. A mixture of relief and adrenaline, of arousal and anticipation, spun inside his chest. “Good.” He put the note on his nightstand. “Threw me for a minute, running out of bed.”
“But seriously? That’s kind of crazy.” She crawled across the mattress, kneeling and eyeing the paper. “I mean—”
“Ella?”
“What?” Her chin tilted up, as she was still apparently amazed they’d had the same thoughts today.
He dropped his voice. “El.” He read it, but damn, he wanted the words to burn in his ears.
“Bishop.” She crawled back, walking up his body, and into his arm. Her tongue traced up his neck, and she kissed his earlobe, whispering, “I’m in love with you, Bishop O’Kane.”
It hit him everywhere.
Ella raked her nails down his chest. “I don’t want to go to sleep. I’m done processing. I’ve done everything I’m supposed to, and I’ve said the magic words. Now I want to play.”
Like there was any turning back now. “Rule book says your shirt has to go.”
“Absolutely.” She lifted her arms, and he pulled it off, tossing it over the side of the bed.
She kissed him, letting her tight nipples sway against his chest, and he couldn’t keep his hands away. Palming both breasts, he rubbed the peaked tips between his thumbs and forefingers, watching color rise in her face. Gone was her playfulness, making room for straight-up arousal. He pinched, and she sighed, heady and hot. Then he squeezed and plucked her deep cherry red nipples again.
“Feel good, El?”
“Mm-hmm.” She squirmed as he increased the pressure, her head dropping back. “Yes.”
Releasing the tweak, she relaxed, almost buckling, and he slid his hands down her stomach, watching a trail of goosebumps erupt. “If you read carefully, it says these have to go too.”
“I was hoping so.” She lifted her hips, and he snagged the sides of her panties, dragging them down her legs, and dropping them over the side of the bed.
“God, I like this game.” Her hair drifted over one shoulder. Her breasts were swollen, and Ella’s eyes drifted closed as though she couldn’t have been more relaxed, more turned on, more in the right spot.
“And I like that you’re mine.”
***
“Me too.” Ella’s eyes fluttered. Sitting over his thick thighs, very aware that his engorged erection was a layer of fabric away, she couldn’t fathom how possessive and careful he could look at once. She traced his jawline. His scruff scratched her skin, and she teased down his throat. “I like that you’re—”
“Can’t say mine. I already took it.” Playful, even when his intensity could melt a glacier.
Ella licked her lip, shifting and smiling as she teased against the bulge in his boxer briefs. “Sexy.”
Bishop’s hand shot be
hind her, and he flipped them over. “Too generic.”
She shouldn’t have teased him like that, except wow. His massive weight brushed on top of her naked body—oh—and her shaky breath couldn’t be hidden as his powerful thighs spread hers.
“Try again, babe.”
“Mmm.” Out-of-this-world provocation wasn’t good for thinking through answers. “I like that you’re strong. You’re ripped.”
“That doesn’t compete with mine.” He stroked the length of his hard cock against her, and her mind short-circuited.
“Shit,” she moaned at the pressure on her clit. “That’s so nice.”
But the pressure evaporated, and she whined a little until he dipped his mouth to suck on her nipple.
“Bishop, please.” Please, what? Please, everything.
“Last time, Ella. You like that I’m…”
Oh, God. The wet heat sucking on her nipple went back to work, and the powerful flow of his body worked against hers.
“I… I like that…” She gasped. “I like that I… can’t say no to you.” She moaned. “Ever.”
“Good answer.” He released her nipple and rewarded her with two fingers that quickly stroked and speared her.
“God!” She dropped her head back, arching as he sunk his fingers in, knuckles deep. “Yes.”
“Damn.” Holding himself up, Bishop’s mouth took hers with power reserved for a nuclear explosion, and he pumped and curled his fingers.
Ella cursed a thousand times as his mouth made love to hers, whisking away her obscenities before they left her lips.
“Want to come, babe?”
“Yes!” She clung to him. “No!”
Questioning her with a look, though he didn’t stop the insane onslaught building, he decided for her. Yes, she would come, and thank God, because she was on the edge and had no idea how Bishop even had a string of sanity.
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