by K. L. Kreig
Connelly’s always been so perceptive. He knows something’s wrong. Something big. Something that will kill the us he’s trying to rebuild.
“Bu—”
Swooping down, he swallows my objection with his mouth, pushing the others back in with his tongue. Then we’re on the move again. The softness of the down comforter pillows my back; his bulky weight causes me to sink farther into the feathers.
“Not tonight, Nora. Not tonight. I need one more day before we break open old wounds and unleash old ghosts that can never be put back. Please, not tonight, princess. Just let me show you how much I love you.”
His voice is barely there at the end.
He sounds scared.
So am I.
I reach up and cup his cheek, willing the tears away. “Okay. Okay, not tonight.”
“I need you. So goddamned much.” His raspy words were unnecessary. Voracious desire is written on the hard lines of his face, threaded in every gritty word. It shines brightly in his brilliant eyes.
“You have me. I’m yours.” For as long as you’ll keep me.
He rises on his haunches, first undressing me, then himself. He lowers back down, sinks his hands into my hair, and gently pushes inside me, our eyes air-locked so tight even gravity itself couldn’t tear them apart. It’s the most defenseless and real moment I’ve shared with anyone.
As Connelly sweetly makes love to me, worshipping my body with gentle touches and showering me in reverent words, we both know this is different. Tomorrow when the sun rises, casting an inescapable spotlight on our sins, everything will change.
We both know it.
We both feel it.
We’re both ignoring it in a desperate attempt to soak in each precious minute we have left together that’s not tainted with cloaked truths and hurts from a time long ago.
Our past, which has always been nipping at our heels, has finally caught us.
Time’s up.
Chapter 17
Conn
It’s nearly four in the morning and I still haven’t closed my eyes. When we returned from dinner at eight-thirty, I spent hours making love to Nora and even though I feel both sated and starved, I know she needed sleep. I think I let her drift off sometime past midnight after she couldn’t keep her eyes open any longer. The woman I’ve loved, lost, and have somehow found my way back to again is currently draped over my naked body like a soft blanket, dead to the world. The fact that she willingly spent the night wrapped around me, trusting me, is a genuine gift—one I will not take for granted.
I tighten my hold, wishing I could crawl into her.
I’ve never been happier.
Yet here I lie, hours later. Wide awake. Fucking terrified that true happiness I once thought unattainable is about to be blown to smithereens for the second time. This all feels too good to be true and usually, that’s a bad fucking sign.
She wanted to talk. I should have said yes. I saw the veiled skeletons swirling like bony dream-killing monsters in her green eyes and I just couldn’t do it. I didn’t want to ruin a perfect evening. I wanted to bury my head in the luxury of denial a little while longer before we opened the history book and turned to the pages containing our past sins.
Over these past few weeks, I’ve bared my soul to her. I may not have shed all my transgressions, but I’ve bled every single emotion I have in me. I’ve held nothing back. Not a fucking thing. I’ve flayed my insides open time and again, spilling my deepest inner feelings. I’ve told her things I’ve never spoken of to another person, not even my twin, my closest confidant.
But she hasn’t done the same. She has the worst poker face of anyone I’ve ever met, but getting her to admit what’s going on inside that pretty little head of hers is the biggest challenge I’ve ever faced. I want to know what she’s thinking. I need to know what she’s feeling. I need assurances she wants there to be an us...that she’s willing to try.
I love her.
She loves me.
Of those two things, I have no shred of doubt. None.
But I have secrets.
So does she. Hers are secrets she’s trying to run from, though. Mine, I’m ready to bleed.
I have a gut-wrenching feeling she knows mine already, but I have no fucking clue what hers is. I want to know, yet I don’t. I need to know, yet I’m scared to hear them because secrets destroy. They obliterate trust. Ruin lives. Shatter futures. They challenge your capacity to truly forgive. They test how bottomless your love really burns.
What will happen to us once our transgressions are revealed? Absolution? Resentment? God forbid…the end? Can a love that has never died be snuffed out by the admission of our weaknesses? Can I have a future with the only woman I’ve ever let into my soul, the only person who will ever carry my heart in the palm of her hand?
I hope so. I want that. I want freedom. I want forgiveness. For both of us. I want a life with her. I want to wake up with her in my arms and go to bed with my cock pressed snug between her ass cheeks. I want to slip inside her inviting heat morning, noon, and night. I want her silky hair wrapped around my hand and her soft lips captured between my teeth. I want her fingers intertwined with mine as we walk down the street. I want to start our own traditions, like freezer crap night. I want my possessive claim wrapped forever around her left ring finger.
And I think I may even want kids. Kids…Me. The man who arrogantly professed just a few months ago that a wife and kids weren’t in his fifty-year plan, but now it’s practically all I can think about.
I selfishly want it all.
I want my happily fucking ever after with my soul mate.
Nora was right. I have a lot of wants.
But will I get them? Is wanting everything too much to ask?
I guess today we’ll find out. It’s time to rip off the Band-Aid and let the past bleed scarlet until every iniquity we’ve committed against each other is lying in a dark puddle at our feet.
Then I can only pray we’ll be able to walk away clean and pure.
Hand in hand, together.
No other outcome is acceptable.
Chapter 18
Conn
I woke Nora up this morning with my tongue in her pussy and her breathless moans ringing in my ears. I made love to her last night, but this morning I had an overwhelming need to mark her body, inside and out. I wanted her to feel me with each step she took. I wanted the imprints from my crushing passion for her to be carried around like prizes for a week, teasing her every time she glances in the mirror.
She looked at me expectantly after she came down from her tongue-induced high, but I put her off once again. I don’t want to head down that rabbit hole yet. We’ll be lost in it soon enough. As long as I have her here, tucked away with me alone, I’m going to keep living in my little fantasy world that everything is fine and nothing can shatter it.
But the clock is ticking louder and faster. I hear the fucker tick-tocking in my ear and I need to fasten those final knots, creating an unbreakable, load-bearing connection that will be able to withstand any tension we place on it.
We have an hour and a half before we need to leave for the airport. I intend to make full use of every one of those seconds.
“A hotel room with a doorbell?” she asks mockingly when we hear the chime echo through the massive suite.
“Nothing but the best for you.” After a quick, hard kiss, I pick up a robe from the chair, leaving her lounging naked on top of the messy sheets. I glance back and catch her appreciating my ass with a satisfied smirk on her face.
I flex both cheeks before saying, “It’s all yours, princess.” I enjoy her laughter following me all the way to answer the door. Sliding my arms through the sleeves, I let in room service. After providing a generous tip, I wave them out and roll the cart into the bedroom with the goodies I ordered.
“What did you get?” she asks excitedly, leaning against the cushioned headboard. She covers herself with the sheet and just chuckles when I scowl.
Sitting on the edge of the bed, I pull her to my mouth. She melts under my tongue like cotton candy. I’m instantly hard. Again. Especially at the thought of how I’m about to eat my breakfast.
“Lay down, my beautiful girl.” I kiss her softly while tugging down the fabric she’s using to conceal herself. She lets it fall.
“But I’m hungry.”
“And you’ll eat. I promise.”
“You’ve changed,” she announces once she’s splayed out against the stark white sheets. It makes me stone hard that she obeys me readily, but that she has her own mind and isn’t afraid to use it. The dichotomy is a total turn-on.
“How so?” I ask retrieving the tie I threw on the chair in the corner of the room.
She glances at it and back to me without so much as a flinch before responding. Fuck, I love her. So damn much. “I mean you’re still cocky and arrogant, don’t get me wrong.”
I smirk when she gives me a cheeky smile. After I ditch the robe, I sit back on the mattress, my knee touching her bare hip. Starting with the tip of her curled middle finger, I run a finger lightly down her turned-up palm and continue my path on the inside of the arm she has curved over her head. Her eyes darken and become heavy. I have a hard time not stroking my cock as I watch her desire for me deepen and spread.
“And?”
“And…” She clears her froggy throat. “You seem edgier. Like every character trait about you is sharper. Honed, I guess. You seem to have this deep-seated need for control.”
I think about that for a few seconds as I circle her dark, puckered areola and twist her taut nipple, pulling a soft moan from her throat.
I am all of those things. Life has sharpened me. Why deny it? I’ve always had the uncontrollable need to win, but since Nora walked away from me, that’s become laser focused. Losing Nora changed me in ways I still don’t think I fully understand.
“You make those sound like bad things. Control is actually a very good quality, princess, as you’re about to find out.”
She tries to laugh but it comes out strangled. Probably because her nipple is now caught between my teeth. “You want to control me?” Her hand tangles in my hair. She arches her back to get closer.
I release her tasty bud with a pop. “That would be like controlling air. And I’m a lot of things, but I’m not a fucking sorcerer.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” she groans as I take the other straining bud into my mouth. “You do pretty magical things to me.”
Good to know.
“Time to eat,” I growl, dragging my tongue up between the valley of her breasts before thrusting it between her lips, taking her in a bruising kiss.
I kiss her until she’s putty in my hands. She puts up no resistance when I thread my tie around her eyes and knot it carefully, but snugly, on top of her red tresses.
“What are you doing?” she asks breathlessly, her hands going to the fabric now stealing her sight. I pull them back.
“Eating breakfast.”
“While I’m blindfolded? That hardly seems fair. I’m hungry, too.”
I whisper against her lips, “Trust that I’ll take care of you, Nora. I’ll always take care of you if you let me.”
Her entire body relaxes and a soft smile graces her lips. Suddenly I wish I hadn’t covered her eyes. I want to see them sparkle with love. “Okay.”
“One more thing…don’t move, princess, or I’ll stop,” I husk. “And I don’t think you’re going to want me to stop.”
Her only response is to lick those luscious lips.
Uncovering several trays, I remove a piece of sliced fruit. She flinches at the first touch of coolness against her skin but is silent as I run the juicy flesh down the column of her throat. I continue between her breasts straight down her torso stopping just short of her slit, which is already exquisitely wet.
“What is that?” Her breaths have already quickened.
I don’t answer. Instead, I trace the wet trail I left behind with my tongue, starting at her mound, working my way back up. When I reach her mouth, I suck her bottom lip between mine before kissing her softly. I gently twist my tongue with hers, letting her taste me.
“What does it taste like?”
“Mango.”
I smile against her mouth. “Very good.”
Holding the lush tropical fruit to her lips, she opens and takes a bite. “Mmm…that is so good.”
I pop the rest in my mouth and reach for the next thing, changing it up. This time, I draw circles around the inner wrist of her right arm, working my way up to the crook of her elbow before repeating the entire process over again with my tongue ending up twined with hers.
“Watermelon.”
“You’re a fruit connoisseur, I see,” I say lowly. I feed her a bite of the dripping melon, licking a stray droplet that trickles down the side of her face.
“It’s going to take a long time to eat breakfast this way,” she teases.
“That’s the point, sweetheart.”
“The sheets are going to be a mess.”
“Don’t give a shit if they’re ruined.”
“Okay, then.” She smiles wide. It’s contagious. “Continue. I’m starved.”
I reach for the next thing and lift her leg so she’s spread open to me. “Fuck, Nora,” I curse, taking in the milkiness between her thighs. She’s coated. “This turning you on, princess?”
“This is the sexiest thing I’ve ever done.” Her hips shift slightly upward. I almost abandon the rest of what I have planned, her wetness beckoning me to sink inside. Quench the ache deep in my balls.
“Me too. And before you ask…this is another first.”
Happiness lights up her face so bright I’m almost blinded by it. I’ve never seen a thing more beautiful than she is.
When I touch the next piece to her inner thigh, she jerks. “That’s warm.”
“It is.” I draw a line north, to that sweet spot where her inner thigh meets her delightfully wet pussy. Once again I follow the same line I painted. Unable to resist, I circle her pebbled clit lightly, drawing it smoothly into my mouth. I lave gently until her moans grow louder and more insistent and then I retreat. She tastes like milk chocolate and me. Best fucking combo ever.
“Connelly, please.” Her body undulates beneath me. Fuck. I can hardly stand this slow, deliberate torture myself.
“Not yet, baby,” I murmur, palming myself to take the edge off. “I want you hot, wet, and wanting. Aching so badly for my touch, my kiss, my heavy cock that you’d gladly sell your soul for me to relieve your physical agony.”
I tap her lips with the berry until she opens. “Oh God,” she moans in delight. “Chocolate. And strawberries. Delicious.”
“It’s more delicious on you. Trust me on that.”
My eyes are tracking down her gorgeous, writhing body when I notice a cluster of light moles just right beneath her left breast that I haven’t seen before. I dip my finger in the crème fraîche and trace a line between them. When I’m done it looks like a stick figure, minus the head and arms.
“That’s Cancer,” she says quietly.
A rush of terror washes through me at the mention of that word. “What?”
“No, no…” she scrambles at the panic threading my voice. “The zodiac sign. Cancer.”
I look at the headless figure again while I tell my heart to slow down. I just found this woman again. I can’t lose her. “Hate to break it to you, princess, but the zodiac sign for Cancer is a crab.”
“I know.”
“Well, what I’m looking at is about three moves away from a win at hangman,” I chuckle before bending over to lick the cream off.
“Yes, but those five stars are all you can see of the Cancer constellation in the summer sky with the naked eye.”
My gaze drifts over her mountainous breasts in time to catch her wetting her lips. I want them wrapped around my throbbing dick.
“I’m a Cancer, you know.” I don’t know shit about astrology, but I at least know what my sign is. Women seem to dig that for some reason.
“I know,” she replies softly.
Something in her tone catches me. I sit up, my eyes falling back to the line of tiny imperfections on her otherwise perfect body. When I connect the dots again, she shudders under my light touch.
Possessiveness swells hot inside me. I’m not usually into portents and all that crap, but I have no doubt this is one. Nora is my soul mate and this affirms it. “It’s a sign, then. That you’re mine.”
Her smile. Magnificent. “I always knew I was destined to end up with a Cancer, and when I met you…”
Suddenly I don’t want her eyes shielded from me because I feel like this is a pivotal moment for our future, so I slide the garment off and stare into her bright green eyes when she blinks them open.
“When you met me, what?”
Running her finger along the scruff of my jaw, she has so much love in her eyes when she says, “I knew I was done waiting.”
“Nora.” My throat constricts. I feel intensely conflicted right now. Anger and hurt that she left me try to crowd out the incredible love I have for her, taking center stage. Bitterness that we lost out on a decade together twists my gut into tight knots. But genuine fear that I’ll wake up tomorrow and this will all be a dream is what’s truly terrifying. “Do I have you, Nora? Really have you?”
Water rapidly fills her eyes before spilling over and running into her shiny hair. “You have me for as long as you want me.”
I cover her body with mine and wipe away the streaks with my thumbs. “There will never be a day that goes by that I don’t want you, Nora. Not one. Don’t leave me again. It will completely break me this time.”
“Me too.”
My stomach growls, but I ignore it. I have expended so many calories over the past twelve hours, but the need to have her again outweighs every other human need I have. She’s a craving I’ll never satiate. A hunger I’ll never assuage. I need to be inside of her, feel her snugness squeezing my cock. “Are you hungry?”
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