“Well, am I free to go?” she asks quietly.
“Free to go where?” I ask, truly confused.
“Don’t you want me to leave? Isn’t this exactly the kind of thing you’d wanted to know and avoid when you ordered the background check?” she asks.
“For a smart woman, you’re pretty damn obtuse,” I say. “I told you why I ordered it, and that by the time it came through, I didn’t care what it said,” I remind her.
“And you care now?” she asks quietly.
“Did you not hear me earlier?” I ask and place my hands on her shoulders.
“Which part?” she says. Her smile is small, but it’s there, for the first time all day. I skim her arms and the sweep of all of that unbelievably soft skin at my fingers makes me want to take her clothes off and pull her supple body against mine and show her what my words have failed to.
That I need her constantly.
That she owns me as completely as I own her.
That I love her endlessly.
“The part about you and me being made from the same combination of elements. About you being mine?”
“Still?”
“Tesoro, knowing didn’t change anything. In fact, it just showed me how alike we are.”
“Why? Are your relatives murderers, too?” she asks, and shoves her hands through her hair and looks up to the ceiling in despair.
“Maybe?” I shrug and think about it quickly. “I don’t know,” I say.
“Well, then, they’re not. If you had a murderer in your family, you would know it, trust me,” she says.
“Then, I don’t know that I would care. You’ve been shaped by the river, learned more from it than you did from the man who spawned you. You are not him. You have shaped me,” I tell her.
“Ha, right!” She laughs. I ignore her and press on. “You know the Mississippi River starts in Minnesota, right?” I ask her.
“Of course, I do,” she says.
“Well, at its mouth, it’s narrow enough that you can walk across it in less than a dozen steps,” I say.
She looks at me, eyebrows raised in question.
“You’re like that river. At least in the way you’ve affected me,” I say.
“How? Easy to cross?” she says morosely.
“Stop pouting.” I chuck her under the chin. “I mean that you started like that for me. A pin prick sized drop of water on the very still waters of my life. And the minute you touched me, you caused a ripple that blurred everything I thought I was certain of. The way I saw myself, my obligations, my future. And now, just like that river you love so much does, it winds its way south, you rush through me, and I’m drowning in you.” I kiss her quickly.
“I’m all for you loving me, but it’s not worth your life.” She uses the very same joke I made that night in the hot tub and I laugh.
“Actually, I can breathe deeply for the first time in a long time. I know we’re from totally different worlds, but I feel like we’re also from the very same one. We love our family—not just the ones who were born of our blood. My brothers, Stone and Beau, aren’t biologically related to me at all,” I tell her. “You’re not the daughter of a sadistic drunk and the sister of a killer. I’m not the scion of a line of philanthropic, but short-sighted men and faithless women. Our legacies—what we choose to leave of ourselves in this world—is up to us.”
She sighs…
“Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” I ask her.
She purses her lips and then she blows out a breath. “I don’t talk about it. No one in Amorel does. It’s our collective secret. We all like to pretend that Merle—that’s my dad—never existed and that Fortune is already dead,” she says quietly.
“And I’m ashamed of what they did and how I deny them. But to acknowledge them is to remind everyone not just that my brother killed my father, but about the blood that runs in my veins. It means something that it’s part of my history. And, in a way, that’s more than just a random moment. That it shaped me. Reduced me. Just like the river. Just like I thought Nigel had done. Just like I was afraid you’d do if I gave you another chance,” she says. I grasp her chin, a little more forcefully than I need to and turn her face toward mine.
“There is nothing that could reduce you. You wear your name like a crown, and it’s one of the truest things about you,” I tell her.
She sniffs dismissively. “It feels like a joke. And I’m afraid sometimes that it is. My brother Fortune is going to die on a table with a state-sanctioned, poison-filled needle in his arm. My brother, Happiness, ran away before he was thirteen. I can’t imagine that his life has brought him much of his name’s meaning.” She shakes her head.
“Well, first, I think you’re giving your parents a lot of credit. Your mother, I will say, seems lovely. But fortune teller didn’t seem to be one of her skills. They gave you a name they liked. You’ve made it your own. You can decide that what you’ve done with your life is worth less than some whim by your parents twenty-seven years ago. But you would be lying to yourself,” I tell her.
She looks up at me through her long lashes and smiles.
“You believe in yourself. Enough to see beyond your current situation and reach for more. That’s more than I can say for myself. I didn’t consider that your interest in me could be more than all of the things that I’ve used to define myself. But, I swear, by the time we left Italy, I knew I didn’t care what it said, and I knew that I could trust you,” I say. And then I add the part that has been a more recent revelation. “I know that one of the reasons that people think of my money when they look at me is because that’s what I show them. I started changing that after your visit. If I wanted more from people, I had to give more,” I say. “You asked me that about wanting more from my experiences than money could buy.”
“Oh Hayes,” she says wistfully.
“What?”
“Thank you for speaking so my heart could hear. I don’t want to be bought. I don’t want to be wooed with flowers or nice trips. I want to be wowed by you living your best life. Because I want to live mine, too,” she says.
“Let’s do it together.” I pull her off the window seat and carry her toward the bed.
“What are you doing?” she cries. “I’m still talking …”
“Well, when you’re done, you’re going to put your pussy on my dick and make it dance,” I say. “I just want to get you in position.”
“Aren’t you mad that I didn’t tell you sooner? How do you not have any more reaction than this?” she asks.
“I already knew,” I admit and then brace for her reaction. Her body tenses and I just hold on tighter.
“You knew?”
“Yeah. After you left that day, I read it. I wanted to know what spooked you so badly,” I say.
She glares at me.
I smile at her.
Her glare falls apart and her mouth trembles before she covers it with her hands.
“You have the heart, spirit, and courage of a queen. I’m proud to know you. Proud that you love me. You’ve taken something and made it into nothing,” I say.
She rolls her eyes. “You’ve got it backward,” she says exasperatedly.
“No. I don’t. I’m telling you that you have taken something that should have reduced you, changed you, trapped you, maybe even erased you, and you have made it something so insignificant that you can leave it out of your life story and no one will know it’s missing,” I explain.
The light in her eyes changes. It softens, becomes more luminous and she relaxes in my hold.
“You really don’t care?” she asks.
“Of course, I care. But not in the way you think. I’m sorry you lived through that. I care that you think it’s something you should be ashamed of.”
“I worry sometimes that it’s in my blood,” she whispers and clouds roll into her eyes. So, I sit down on the bed with her still in my arms.
“What is?”
“That violence. Not because I feel inclin
ed to it. But because I always know when it’s coming. Will I pass it on? Will it suddenly rear its head?” She sounds dejected.
I squeeze her a little.
“My grandfather was a cruel man. Everyone acts like he walked on water because he donated money for a hospital and because his name was Rivers. But I know what he was. My father, for all of his failings, raised me to believe I am my own man. He sent me to Gigi to make sure Thomas wouldn’t ruin that. And as much as I resented it then, I’m very grateful for it now as an adult. Because I can see that left to Thomas, I’d probably be just like him. Forgetting that my name is more than an access card for us. It can also be one for others. There is no such thing as a generational curse. There’s intent and action.”
“Then why do you feel responsible for what Kingdom has done? Why are you spending this money and time on the flood victims?”
“Because I can. Because it’s a chance to correct the course, and I’m taking it. I’m not trying to raise people from the dead, Tesoro. Just trying to fix things going forward.”
“What if I make the same mistakes they did?” she asks.
“I hate to break it to you, Tesoro. But, you have your own flaws to worry about. You’re stubborn, impulsive, and for all your instincts about violence, you seem to walk into danger all the time. Like falling off cliffs that you go walking down at night.” I tap the tip of her nose with my finger.
“Don’t touch my nose; it’ll make me sneeze. And thanks for the praise.” She shoves my shoulder lightly.
“Tell me mine,” I ask.
“Your flaws?”
“I know … you probably have to think really hard about it,” I joke.
“You’re possessive, cynical, and suspicious,” she says without missing a beat. I let out a bark of surprised laughter, and then I kiss her softly.
“And you’re perfect. And mine,” she adds.
A cloud breaks over us. Sun streams in, and it feels like the return from a long march, and I’m so glad to be home.
When I break the kiss, she cups my face and sighs my name.
“Yeah, that’s better. Next time you say my name, though, I want you to scream it,” I say, then stand up and throw her onto the bed.
THUNDER
CONFIDENCE
I land on Hayes’s mattress with a small bounce and little shriek. My heart is thudding as I push my hair out of my eyes and see him looking at me like I’m the very last meal he’ll ever eat.
His nostrils flared, his eyes hot with desire, and his lips are flushed. Mine tingle, sending signals to him that they want to feel him. All of him. I’ve missed him more than I can say. Sex was one of the ways we communicated.
We would say “I love you,” “I hate you,” “I’m scared,” “I’m angry” when we fuck. And now, I’m hungry to know everything he’s kept from me in the time we haven’t touched each other.
“Tesoro,” he says huskily and pulls his shirt off. I can’t believe all of that is mine. He pulls his jeans off, too, and the most beautiful cock in the world peeks out of the top of his boxers.
“Come here.” I crook my finger and he lies down next to me. He slides one of his strong, warm hands up my thigh and cups my pussy.
“Fuck, you can never ever keep this from me again,” he says and pinches my clit. I gasp loudly, sharply, and I rock into his hand as heat and wetness fill my panties and I press against the warmth of his palm.
He dips his head and takes my lips with his and I sob at how perfectly right it feels to have my lips in the sacred embrace of his.
“I love you so much,” he whispers into my mouth. “I never want to be away from you, Tesoro. Never.” He grabs the front of my blouse and yanks until the straps give … the fabric sliding down my body sends a rush of anticipation across my skin like a river of electric shocks.
“I love you, too,” I say urgently, desperate to get these words out of the way so that I fall into his kiss and drown in the river of emotion he’s swept me away on. He gives me what we both need. He cups the back of my neck and rolls us until he’s lying on top of me, and then he slams his mouth onto mine and pushes past my lips and sweeps my mouth with his tongue. He kisses me like that and I can’t breathe. I don’t want to. I want to die with him stealing the breath from my lungs. I want to drown in him.
When he drags his lips off my mouth, he takes my lower lip with him and holds onto it with his teeth. The sting of his bite feels so good. Just like everything he gives me. Even when it hurts.
He drops his forehead onto mine. Our chests heave in unison, we breathe nose to nose, open mouth to open mouth. His eyes are shining and they hold me in a trap so exquisitely loving that I feel like I’m floating.
“I would cross galaxies for you, swim every ocean, fight dragons,” he says and his hands push my skirt up around my waist. He pushes my panties aside, wets his fingers by pressing them into my mouth and then slips his hand between us. He skims my clit with the edge of his blunt finger nail and then slides three of his big fingers into me.
I cry out at the sharp bite of my flesh stretching. He pushes them in, pulls them back out, and bends his head to my breast.
“I love seeing you like this. Your pussy is so goddamn tight, Tesoro.” He captures my nipple through the lace of my bra. He bites it and flicks the sensitive flat of it with the firm tip of his tongue.
I’m chanting his name and he finger fucks me harder, bites my swollen nipple and tears leak from the corner of my eyes as my orgasm breaks with no warning.
“Ti amo tanto,” he says against my chest and I feel the reverberation of his words in my heart.
“I love you, too,” I respond.
He kisses his way upward. His mouth is wet, his breath hot as his breathing grows more ragged.
“Sei la mia anima gemella,” he says as he parts my thighs.
“And you, are mine,” I respond.
“Non posso vivere senza te,” he says and slides into me with one, deep, powerful thrust forward of his hips.
“You’ll never have to live without me,” I assure him
He grips the headboard.
“Ti fotterò così forte,” he growls.
“I don’t know what that means,” I moan when he pulls back out.
“It means I’m going to fuck you so hard ...” He bites his lip and tightens his grip on the headboard. I’m mesmerized by the flex and bulge of his big biceps over my head.
“So hard that what?”
“Let me show you,” he says and he thrusts up into me so hard my whole body slides up the mattress and the headboard rattles.
“Let me ride that wave, Tesoro,” he pulls back out of me and I smile wide, lick my dry lips and gaze up at my god of sin, my Duke of Midnight, my renaissance man, my heartbreaker, my heart fixer, my everything.
I’ll never stop falling in love with him. We make magic together.
I want to hold my breath and stop time. The feeling I have, of being enough, of being loved for all that I am, with no desire to change anything about me. With more than acceptance of the baggage I bring—with pride. I want him and this forever. Right now though, even that wouldn’t be long enough for me.
“You make me so fucking crazy.” He puts one hand on my hip and starts short, deep, hard, fast and my eyes roll to the top of my head at the intensity of his fucking. I feel like I’m being consumed.
“Sei il tesoro più prezioso che ho trovato e che vorrei custodire per sempre”
I have no idea what that means, but I remember the first time he called me Tesoro, and my heart swells. I flash back to the moment I fell in love with him. It was that night on the ledge when I was sure that I was going to die.
And my heart, facing its potential demise, made a decision. If he hadn’t been there, I wouldn’t have made it off that cliff. And since that night, he’s owned my heart. That river will roll over the delta whenever nature commands her to without any regard for the best laid plans of mice and men. And Hayes, my river, will roll over me. And I wi
ll love him through it all because my heart has chosen him.
“I would rearrange the universe to have you,” he says, and his body flexes over me. The muscles in his shoulders and arms flex under the smooth golden-hued skin that covers his beautiful body, and his thrust is so deep and hard that I’m sure he’ll split me in half.
His chest heaves and he thrusts up again.
“Rearrange me,” I sigh and he thrusts even harder.
“Shatter me,” I beg and he fucks me hard, his arms and chest flex and ripple over my head, and when I come in the most spectacular explosion of tension I’ve ever felt, my whole world distills to the moment that would make this act between us a covenant—a promise.
He grunts into my neck and drills me into the mattress.
Yes, I will never get enough of this.
He lifts onto his knees and grips the headboard, his lower lips trapped between his teeth, his body moving like a machine between my thighs—fast, hard and unrelenting—until he throws his head and shouts my name between grunts.
He pulls out and spurts on my stomach and thighs. “I claim you,” he pants, before he slides back into me.
Our come mingles and smears between our sweaty bodies. I lift my hips and press us together. My orgasm’s aftershocks are still sending dancing, shimmering shivers of electricity through me.
Then Hayes drops his big body onto the bed next to me, and a huge cracking sound is our only warning before the entire bed collapses beneath us.
We lay on the sunken mattress and stare at each other before we burst out into laughter.
Then, as if in response to our mirth, the splatter of rain starts to beat on the window.
“It was raining during our first time in Italy,” I remind him.
“‘Because thunder only happens when it’s raining,’” he croons the hook to the Fleetwood Mac classic in my ear. “And I promise you, this is the only place where we’ll make this kind of noise. In our home, there will always be peace, You’ll always be safe,” he whispers and pulls me into his arms.
The Rivals Page 27