by Megan Crane
“Jesus Christ.”
But she wasn’t done. She leaned in closer to drive the point home.
“Twenty-four seven, three hundred and sixty-five days of the year, you need to be available. In every possible way. There are no shifts, no vacations, and certainly no sick days. Whatever he wants, whenever he wants it. Total, grateful surrender, night and day, forever.” She could feel the brittle smile on her face, but it was nothing next to how she felt. Particularly when Griffin only stared back at her, motionless, that dark look on his face. “So yes, Griffin. I know that men think I’m beautiful. Lucky me.”
And for what seemed like an eternity, there was no sound in the inn’s lobby but the snap of the fire.
“It’s time for you to get back upstairs,” Griffin gritted out, one or two lifetimes later. “Let’s go.”
He tilted his head in that way he did, as good as an abrupt order. And Mariah didn’t have it in her to fight it, not when she’d flipped over such a terrible stone, exposing all the ugliness beneath it.
She could feel it all squirming around inside her now, raw and unmanageable. Yes indeed, she knew all about being a trophy wife. The shinier she’d gotten, the more obedient, the more David had taken.
Taken and taken, until she had been little more than a flower with its head popped off.
She reminded herself that she was tough as she walked up the stairs, Griffin a silent wall of disapproval at her back. She hadn’t been kidding when she’d pointed out that they were the same beneath all their masks. She’d been forged in a nasty fire, too, and she’d never had the opportunity to consider what she’d done honorable.
When she got to her door, she stepped aside as Griffin went in to perform his usual check.
She stayed where she was when he came back, nodding at her to let her know he hadn’t found anything suspicious. Because there was nothing suspicious here. This was Alaska, and Mariah was more certain by the day that she’d left her troubles back in Georgia.
“If it helps,” she said softly, because he was close again and she had that ache in her that always seemed to grow when she was near enough to touch him, “you’re not the only one who’s disgusted with me.”
He stopped on the other side of the doorway, facing her where she stood in the hall. “I’m not disgusted with you.”
“You do a really good impression of it. Must be all that talk about whether or not I know that I’m pretty enough to be a trophy for a man like David.” She felt the way her mouth twisted, and it was no mask. It was too real, and she didn’t know how to stop it. Much less the words that came next. “But certainly never good enough for a hero like you. You made that perfectly clear.”
This time, it wasn’t the muscle in his jaw that gave him away. Because maybe he was already too edgy. Or less contained than she’d imagined. Because his eyes flashed, a bright, hard heat.
“I’m no hero,” he threw at her, and even his voice was different. Not cold. Raw straight through, like he ached the same way she did. “It’s not a question of pretty enough or good enough. You’re a beautiful woman, Mariah. I’m not immune to that. To you. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to act on it.”
A kind of sob rolled through her then, too huge for her to control.
“Why not?” Her voice was as raw as his, too hurt and too honest. She would feel the shame of it forever. “What do you have to lose?”
“Me,” he hurled back at her. “You make me lose control. You make me lose me.”
She had never heard him sound like that. Wild, uneven. Not icy or controlled at all.
“Griffin,” she began, putting out her hand to touch him again, finding that hard line of his mouth and smoothing her fingers over it. “You don’t have to—”
He muttered something that she knew was a curse, and she could feel the heat in the words, but she didn’t recognize the language.
And then it didn’t matter.
Griffin hauled her into his arms, kicking the door shut behind them to lock them up tight in her hotel room, and took her mouth with his.
Twelve
She tasted like things Griffin didn’t believe in.
Magic. Heat and desire.
And he knew he would regret this. Maybe he already regretted this.
But he couldn’t let go of her.
This time, when Mariah wrapped her arms around his neck, he indulged himself. He ran his hands down her back, vaguely recalling that she’d lost her wrap downstairs, and then not caring at all because the only other thing she was wearing was an absurdly soft T-shirt. He tested the curves that he’d been much too aware of for far too long. The delicate line of her spine, the mouthwatering flare of her hips.
He lifted her against him, letting out a groan when she wrapped her legs around his waist and crossed her ankles, holding on tight.
God help him, the ways he wanted this woman.
But he’d waited much too long to rush things now.
He carried her over to the bed, tipping them both down onto the mattress, and for a long while, there was nothing but heat. Need.
And greed for her like a fist that gripped him, hard.
He kissed her until they were both out of breath, and then he helped himself to that line of her neck, the ridge of her collarbone where she often rested her hand and drove him crazy.
She rolled on top of him, settling herself in just the right way against him so that they both caught their breath.
He liked it when she sat up. It was easier to pull that T-shirt off, then get rid of her bra, so he could finally get a look at the perfect curves of her breasts and, better yet, fill his hands with them. Her hair was everywhere, curling between them, sliding this way and that, and as he tugged her down to take her mouth again, he buried his hands in all that blond silk.
Then he flipped her over, because she wasn’t the only one who liked being on top, and found himself grinning against her mouth as she fought him to get his henley off. He reared back, tugging his shirt the rest of the way off and tossing it aside.
“All of it,” she ordered him. “I want it all off.”
“Stop,” he told her when her hands moved to her jeans. She stared up at him, her hair tousled and her lips swollen from his, the tips of her breasts pink and inviting while passion turned her blue eyes navy. “I want to undress you myself.”
She actually obeyed him for once, and he took care of his clothes, coming back to her like a man possessed. He kissed her until she was squirming against him, into him, and then he started all over again.
Griffin found his way down the column of her neck, back to her beautiful breasts. When she was arching against him, her head thrown back and pretty keening noises coming out of the back of her throat, he moved lower. He tested the shallowness of her navel and the sweet slope of her belly. His hands found her hips and caged her, enjoying the way she bucked against him.
He took his time finding the button to her jeans and tugged them down, but not all the way off, trapping her. He settled where he was, holding her down, and then pressed his mouth to that pretty bit of lace between her legs.
She tasted like sugar and smoke, and he was only getting started. Her hands were on his head, and she rocked against him. Harder and more insistent, until he took pity on her.
Griffin angled himself up and tugged her jeans off of one leg. He went down again, pulling her leg over his shoulder to hold her open and wide before him.
And this time, when he bent to taste her, he let his fingers slip beneath the lace. She was scalding hot, entirely too beautiful, and he couldn’t keep himself from toying with her. When she started to moan, he bent close again, held the lace to one side, and licked his way into all her sweetness.
She shattered almost instantly.
Griffin rode it out, then moved, shifting back off of her. He freed her other leg from her jeans and pulled her
panties down. Then he tossed them aside so she was as naked as he was.
Mariah was still shaking while he dealt with the condom, and her eyes were dreamy and hot when she opened them again.
She took his breath away.
But she was talking, her drawl even more honeyed than usual, and now he knew that she tasted the way she sounded. “To clarify, the man who had no intention of ever having sex carries condoms around?”
“I like to be prepared for any eventuality.”
“Oh sure. You’re just like a Boy Scout.”
Griffin gathered her against him, pulling her knees up on either side and settling between her thighs. He notched himself against her heat, watching her eyes grow dark and wild all over again.
“On my honor, I do swear,” she began chanting, taunting him even now.
But that only made it hotter.
Especially when he thrust in, deep.
They both made a noise at that.
“Yes,” she whispered. “Finally.”
And then, because he could, he went slow.
Hauntingly, deliberately slow.
Griffin didn’t speed up when she started to shake. Or when she started to sweat, her face red and her hair damp.
He didn’t pick up the pace when she begged. Or when she stopped begging and tried to do it herself, rolling her hips against him and trying her best to speed them both toward that edge.
He went slow. So deep it almost hurt, then out again, over and over. Until he wasn’t sure which one of them he was driving insane.
Mariah shattered again. She wrapped her arms around him, tried to climb him and control him, but all she did was toss herself over that edge again.
“Please,” she whispered. “Please, you’re killing me.”
But Griffin kept it slow.
Because he could. Because he had made an art out of waiting.
Because this was a lesson, for both of them.
And because he shouldn’t have allowed this to happen in the first place, and he had no idea if he would ever allow himself to do it again.
He drank up her responses like the whiskey he no longer indulged in.
Each time she broke into pieces and shattered in his arms, he took it in and gloried in it. And only when she was mindless beneath him—only when he was crazy with the scent of her skin, the clutch of her body, and his name on her lips—did he allow himself to break.
Griffin dropped his head down, clasped her hands in his, and let himself go.
At last, something in him roared, as he hurtled over that cliff.
And lost himself completely.
* * *
• • •
It could have been days before Mariah came back to herself. Years, maybe. She was surprised to find Griffin stretched out there on the bed beside her, more astonishingly perfect than she’d imagined.
All the lights were still on, so she indulged herself, turning on her side and letting her gaze trace over him. His beautiful brown skin was like satin to the touch, and he had what she instantly determined to be the perfect amount of hair dusting his chest, then starting again below his navel. He lay with one arm beneath his head, and she didn’t know how she knew when he shifted to alertness, because he didn’t move.
One moment his eyes were closed, the next they were open. And on her.
She could have felt shy, maybe even awash in regrets, but she didn’t. Maybe that would come later, when she had time to process this.
But she doubted it.
She reached over and traced a tight ridge sculpted into his abdomen, and took it as a triumph when he didn’t tense.
“How long has it been since you last let yourself lose control?” she asked.
She felt his gaze on her like a new heat. “There are a lot of ways of losing control. Are you talking about my temper? Do you want to know the last time I let myself get mad?”
“If that’s what comes to mind as you lie here naked, in bed with a woman. Sure. Let’s talk about your temper.”
“The last time I lost my temper was when my fiancée and my best friend informed me that, really, they would rather be married to each other than have anything to do with me.”
He propped himself up on one hand and faced her. And his gaze was no less intense than it had ever been, but this was different.
It took Mariah a moment to realize that there was no trace of iciness in there. At all.
“Ouch,” she said, noting that he didn’t seem particularly messed up about it. She suspected that meant it had happened a long time ago. “Is that the last time you had sex?”
His mouth curved. “I spent a good while making my own bad decisions.”
“I’d say you were entitled to some bad decisions.”
He reached over, a look of intense concentration on his face, and traced his own trail between her breasts, then lower. He grinned with pure male satisfaction when she shivered in reaction.
“I’ve never found that entitlement gets anyone very far. What starts with entitlement ends in excuses. I decided I didn’t want either.”
“No entitlements, no excuses.” She studied his face. “But you’re okay with me being the enemy?”
“I don’t think you’re the enemy. Not my enemy, anyway.”
“Are you sure?”
Griffin sighed. He reached over and took hold of her, rolling until she was sprawled across his chest, and then held her there until she settled. She was unnerved by his casual strength, and if she was honest, fascinated by it. She piled her hands beneath her chin and gazed at him, trying not to think too much about how intimate this was. How . . . unmasked and vulnerable she felt.
“Control isn’t something I do,” he told her, his gaze intense and his voice serious. “It’s who I am.”
“Does it have to be all or nothing?”
He smoothed her hair back, focusing on the task as if it were the most important thing in the world.
“I’ve never known how to do anything halfway,” he said after a moment, and it sounded like a confession.
Mariah was enjoying all of this too much—Griffin stretched out beneath her, hard and warm. His gaze took in everything and still focused on her like she was the only thing in the world.
And the fact that she didn’t have to figure out a way to hide while he was looking straight at her. She could tell he liked the mess of it. The realness. The salt on her skin, the way her hair tumbled everywhere, the drag of her body against his.
He liked it—but she did, too. She more than liked it. It felt different from sex. It felt like some kind of sacrament.
His confession fit right in.
“I don’t think you’re all that different,” he was saying in his typical gruff manner. “You walked off that ferry like a queen. Now you’re running around with your hair wild and your feet bare, kind of like you’re trying to go full Grizzly Harbor. I might like to control myself, and everything else while I’m at it, but you like to disappear into whatever role you’re playing. And if you think about it, it’s really all the same thing.”
“I’m not disappearing,” Mariah told him, an odd certainty washing through her. “Maybe for the first time in my whole life, I’m not trying to disappear at all.”
“Good.” His gaze searched hers, and she wanted . . . too many things she didn’t know how to name, much less ask for. Especially when he stopped arranging her hair and ran his hand over her cheek instead. “You’ve got nothing to hide, Mariah.”
“Griffin,” she whispered. “Neither do you.”
She couldn’t have said if she leaned forward, or he did. But either way, they were kissing again.
And the heat grew quicker this time. From sweet to wild in an instantaneous blaze.
Mariah felt him stir beneath her and couldn’t seem to keep herself from rocking agai
nst that hard ridge. He let out a low noise, then rolled to the side to deal with the condom.
When he was done, he pulled her back on top of him. Griffin wrapped his hands around her hips, lifted her up, and then settled her back down against him so she could take all of him deep inside her.
“I should punish you,” she whispered, bracing her palms against his chest and letting her hair fall down to trap them. “I should slow it down and drive you crazy.”
Griffin’s grin edged toward cocky. “Go right ahead. If you think you can.”
She couldn’t.
Mariah moved over him, losing herself far too quickly in the exquisite sensation, the friction and the delicious fullness, and most of all the golden heat in that dark gaze he never moved from her.
And this time, when she broke apart, he flipped them over again, bracing himself against the bed so he could drive into her, swift and sure, until she was meeting him, crashing against him, and shattering all over again.
Only then did he go with her, his head next to hers and her name on his lips.
When she stirred again, the room was dark but Griffin was still there.
He pulled her against him, her back to his front, and took her that way, both of them coming hard and fast, a part of the inky darkness.
The next time she woke, she was alone.
There was light outside the windows. And Mariah felt different.
Reborn.
She swung her feet over the side of the bed, cataloging all the delightful aches and tugs that reminded her what kind of night she’d had. She saw the wrap she’d worn downstairs folded neatly on the chair and smiled. She couldn’t remember wearing it when they’d been standing in the doorway up here. She’d likely dropped it downstairs.
Meaning that after Griffin had left her, he’d snuck back in and neatly folded it while she slept.
It was absurd how warm that made her feel. It was a folded length of merino wool, not some kind of valentine.
But she couldn’t seem to wipe the smile from her face.
Mariah made her way into the shower, aware of her body in a way she wasn’t sure she had ever been before. Every square inch of her skin felt alive and brand-new, so that even the water running down her arm made her shiver.