by Brynn Ford
“I’m so scared you’ll break my heart.”
I could see it in her eyes how true that was. She’d been hurt so dramatically by Asher and I had no shame in admitting that I hoped someone finally finished him off in prison. The person she loved and trusted more than anyone, the man she shared her home with, had tried to kill her and then eviscerated her reputation in his own damn trial just for the hell of it.
Ris had every right to be afraid. I just wished there was a way I could prove to her that I wouldn’t hurt her. Though she had every reason to believe that I would, especially since she caught me with Desi and Vaughn.
“I know, sweetheart. I’m fucking terrified, too. I’ll do whatever it takes to show you that you don’t need to be scared. But it will take time. And I need to know you’re all in this with me. Because I’m all in this with you.”
“What about Desi?”
I knew that was coming.
“I’m sorry about what you walked in on. I feel ashamed for losing myself in that moment. I was really upset over the way things were going with us. I felt so out of control. And along came Desi offering me her submission. Dominant habits die hard, I guess. She was already in subspace with Vaughn when I got home and my dominant side just took over to drown out the anxiety and –”
“It’s okay. I mean, I was surprised, a little upset, but it wasn’t like you were doing anything wrong. What I mean to ask is…are you ready to give her up? Can you let go of her so you can be here for me?”
I sighed, brushing the hair back from her eyes and tucking it behind her ear, “For a while, I didn’t think that would be possible. I actually thought I was in love with her at one point. I did love her, I still do. She’s always going to be a part of our lives. But it’s simply not the same as what I feel for you. It could never be the same. I’ll do whatever you need me to do. I promise. I want you to be the most important woman in my life,” I grinned, “Do you think you’re up to that task?”
“I will be. But I need time. Can you give me that?”
I didn’t want to waste any more time when it came to her, but I could, and I would if it was what she needed.
“I’ll give you time, sweetheart, and whatever else you need.”
“I can’t just fall, okay? I need to protect my heart.”
“I’ll help you protect it.”
“I’ve got walls built up –”
“I’ll tear them down brick by fucking brick. You know I will.”
“How can you sound so confident? It’s not going to be easy. I’m a wreck right now.”
“What makes you think I want easy? I’ve had easy. It’s unfulfilling and I’m done with that part of my life. Besides, you know me, I’m always up for a challenge. And you, woman, challenge me every goddamn day,” I smirked, “I know what I want now and it’s you.”
She sighed, “I want you, too.”
I swallowed, hating the way my voice sounded so vulnerable, “Do you think you can ever love me?”
Her features softened, “Jasper, I do love you. I love you. I’m scared because I love you so much.”
“Fuck. I love you, too.”
She brightened with a small smile and a chuckle, “Please don’t say fuck and I love you in the same sentence.”
“I may not have much experience in the matter, but I hear love and fucking go quite well together,” I brushed my thumb over her bottom lip, “That smile of yours, sweetheart. Tell me what I have to do to keep it there and I will do it.”
A mischievous smirk crept across her face as she came out of fear and back to life, “I have a few ideas.”
Looking down at her, I felt the heat of her words in the overwhelming realization that this woman loved me, that she would be mine forever if I had any say in the matter, and I most certainly did. The thought that she would let me kiss her now, that we had time now to explore each and every one of the dangerous, dirty ideas swirling around in her mind turned me on. I couldn’t help but grind my hips forward into hers.
“I want to know every single one of them.”
“I want you so much right now.”
“Me too.”
“But we can’t here. Not like this. It’s a small house and that guest bed creaks.”
I cocked my head, “How do you know that?”
She smiled, “I’ve slept in it before. Get your head out of the gutter.”
I grinned, then sighed, conceding her point, “You’re right. As usual.”
“Oh, honey, say that again,” she slipped a hand between us and shamelessly grabbed my cock over my pants.
Fuck.
Is this woman really going to be mine now?
I grabbed her hips and spun her around to take my place, lifting her up onto the kitchen island. She opened her legs for me and I immediately filled the space.
“You’re right,” I repeated for her, drawing the words out sensually, “You’re brilliant and you’re deductive and observant and you’re nearly always right.”
Her hands settled on my hips and she leaned forward to kiss the side of my neck. I groaned.
“You really have changed, haven’t you?” she said coyly.
“If by changed you mean I’ve learned to recognize true fucking perfection right in front of me, then yes. Because you’ve been there all along, Angel, and I was just too goddamn stupid to recognize it.”
She pulled back to look at me with sincerity as she studied my face, “If we can figure this out, find a way to make us work…we could set the world on fire.”
“You’ve already set the world on fire. I’m just asking to stand by your side while it burns bright for you.”
She fanned herself dramatically with one hand, “Oh, my God. Jasper Haven as a genuine romantic is truly soaking my panties.”
“I genuinely, romantically hope so,” I smirked.
“I wanna ask you to kiss me again.”
I leaned forward, ready to oblige, but she grabbed my face in both hands and held me still, halting me.
“But the next time that you do, I want you to make love to me after.”
“And we’re not doing that here, so…”
“So, not tonight.”
I nodded in her hold, sighed in sexual frustration, but complied.
“Okay,” I told her, “I get it.”
“I just want it to be special.”
“You don’t need to explain it to me. That’s what you want and that’s what I’m gonna give you.”
I couldn’t say it wasn’t the most frustrating fucking thing waiting to kiss her, waiting to fuck her, but I knew why she was asking for the delay. She was protecting her heart, just like she’d said.
Sure, I could’ve pushed her, seduced her into submission with my charm the way I’d always done before. If I did that, though, then I wouldn’t be proving to her that I wanted her for good, that I had changed, that I was the man she needed me to be.
So, my dick would just have to wait for her.
Besides, if it earned me this look of intense love that she had dancing in the blue of her eyes, then it was worth it.
That look was priceless.
“I love you,” she said then smiled.
“I love you.”
It was easier than I ever could have imagined it would be to tell her that.
Soon after, she walked me to the door and told me goodnight, granting me the pleasure of a single, soft kiss pressed quickly to my lips.
I checked into my hotel, leaving her for the night to rest in peace in her brother’s home. We made plans to meet for dinner the next night.
Room service in my hotel room.
It was just past midnight when I settled into my room, which was still early for me. I felt so calm and relaxed for the first time in a long time, though. I climbed into bed, perfectly happy to lay there in the dark, thinking through all the details of that fucking beautiful kiss and the woman behind it.
The last time I felt anything close to something like it was my first kiss with Audr
ey, and even that couldn’t compare. Admitting that ached in my chest. A part of me still had a hard time letting go of her without closure.
I had to make a decision. I could let myself feel guilt over finally moving forward emotionally, or I could admit that letting myself fall hard for Ris didn’t lessen the love I felt for Audrey all that time ago. Loving Ris didn’t erase the past. It just meant I could grow in love.
God, do I need to grow.
It had taken me too long to recognize that I had become nothing more than a man-child in his early thirties. I had Desi to thank for that wildly, and frustratingly accurate, terminology. I had limited myself with my very specific lifestyle choices.
Not to say they hadn’t served me well.
Not to say they hadn’t served a purpose.
Not to say they weren’t fucking fun or that I would be giving them up entirely.
I was a stronger, more confident man for my experiences as a dominant. I wouldn’t trade those experiences for the world. And I fully intended to continue being dominant, though the manner of which was about to change drastically.
Lord help me.
I was ready to commit to a relationship with Ris. I could no longer envision a future without her. Hell, I don’t think I ever pictured her leaving my life from the moment I had met her.
That should have been my first clue and I should’ve known a long damn time ago.
The past was the past and I was ready to move forward from it all and focus on her. I was scared shitless, though, because I had no goddamn idea what the fuck I was doing.
A partnership is what Ris wanted and if that’s what I had to give for her to be mine, then I would figure it the hell out. Because that kiss shook me deep and changed me in ways I didn’t even understand.
After all the screwing around I’d done over the last decade, one kiss with Christine Warren had me ready to hand over the whip and let her take control.
Chapter 29
Ris
I had butterflies in my stomach.
I was nervous to see a man who had once fucked me in the ass while I rode a vibrator to climax with my hands tied behind my back at his sex club. I was nervous to see a man who literally knew me inside and out. I was nervous because one kiss with him changed my entire world.
Jasper had always been the man I needed. I think I’d always known it on some level. In hindsight, I think knowing he was it for me is what drove me into the arms of Asher. It was because I knew, without admitting it to myself at the time, that Jasper was what I wanted even though he couldn’t reciprocate.
I left him for Asher because Asher offered me the partnership that he wouldn’t.
He lied, obviously.
But maybe Jasper never would have been ready for me if we hadn’t both been through the shit storm we’d seen the past couple of years.
Whatever had changed his mind about me, I was grateful, because the thought of going on without him physically hurt.
And fuck, I needed his strength now more than ever when my reputation was crumbling and my career failing.
I had to breathe deeply in the hotel hallway before lifting my hand to knock on his door. I held my breath waiting for him to answer, wondering if the man standing behind the door would look the same to me today after such a life-shattering kiss, wondering if he would still feel for me today what he said he felt for me last night.
The door clicked open without warning and the air rushed out of my lungs. The smile that stretched across Jasper’s face made me buckle at the knees. I brightened instantly, all the ache of recent days blurring into the background.
I swayed backward, sensing him coming after me before he even moved. His smiling face faded to an expression of lust-filled determination as he stepped forward, sweeping one arm around my waist and dragging me inside the room. He pushed the door shut behind us with his other hand and moved me, walking us backward toward the bed.
“I fucking need you. Right now, Christine.”
I didn’t know what to expect coming over here tonight. We made plans for a quiet dinner in his hotel room. Of course, I knew we both expected sex, but I didn’t know when or how it would happen or even what it would be like now that deeper feelings had been expressed.
His command, his sincere need and quick desperation for me had me ready to give him whatever the fuck he wanted.
The backs of my legs hit the bed and I sat as he bent down over me, forceful in his dark hovering. I paused, eyes locked on his as I stared up at him, waiting and watching and breathing for the next moment.
He didn’t move.
He didn’t speak.
His eyes stole glimpses of me, sweeping down my curves. But then I realized the stolen glances were hidden commands.
Take off your clothes and let me see you, is what they told me.
The unspoken command was different from times before. It wasn’t insistent or impatient. It was pleading, begging, needing. It asked me to comply and waited for me to choose compliance. I’d always had the choice as his submissive, but this somehow seemed different, more equal.
I lifted my shirt, peeling it off over my head and tossing it aside. It was one movement to show him that I was his and I would willingly comply.
Oh, my God.
I’m his.
Am I really his?
Is he really mine?
We never broke eye contact as I reached behind me to unclasp my bra.
“Tell me,” I said.
He didn’t twitch or seethe at my demanding. Instead he warmed to it. I didn’t have to explain what I wanted him to tell me because he already knew.
“I love you, Angel. You’re mine and I love you. I’m yours and I love you.”
I sighed, pulling my bra straps off my shoulders and throwing the damn restrictive thing to the floor, “Do you know how much time I spent doing my hair and make-up and trying to decide what to wear for you tonight?” I half-smiled, “And it was all for nothing because you’ve got me half-naked thirty seconds after I walk into the room.”
He grinned, “Well, then I’m not working fast enough, because I expected to have you completely bare beneath me by now.”
He’s mine.
He’s mine.
He’s mine.
“So, what are you waiting for?” I replied coyly.
Law took a deep breath, “I’m waiting for this urge to pounce on you and rip you to fucking shreds to pass.”
He reached down, grabbing his cock through his pants and adjusting the length of it. His hips rocked forward as he did it, level with my eyes, and I shuddered.
“Oh, my God,” I breathed, “You’re gonna splinter my soul tonight, aren’t you?”
His chuckle was low, “If I do it right.”
Without warning he dropped to his knees in front of me. Law was on his knees for me.
For me.
He reached down, working to unclasp the delicate straps that held my high heels to my feet, “Tell me,” he said, watching me, repeating my earlier demand.
I repeated the words he’d said to me, but I had to take a deep breath first. I had to speak them slowly, carefully, making sure they came out with the sincerity I felt. Because I truly felt them deep in my soul and to say them with anything but care would be an insult to the both of us.
I grabbed his face in both hands, stopping him just after he removed one shoe.
“I love you, Jasper. You’re mine and I love you. I’m yours and I love you.”
The blue of his eyes flickered with mine, dancing in rapid movements as we looked and let ourselves feel something more than shared physical sensation. It was shared emotion, pain, joy, lust, love. It was the intensity of his soul I could see through his gaze and I could feel it screaming for me, begging me to find a way to unleash the love it had held back for so long.
Our mouths crashed together, colliding somewhere in the middle of the heated space between us. I devoured him without shame, opening my mouth and giving him my tongue to taste, to lash wi
th his.
Jasper pushed and I was on my back in a flash, weighted down to the mattress as his body crushed mine with force. He laid heavy on me, unforgiving, taking my breath away. But it was no matter to me because he gave me back every stolen breath with his fevered kiss.
I’d never been kissed like that.
I’d never felt like my heart, my breath, my soul, were being stolen from me while being replaced in greater measure by the heart and breath and soul of the thief.
I’d never given so much to feel so much more returned to me.
I moaned into his mouth, a hopeful plea for more.
He held my cheek in one hand, kissing me deeper than he ever had before, while the other found the side of my belly. It skated upward, tickling my skin, leaving a trail of goosebumps in its wake as his fingertips found the mound of my breast.
My body bucked beneath him, showing him without words that I wanted him, showing him that I was made to respond to his touch. I grew achingly desperate as he cupped my breast, kneading lightly, brushing his thumb across the top until he found my nipple and teased incessantly.
I was so overcharged for his touch that I cried out into his mouth, unintentionally breaking our kiss. I felt light-headed, lost without his lips on mine, but then his eyes caught me and I felt like I was home again.
He grinned down at me, devilish delight at the pleasure he gave me shining gleefully from his eyes. He sat up, straddling my hips. I was trapped beneath him, but I had no desire to escape.
His thumb was still brushing across my nipple, whisper soft. I lifted my hands, placing them on the bed above my head. He bent down, kissing the breast his hand was absent from.
I arched my back, my body pleading with him to give me more. He licked, dragging his tongue across before clamping down on the sensitive bud and sucking.
My hands flew to his head, fingers digging into his thick, perfect, wavy hair and holding him in place. I expected him to fight me, to grab my wrists and slam them back down to the mattress. Instead, he gave me what I demanded, swirling his tongue around my nipple as he sucked and licked delightfully.
“Yes,” I moaned, lifting my hips.