The burn turned to flames within me, and the pressure built, until—
“God, honey.” He plunged into me balls deep.
And I shattered with him.
A glorious climax in tandem. Nothing like the last one, but no less spectacular.
We flew together, our bodies joined in the ultimate clasp, our sweat mingling, his lips pressed to my neck.
I love you. I love you. I love you.
The words swirled around us, sometimes in his voice, sometimes in mine.
Sometimes simply vibrating in the air between us.
Whole. Complete. Never alone again.
Never.
Never alone again.
Morning came sooner than I wanted it to. I woke next to Bryce when the alarm on his phone went off at seven a.m. I stretched my arms languidly above my head, letting the sunlight stream from the window onto my still naked body.
Bryce opened his eyes and fumbled for the phone. “Sorry about that.”
“It’s okay. We’ve both got to get up anyway.”
He smiled. “Last night was amazing.”
“It was perfect,” I said.
He sighed. “But now back to reality.”
“Afraid so.” I kissed his lips lightly. “Unless you’ve got time for another round?”
He pulled me into his embrace. “I always have time for that.” He pushed my long hair out of my eyes. “I’ve never been so afraid in my life as I was when you were missing. I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you, Marjorie.”
I kissed him again. “You won’t lose me.”
“I can’t.” He inhaled and let it out slowly. “I want you to go to Paris.”
“We’ve been through this. I’m not leaving until Jade has the baby. And right now, I can’t leave. Not until all this is settled.”
“I miss Henry like crazy,” he said, “but at least I know he’s safe. I text my mom hourly. I’m sure she thinks I’m nuts.”
“She thinks you love your son, and you do.” I kissed his forehead, his hair tickling my lips.
“I’ll miss you like crazy too, and I’ll text you all the time. I just can’t go through not knowing where you are again, what’s happening to you.”
“Nothing happened to me. Nothing horrible, anyway.”
“But it could have. What if it hadn’t been Dominic who took you? What if it had been that psycho brother of his?”
“It wasn’t. He was busy trying to take on you and Joe. How do you think I feel? You got pepper-sprayed, but something much worse could have happened.”
He shook his head. “We were ready for him to be armed. We took care of that.”
“But you weren’t ready for the pepper spray.”