Not in spite of his flaws. Not because he’s handsome. Not even though he is a ruthless bastard. I just love him, exactly as he is. If he never changes. If he never sees things my way. If he never gets better. He is exactly what I want and how I want him right now. And the liberty of that, of not needing the one you love to be something else, and finally believing that he wants you just as you are . . . that the constancy of his desire through years, fluctuating dress sizes, and barrier after barrier he keeps knocking down to get to you, is real. That you can trust his passion. That his desire is authentic, and even though he’s sometimes a black-hearted man, what he feels for you is pure. Who would chase something as hard as Jared has chased me if you didn’t want it badly?
“Kiss me,” I whisper, training my eyes on him. “I want to taste like you.”
A warning flare fires in his eyes.
“Banner, you can’t say things like that to me wearing this dress and looking the way you do tonight.”
God, and here I was fretting over my wide, square ass. Concerned about my Spanx-less jiggles, and he is looking at me like I’m his last supper. I turn my head to kiss one palm, framing my face and then to kiss the other. I suck at the warm skin of his wrist, pulling the pounding pulse between my teeth, feeling his life blood throb against my tongue.
“Jesus, Ban,” he rasps, sliding his other hand down to my waist, skimming over my well-rounded curves, cupping my ass. “I’m horny as hell right now. We probably shouldn’t. I won’t be able to stop.”
I reach down to grip the rigid line of cock in his pants.
“Who said you’d have to stop?”
“But Zo—”
“Knows it was you,” I say, tipping up to kiss his neck. “He finished his chemo last week and will not stop me from helping him if I need to no matter what comes next.”
He swallows convulsively, shuts his eyes tightly.
“I don’t want your reputation ruined,” he says, concern sketched between his dark blond brows. “I know I said I didn’t care if you cheated, but I don’t want people thinking you’re anything other than the incredible woman you are. What you’ve done for Zo . . . I don’t deserve you.”
“But you’ll have me anyway, right?” I remind him of his own words
“I have no choice,” he says hoarsely. “I love you.”
That word. The one I just assigned to the desperate, persistent, stubborn passion lodged in my heart for him. Hearing it on his lips steals any resolve I have.
“And I love you, Jared Foster.” I speak the words against his mouth, breathe them into him so he’ll believe me. “Exactly as you are.”
Hearing the same acceptance from me that I see in him, hear from him, opens the cage door on the passion he’s checked, at my request, for the last three months.
“Exactly as I am, huh?” He dips to grab the hem of my dress and drags it up over my legs, the cool air electrically charged with every new inch of me he reveals. He thrusts sure fingers inside my thong. There’s no fumbling or searching. Jared could find my clit in a cave. I’m already wet and swollen. He drops his forehead to mine, his breath heavy and hot over my lips.
“Hallelujah,” he whispers. “This pussy has made a believer out of me.”
My quick laugh bounces off the bathroom walls.
“You can’t say that. It’s borderline blasphemous.”
“As long as we don’t cross the line, and I think I’ve had about enough of you telling me what I can and cannot say about a pussy that is mine.” He smiles down at me, the same wicked man he’s been since our days at Kerrington, but there’s a new contentment in his eyes.
“It is yours,” I agree, my smile fading. “I am, too.”
“Dammit,” he mutters into my hair, slides his mouth over my jaw, down my neck. “I don’t want anyone to catch us, for them to talk badly about you.”
“You let me worry about my reputation.” I chase his mouth until I catch it, kiss it. Own it the way he owns mine. We moan and growl into the kiss, with my hands tugging his shirt from the waistband of his pants. He digs his fingers into my upswept hair, and cool strands brush my bare skin as they fall. He hoists my skirt higher, and I hear a seam tear.
“Face the wall.” His voice is harsh. Insistent.
“Oh, God, hurry,” I turn, panting against the wall. I’m wet between my legs and my nipples are like quarters, hard and round under the tight dress.
The sound of his zipper is Pavlovian, and my pussy drips like he pulled a lever, a conditioned response to the sensual prompt. My hands flatten on the wall, ass angled for him, so ready for him, when my fantasy morphs into my worst nightmare, frame by frame.
“Banner!” The voice comes stridently. “¿Dónde estás?”
This cannot be happening.