The springs squeaked, and Maxon cringed with something that looked close to guilt, as if he were remembering all the times he crawled into this bed and tried to stay quiet, and I was somehow grinning against his mouth.
Lost to this moment. Lost to this man. All sanity given, offered to his willing hands.
Because in that moment, nothing else in the world mattered.
Nothing but us.
“What are you grinning about?” he asked with a quiet, playful huff, the man grinning, too, though there was so much affection woven in it that the force of it was stretching my chest tight.
Joy pressing full.
“At you. That you’re here. That you came back to me.” I reached out a trembling hand and stroked across his gorgeous face. “That you’re lookin’ at me that way.”
He grabbed my hand and pressed my knuckles to his lips, mumbling at the flesh, “And how am I looking at you?”
“Like you love me. Like you’re gettin’ ready to devour me. Like you’ll be all too happy to do it again.”
Rising up higher, he planted his hands on the mattress as he dipped his face down to whisper his mouth across mine. “Again and again. Forever.”
“Endless,” I murmured back at his lush lips, so soft, so sexy in their pluck and pull as he kissed me slow.
Reverently.
His hand slipped over my cheek, cupped my jaw, my chin. Maxon glided it down to palm my breast over the fabric of my shirt, chills spreading in the wake of his adoring touch.
I arched. Released a tiny moan.
“God, I love the sound of that,” he rumbled, getting onto his knees and sitting back so he could reach down to gather the hem of my tank in his hands. He peeled it up, cool air hitting my flesh, goosebumps flashing across my abdomen and scattering over my arms as he tugged it over my head.
I wasn’t wearing a bra, and my nipples were tingling, pebbling to hard, needy peaks as I sank back onto the pillow.
Maxon stared down at me.
Desire sparked. Little bursts lighting up in the space. Excitement and greed.
“Shit,” he hissed, and he leaned forward onto one hand so he could trace the tip of a finger around the aching flesh. “So goddamn sexy, Izzy Baby. You have any idea what you do to me? Years I spent dreaming about you, fantasizing about this body. No memory could ever do you justice.”
He dipped down and grazed his teeth on the lobe of my ear.
Chills streaked, and I whimpered, hips jerking from the bed.
I wanted to feel every inch of him.
Rediscover and reclaim what I’d been missin’ for so long.
“Can’t wait to get inside of you. Take you the way I’ve been dying to. Going to prove to you that I can be the kind of man you deserve. I promise, Little Bird. I promise you.”
I could feel the tremor of fear come rolling out with it.
The little boy who’d been marred by brutality.
Fed the lie that he would never be good enough.
Heart clutching in a fist, I rocked my head back on the pillow to make sure he understood what I was saying, my gaze seeking his.
“You’ve always been the kind of man who deserved me. Right and good. Just like I always hoped I’d be good enough to deserve you. Maybe you just needed a little time to come to terms with that. With who you really are. The man I saw.”
Blue eyes flashed with regret and devotion.
I ran my thumb along the hollow beneath one of them.
“I’m so proud of who you became. I knew it. I knew it all along.”
And that seemed to be all that Maxon could take before he broke.
Restraint gone.
Chains busted.
He dove for me, his kiss as desperate as his hands that searched my body, palms pressing firm as they roamed my flesh, cupping my breasts before they were riding down and his mouth was taking their place.
Sucking and licking and driving me wild.
Little teases of pleasure of what was to come.
My fingers twisted in his hair, cinching down tight, and I tried to silence the whimpers that were escaping my mouth as he kissed a path down my belly.
Tried to contain the blaze that burned across my skin when he tucked his fingers into the waistband of my sleep shorts.
Tried to quiet the shout of my heart when he angled back and peeled them down my legs.
His gaze fire.
Complete annihilation.
Completely bare to him, my stomach trembled and shook, my knees quaking as he eyed me like he was watching the sun rise and set at the same time.
A collision of colors.
Complete and utter awe.
And I could take it no longer, either, and I shot up, ripping at his shirt to get it over his head, and oh my God, I was sure I died a little when I got the full impact of his fierce beauty when I tugged the fabric free.