To call his expression startled wouldn’t even begin to do it justice. Blood surged up his neck and over his face, the throbbing vein at his temple looked like it would burst any moment, his jaw so tight it could’ve pulverized his molars.
“What the fuck!” he shouted.
I struck him in the chest, and his eyes narrowed. When I tried that again, he caught my arms and pinned them over my head to the bed. With feline stealth he pounced, his powerful body straddling mine, raised over me. I glanced down and found him startlingly erect. He was so hard it was almost touched his stomach. When my gaze lifted to his, there was a lewd smile on my face. This only fed his anger. Complete consternation overtook his expression.
“What the hell is wrong with you?”
“I’m sick and tired of you treating me like I’m something breakable! I can’t stand it another second!”
His grip on my wrists tightened as I fought him––tight enough for it to be painful. “Stop fighting me. I don’t want to hurt you,” he growled.
“You can’t hurt me, you dolt!” Apparently I was making up for lost time because I didn’t fight the impulse to call him every name in the book. “How many bloody times do I have to tell you that!”
His eyes became two golden slits. His expression darkened to the point that it made me pause. Once unleashed, the fury took over. He looked like that full sized tiger I hadn’t seen in a long time.
“You know what––sometimes I do want to hurt you.” Raspy and low, his voice was positively primitive. “I want to dig inside of you, and tear you up just for existing––for making me love you!” Crouched low, his hips were pinned to mine. His erection pressed uncomfortably into my abdomen. “I want to get into your molecules and become part of your DNA. I want to be as vital to you as you are to me.” Burning through my veins, a flush of intense heat traveled to the crease between my thighs. “You’re pissed because I treat you like you’re precious? You ARE precious to me! Fuck! As precious as my own heart––it’s self fucking preservation!!” he shouted, inches from my face.
I broke one wrist free of his hold, and snatched his hair in a punishing grip. My lips crashed into his. He gave back in equal measure. We devoured each other. Squeezing, stroking, pushing and pulling. I squirmed until he was perfectly positioned over the apex at my thighs, and rubbed against him. Neither one of us held back. The friction turned into sparks of pleasure. I erupted instantly, screaming out his name.
His breathing was beyond harsh, the tendrils of his control visibly snapping. On a heavy exhale, he shifted and with a powerful thrust, buried himself to the hilt. The hard impact of our hipbones made me sigh in relief.
We weren’t gentle or considerate. Our bodies slammed into each other without thought to pleasure or pain, without any sense of vanity. It was sweaty and coarse and starkly beautiful.
In the heat of the moment my short nails left a scarlet trail on his lower back and buttocks. Whispering words of encouragement in his ear, I urged him on until he turned wild, shoving me over the edge of a second orgasm forcefully. I came so hard spots floated in my eyes. And as I fell back to earth, a river of tears ran down the sides of my eyes and soaked the pillow, an overwhelming sense of relief unlocking the surfeit of emotion that had been trapped behind that steel door.
A moment later he reared up and found his own release. His face crumpled while his eyes remained open, staring into mine as he emptied himself inside of me…emptying the hurt I had inflicted, the distrust, the fear.
The look on his face eased all my concerns. The full weight of him collapsed on top of me. I wrapped my legs and arms around him and held him close, soaking in the sensation as if it was the first time. After weeks of dancing carefully around each other, something fell back into place. We were us again. We had somehow found our way back to each other––no piece left behind.
“You are––” I whispered in his ear, my voice cracking. “Now and forever.”
“What?” he murmured in a vulnerable, almost inaudible voice. The vibration on the delicate skin of my throat made me shiver and tighten my hold on him.
“Vital to me.”
Chapter Fifteen
The road was ridiculously narrow and treacherous, one lane in each direction. Hugging the mountainside, it snaked up higher and higher with no end in sight. I tried to keep my focus straight ahead, and not on the passenger side window that overlooked the steeply plummeting cliff. Every so often, I checked the rear view mirror to see how the large SUV with the security team was faring. They hadn’t driven over the side yet so that was good.