Each give. Mine.
Each take. Mine.
Each scream. Mine.
This was it for me, everything I’d always needed and wanted, found in the one girl I never realized I was missing. In that moment, pieces of the puzzle that was Chase Winter, shattered to the ground. The past? Didn’t matter. But right now? Feeling her warmth, tasting her desire? It was everything. I pushed harder, faster, she met me with each thrust, grabbing my body tighter against hers.
She screamed my name as we both found our release, a freaking explosion that robbed me of my vision, balance, and sense of time. I’d have held her just like that. Forever. I wanted to freaking set up camp in that shower and never leave. But she slumped against me, boneless, most likely exhausted. She slid slowly down my body, a sexy smile dancing across her lips. “Well, that was nice.”
“Nice?” I repeated.
She nodded and shimmied by me, collecting what was left of the soap I was using and started lathering it across her body. Hot damn. The tease moved the soap down her hips, around her ass, my eyes trained on that soap like it held the secrets to the world. Her hands moved to her br**sts and I swear I almost blacked out as the soap lathered around one of my most favorite parts of her body, playing hide and seek.
Dear God, I was going to pass out on the spot. Already my body was responding to her again — how was that even possible? She handed me the soap and turned around. Growling in frustration, I told myself to calm down and helped wash her back, when really all I wanted to do was grab that mop of black hair and give a little tug while pleasuring her again.
I finished with her back then moved the soap down one of her perfectly formed legs. I went up and down in rhythmic motion then stopped when I reached the inside of her thigh. I let the water cascade down her then moved my mouth to where the soap had been. With a gasp her head fell back as she grabbed my hair and pulled, pushing me harder against her core. Groaning, I don’t know how the hell it happened but I was ready for her. Again. Immediately. Damn, it really wouldn’t ever be enough, would it? I stood and gripped her hips.
“Wrap your legs around me,” I demanded.
“So we can hug?” she asked innocently.
“Right. I’m going to hug you so damn hard you get pregnant.”
“Chase!” She smacked me in the arm.
I was serious as hell. I turned off the shower and wrapped her in a towel, quickly drying the both of us off, and then lifted her onto the counter, again not taking any time to do it right. I nudged her legs aside and pushed into her. I really wasn’t in the mood for romance and flowers. This was need. Primal need. I was in the mood to make her forget everything about what she’d just done — about what we’d both be facing within the next twenty-four hours.
If I died, I wanted the last name on my lips to be hers.
If I got shot, the last image I wanted flickering through my head would be of her naked body, of her smile, of her luscious lips, and of those damn blue eyes.
“Chase…” Mil moaned as my lips slid down her neck, sucking the water droplets with my mouth and teasing her with my tongue. Her head fell back against the mirror.
“I have something to tell you.” I moved inside her, slowly, and then faster.
“Can you make it fast?”
“Can you not distract me?” I groaned.
“S-sorry.” Her body tightened around mine and she shook. Then she sighed and leaned against my chest as my body climaxed and then shuddered against hers.
“I love you.” I’d said it twice in my life. Once to Trace and now to my wife.
“Come again?”
I smirked. “You think I can’t?”
She smacked me in the shoulder.
“What?” I said innocently.
“You’re such an ass sometimes.”
“I think that’s why you love me back?” I whispered in a hopeful voice.
Mil’s eyes were clear as day, so blue and striking that I sucked in a breath to make sure I really hadn’t died. “I’ve loved you since I was fourteen.”
“Really?” I lifted her off the counter so she could stand in front of me and so I could hold her in my arms. “You aren’t saying that to stroke my ego?”
“The last thing you need is more stroking.” Her eyebrows arched in amusement. “And I mean it. When my dad hit me. It was your face I saw. When he…” She choked. “When he branded me, when you didn’t come for me, I pretended that you did.” A fat round tear slid down her cheek. “I closed my eyes and pretended that it was just a nightmare, an alternate reality. I dreamed I was still in your arms. You kissed me and told me it was going to be okay. Earlier you said you didn’t want to be a white knight. It’s funny, because in my book, you really have always been my savior. You’ve been my everything. I was just too angry to admit it.”
“And now?” I whispered, my voice hoarse.
“Now I can’t help it.” Her hands caressed my face, rubbing over the stubble that had started making its presence known since I hadn’t shaved that day. “I can’t help but want you. I can’t help but need you. I can’t help but depend on you. It wasn’t my own stubborn will that kept me alive all these years, Chase. It was you. It’s only ever been. You.”
My heart about burst.
And I finally knew the difference. Before, I’d thought I’d been in love. It had hurt like hell, but that love? The love I felt for Trace? I realize now it was mostly lust and a deep unrelenting friendship, nothing more. I’d loved her with my whole heart. I still did, but not the way I loved Mil.