“Did you just get out of the shower?” I sway my hips, slow and steady beneath his perusal.
“Yep.” He circles me, his hooded gaze touching every inch of my body, from my flirty smile and sports bra to my tiny dance shorts and bare legs. “I went for a run.”
He and Trace run every day, making use of the trails on the wooded property. Sometimes, they run together.
I glance at the closed door. This is the first time one of them stepped in here since the day they punished me.
Cole follows my gaze. “Trace is holed up in the office on work calls all day.”
“He said you would be dividing up your time with me. Is that what this is?”
“Yes. I wanted you to have a few days to yourself.” He looks around the studio with pride in his eyes. “How’s the space working out?”
“I love it, Cole.” A gushy grin lifts my cheeks. “I don’t ever want to leave.”
“I like the sound of that.”
The song ends, and the recognizable beats of Yeah by Usher pumps through the room. Seized by the tempo, I move on instinct. Hips, torso, arms—my body knows the catchy rhythm and loves it.
An impish smile steals over Cole’s mouth.
I step backward, bouncing and swinging my arms overhead. “What?”
“I’m going to smack that.”
“This?” I slide a hand over my rear as I dip to the floor and slide back up.
“Yeah.”
“Come get me.” I reverse through the room, jumping to the electronic beats and popping my movements.
He chases, his expression so intensely hungry it makes me feel giddy, alive, and wildly turned on. When he catches me by the windows, he spins me toward the ballet bar. Then he moves in, syncs our hips, and grinds with the music.
His bare chest burns against my back, his mouth hot on my neck, and his hands roam everywhere. Bodies pressed tightly together, we move as one, rocking, grabbing, and panting. It’s the sound of our breaths that really gets me going. His is labored and shallow, telling me he wants me as badly as I want him.
Perspiration slicks his skin as his chiseled physique bunches and plays around me. He’s hard, so damn long and swollen pressed against me, and I can’t stop thinking about that unfastened button. And the zipper that needs tugging. And the underwear I know he’s not wearing.
His body is made for sex, and he dances like he’s mating. Hips thrusting, hands squeezing flesh, he leads, and I follow. He pulls, and I give. Then I break away, spinning around him in teasing circles.
He watches me like a predator, his eyes drunk on desire, and his kiss-shaped mouth beckoning me. Utterly possessed by him, I drift closer with fire in my belly. He snatches me by the waist, aligns our bodies chest to chest, and rolls our hips. Then he crushes his mouth against mine.
We kiss for a moment that carries on forever, in an airless space, dancing as one body, skin sliding, limbs entangled, and hearts wild.
God, I love his lips. Our story was born there, on his dimpled smile. Every kiss we share validates what we knew the day we met. He’s my first love as I am his. We’re a constellation of fate, love spiraling to death to lies to love, and despite it all, we continue to spin with stars in our eyes.
We dance through several songs, kissing and grinding until my lungs burn and my mouth goes numb. I feel like more than flesh and bone when I’m in his arms, like I’m one half of something momentous. Like I’m an elemental part of something so rare and untouchable only a few people in the world ever experience it.
“I want to learn the dance you choreographed.” He nuzzles my neck and spans his hands over my backside.
“Which dance?”
“The one I should’ve learned four years ago.”
Our first dance.
The dance that never happened.
My heart trips as I envision a dream I thought I’d buried with his ashes.
A marriage to my first love.
A wedding dance.
With Cole.
As warm, gooey hope flutters through in my veins, another emotion knocks inside me, crashing everything to a halt.
Fear.
As much as I love the idea—the ballroom, white dress, tuxedo, wedding rings, and our smiles as we twirl through the room—all my happiness shatters when fear shoves its way in, that jealous whore.
Cole hurt me in the past, and he could do it again. I’m so attached to this dance, and teaching him the steps could deepen my attachment to him. What if he knows that and this is just a ploy to outmaneuver Trace? What if I teach him and give the dance to Trace in the end? I can’t do that to Cole.
I open my mouth to tell him…what? I don’t know.
He cradles my face in his hands and looks at me like I’m a coin at the bottom of a well. A flickering candle on a cake. A star shooting across the sky. I’m his wish, and he is mine.
“Lie to me, Danni. Tell me we’re not made of the same destiny.”
“I can’t.” I blink, heart stammering. “I won’t lie.”
Over the span of four years, we leapt and soared. We fell and crashed. Then we brushed ourselves off and jumped again. We’re not a phenomenon of chance. We’re meant to be, and fate always finds its way.
I lean my brow against his, hugging the broad slopes of his shoulders. “When do you want to start learning the steps?”
A smile lights up his whole face, popping those dimples and painting his brown eyes with an eager glow. He lifts me from the floor and carries me to the couch, kissing me as he lowers me to my back.
I crane my neck to the look at the door. “What about—?”
“Trace wouldn’t dare come in, and there are no cameras in here.” He nibbles my lips. “No more spying.”
Kneeling over me, he deepens the kiss with fevered licks. His hand slides over my neck, through my hair, down the length of my body, and pulls on the sports bra impatiently, aggressively. I help him work off the top, and his mouth falls upon my nipple, tongue flicking and curling around the bud.
“Swear to God…” He moves to my shorts, yanking them down my legs while holding my gaze. “I’m not stopping until your pussy’s sore and the walls in this room know my name.”
My legs tremble, and I glance down at the bulge straining his zipper. “Are you always hard?”
“Yes.” He tosses my shorts and climbs up my body. “Because you’re always goddamn sexy.” He molds his hands around my breasts. “Ninety-nine percent of the time, I’m fucking the hell out of you in my head.”
“And the other one-percent?”
“I’m blowing my load in my hand.”
“Cole,” I moan, wriggling beneath his sweeping caresses. “I love when you get all poetic. You and your dirty mouth.”
“My dirty mouth is a sucker for the romantic stuff.” He grazes his teeth across my breast. “Like eating your pussy and lapping up your come.”
He shoves a hand between my legs, using his muscular forearm to spread me wider. With a knee on the couch beside me, he plays with my wetness, opening me, spreading my heat, and plunging his fingers deep inside.
My back arches, and my knees fall open as he thrusts and teases with wicked skill. I bury my hands in his hair, whimpering and rocking my hips. I want. I need. Christ, I don’t know the difference when his long fingers are stroking inside me.
He worships my peaked nipples with hot, wet lips and slides back up, face to face. I sprawl my hand across his scratchy cheek, and he kisses me like we’re the last of our kind, like we’re an extinct species in a loveless world.
Then he leaves my mouth, trailing kisses down my breastbone, across my abs, tickling his whiskers against my skin. His lips are the greedy kind, the kind that possess, devour, and plunder every part of my body they touch.
Dipping his head, he groans against my pussy. “So tight and sweet.” He sinks his teeth into my tender flesh. “I want to break this pretty pink cunt.”
“Have at it.” I gyrate beneath him, high on lust.
He flashes a wolfish grin and lowers his face between my legs. Then he eats me like it’s the last time he’ll ever eat, kissing, sucking, and rolling his tongue around my piercing. He plunges deep and licks every drop of wetness. I tighten my fingers in his hair and wrap my legs around his neck, groaning, holding on, and making it last as long as possible.