Page 286 of Hateful Games

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Later that night after taking a shower, I slide into bed beside a half-asleep Rosalie.

She stirs at the heat of my naked chest, then lifts her head from the pillow. In the most hypnotic and husky tone, she whispers my name, “Nova?”

“It’s me.” I press a kiss against her shoulder and pull her against my body more securely. “Go back to sleep, Rose.”

She has other ideas.

“I had a long nap in the afternoon,” she huffs amusingly and turns in my arms. Her pierced nipples, undisguised by the thin material of her cami top, brush against my chest. Throwing one leg over mine, she props her chin on her palm laying flat over my heart, and asks, “Where were you?”

“Just a quick meeting.” I trace her jaw. My thumb reaching to caress her lower lip.

I ache to bend and steal a kiss.

But I torture myself, wishing for her to initiate it. Like she did earlier. Then at the place of her future shelter. She’s the happiest when she returns from the biweekly meets regarding the shelter project.

I swear I can spend my life just kissing her alone.

The way I’m addicted isn’t because her kisses taste like my favorite drugs.

Drugs kill.

Her kisses do the opposite. They feed life into my soul.

As if she can hear my thoughts, I’m pushed flat on my back. She straddles my hips and her hair falls down her back like a curtain as she bends and locks our lips together. Slanting her head, she grabs the side of my neck and kisses me for a good long minute.

I run my hands up the backs of her legs.

One traveling up to hold her nape while the other wraps around her waist.

“You’re winning,” she whispers, panting against my mouth.

“What?”

“At spoiling and giving me gifts I’ve no chance of topping.”

“It’s not…”

“…a competition,” she finishes with a teasing grin. “I know that. It seems unfair. I want to make you feel as blissful and over the moon as you make me.”

I’m shaking my head before she even completes her sentence and switch our positions. Kissing her hard, I confess, “You’re crazy if you think you don’t. The days you surprise me in the mornings to spend extra time with me, text me during the day because you found something funny, I live for those moments because it tells me I’m as much in your mind as you are in mine. You’ve breathed life into this house, Rose. I leave the office early knowing you’re waiting for me at home. I’ve never had a person who’s all mine. I didn’t even know I needed that until you. You’re the first thing on my mind when I wake up and the last when I sleep. I can’t even do either unless you’re in my arms, your scent on me, and the way you fit so perfectly. Like you belong nowhere else. I could name a thousand more things without losing my breath about just how blissed and over the moon you make me feel.”

She stares mutely, eyes blinking back unshed tears and swirling with too many emotions at once. Her hair spread on my pillow like a halo, she looks like an angel I brought down to hell with me.

Or maybe she pulled me to heaven.

Who knows?

All I know is, I want to be stuck here with her forever.

“You make me happy in your own little ways, Rose. The best part, you don’t even realize it.”

“See… there you go again,” a soft hitch in her voice as she pulls me closer, “making me speechless.”

I kiss her neck, licking the column of her throat before sealing our lips. “I can’t get enough of your speechless mouth. I love it even more when it’s teasing me, sassing me… kissing me.”

Her nails dig into my upper arms, head tilting to give me access when I move back down. Leaving a trail of hickeys in my wake. She moans, wild and seductive.

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