Page 69 of Offside Angel

“You’ve been through so much, and you could have let it make you cold and bitter and angry. But you spent your time making sure your best friend didn't get murdered by her Tinder dates.” She lets out a watery laugh, and I trace the line of her smile with my lips. “And fake dating a stranger so he could keep custody of his son. You take care of everyone else. It's way past time that someone took care of you.”

I slide my hands under the hem of her dress and work slow circles over her hip bones. She rocks against me gently, driving me fucking mad with every brush of our bodies.

“I didn't want it to be like this. I was supposed to leave. None of this was supposed to land in your lap.” Tears roll down her cheeks. “I wish…”

Her voice trails off, and I kiss her, drawing the words out. “Tell me.”

“I wish we’d met in a different life. One without all of this mess.”

“It wouldn’t matter. There’s no version of me that doesn’t love every version of you. In every alternate universe, you and I are just as tangled up.”

She opens her mouth like she’s going to argue—I’m more than used to it by now. But I don’t want to argue.

I kiss her back into the wall and lift her legs around my hips. Her lips are salty from tears, but with every twist of our tongues together, she softens. I press myself between her legs and she moans. Her hand twists in my hair, dragging me closer.

“You want this,” I growl.

It isn’t a question, but she nods.

“You want me.”

She answers by slipping her hand between us and undoing my pants. When her fingers curl around me, I can’t fucking breathe. It’s like I’m in a vacuum. It isn’t until I slide her panties to the side and press into her that I can finally inhale again.

Mira gasps, and I tug on her lower lip with my teeth. I fill her with a slow, relentless thrust and watch as she takes me.

“Say it,” I snarl. “Tell me what you want, Mira.”

“You can feel what I want.”

She’s talking about how wet she is, and she’s not wrong. I rub my thumb over her clit, spreading her wetness over where we’re connected.

“Say it anyway.”

Her eyes roll back. She throws out an arm for something to hold onto, grabbing onto the handle of the refrigerator until her knuckles are white. “Y-you.”

I drag out of her and drive in again. She gasps in my ear, her body quivering around me. “I want you. So much. All the time.”

“I was supposed to take you to bed and do this right,” I remark with a grimace.

“No!” She fists her hand in my shirt, her other arm still tossed over her head. “Don’t stop. Please.”

I couldn’t stop now even if I wanted to.

I pin her hips to the door of the pantry and fill her again and again. “I’m supposed to be convincing you.”

Mira wraps her hand around my neck and rolls against me. She chases her own pleasure until she’s bouncing against me, crying out with every shift of our bodies together. I’m barely clinging on.

Before I lose it, I press into her, driving her back against the wall and holding.

“Please,” she whimpers, trying to wriggle free. “Zane, I’m convinced.”

I press an open-mouthed kiss to her lips and her neck. “Don’t say it because you want me to fuck you. Don’t say it if it isn’t true.”

She scrapes her fingers down my back. “I’m not. It’s always been true. There’s no one else I’d want a family with.”

Talking about kids should not make me this wild, but possession curls low in my gut. The urge I have to be inside of Mira grows into something instinctual. Something raw and feral.

I touch her jaw and force her heavy eyes to mine. “Say it.”

---