Page 19 of Bound By Roses

When I enter the room at the top of the tower, Abby is waiting for me. Naked and beautiful andmine.

I move for her and she does the same, jumping as she reaches me so I can scoop her up against my body, holding her as close as possible and still not close enough. Her lips are on mine, wild and hungry, and the warmth of her alone is nearly enough to send me over the edge.

I can’t see where I’m going, but it doesn’t matter. I’d spotted the bed at the back of the room, and any moment now—

We hit the side of the bed and topped over onto the mattress.‘Did I hurt you?’

‘No.’Her hands work their way under my shirt, nails clawing at my back as if she can somehow pull me closer than we already are.

‘Are you ready?’

She makes a sound of frustration.‘Just shut up and fuck me.’

That’s all I needed to hear. I reach between us and press my length against her, and inserting myself an inch to make sure I don’t hurt her.

Her head arches back, breaking our kiss and together we pull in a breath. “Quinn, please,” she says aloud, and there’s no mistaking the desperation in her voice.

I drive into her as deep as I can and Gods, she’s so fucking wet. The moan that escapes me melds with hers into what might just be my new favourite sound.

She’s close, we both are, but there’s something holding her back and blocking her release.‘Tell me what you need,’I say through the bond because my teeth are too busy taking turns nipping at her breasts.

‘Just you.’

‘You have me.’I kiss her again, so she knows I mean it.‘Every minuscule cell that has a hand in putting me together belongs to you. I am yours, Stabby. In every way you’ll have me.’

‘Alive.’

Alive? Did I hear her right?

‘I need you alive.’

I guess I did. If she’s worried about losing me right now, then I’m not doing my job.

I reposition us so that I’m seated on the bed and she’s on my lap, riding my cock to her own rhythm. I cup her face between my hands and for the first time notice that she’s been crying. Whether it was after I got here, or if she’s been in tears this entire time, I can’t be certain.

“Look at me.”

She does. The bright blue of her irises is illuminated by both the reddening of her eyes and the sunset from the crumbled portion of the tower wall beside us.

“I will never leave you. Not even if the mountains fell, and the sea dried up and the Gods themselves came to drag me away. I’m right here—alive—and I will never, ever, leave you.”

She sobs once before her lips find mine again. She pushes me down onto my back and her pace atop me quickens. The heat consuming us intensifies until it becomes white-hot and near unbearable.

“Quinn!” she screams my name, and I was wrong before.Thatis my favourite sound.

My release comes with hers and Gods, I will never get enough of this. Enough of her.

We stay this way for a long time. Just a heaving mass of tangled arms and legs, unable to tell where one body begins and the other ends. When I finally find the wherewithal to brush the hair from her eyes, all traces of tears have disappeared.

“I don’t tell you enough how beautiful you are.” She’s even more beautiful than the vines of ivy that now weave intricately along the walls and through the windows of the tower as a result of her orgasm. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to that, but I’m not complaining.

“You tell me all the time,” she smiles before leaning forward to give me a quick kiss.

“It’s still not enough.” I move her hand to where the scar on my chest hides just beneath the fabric of my shirt and press it flat against it until it warms the still-tender flesh. “I meant what I said. It would take the destruction of the world itself to pull me away from you. And maybe not even then.”

She takes my other hand in hers and presses it against her chest. “If your heart stops, so will mine.”

“Abby—” I try to object because that’s the last thing I want to hear, but she shushes me before I can get the words out.

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