Page 76 of Guarded By the Phantom

“You didn’t say it back,” she said in a rush, then looked away. “But it’s okay. I just thought… Doesn’t matter.”

“Oh.”Oh!

That was why I needed Nat for these things. I was so preoccupied with myself, with how her words mademefeel, I totally missed how big of a leap it was for her. And I knew she was self-conscious, too, but I tended to forget it, because she was obviously so beautiful and perfect. She had no reason to ever doubt how she made me feel.

“My beautiful, perfect doll,” I whispered, my throat tightening with the weight of the words I was about to speak. “I don’t know anything about love. I have no idea how it feels. All I know is that you’re the only person I care about, the only person I want to share my life with, the only woman I ever want to fuck and hold. All I want is to make you happy. I want to feed you when you’re hungry, protect you when you’re in danger, andmake you smile. I need you viscerally. You can never be away from me. You can never leave, because then, I will be lost. You make everything make sense.”

She stared at me with her lips parted, eyes huge. I stroked her cheek, gently pushing her hair behind her ear. She took a shaky breath at the affectionate gesture and leaned in to kiss my mouth.

“Thank you,” she said thickly as if her throat was full of tears, just like mine had been. “I, uh. I think yours was better than mine.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” I said with a grin, happy the problem was fixed. “Did my words make you come? No. But yours will make me shoot. Come on. Tell me you love me.”

She laughed like it was a joke, but I was perfectly serious. When I slapped her ass to remind her what I said, she took a deep, happy breath and looked into my eyes with that radiant smile that was my undoing.

“I love you.”

We both grunted when my cock bucked inside her.

“Mmm. Keep going,” I said, my balls tingling with pleasure.

“I love you,” she whispered, kissing my cheek. “I love you.” The corner of my mouth. “I love you.” My chin. “I love you.”

My hips jerked, and I fucked up into her while my cock strained, pleasure radiating up and down my spine. She kept saying it, my pretty girl loving me when no one else ever had, and I came inside her, groaning in ecstasy.

Then I flipped us over and fucked her into the mattress, because she deserved to come, too.

Hours later, when dawn grayed the sky outside the window, we lay in bed together. We’d fucked a few times, dozed off for maybe half an hour, fucked again, showered, and fucked. My baby could barely keep her eyes open, but I wasn’t ready to lether sleep yet. There were so many things I needed to do, one especially that burned and itched in the back of my head.

I leaned over to reach for my discarded belt and got the single grenade I always kept on me. I put it in her limp hand.

“Here. Hold it for me.”

“What is it?” she mumbled, her fingers tightening around the grenade.

Next thing I knew, she sat bolt upright, staring at it and breathing hard, her eyes wide with panic. I laughed under my breath.

“Relax, doll. The safety is on. See? The pin is in. It won’t blow up. I’d never give you anything dangerous.”

“It’s a grenade,” she said in a weak voice. “It’s dangerous bydefinition.”

“Oh, fine,” I agreed. “But you’d never be stupid enough to activate it. Let me show you how it’s done, though.”

I took it from her and showed her the safety pin. “See? As long as this is inside, it won’t blow up. But let me show you how to remove it, in case you ever need it.”

“I doubt I’ll ever need it,” she said faintly.

“Mmm. Bear with me. Okay, see here? This is the lever. You need to hold it, like this, and then you can take out the pin. Let’s try it.”

She looked at me with huge eyes, and I smiled in encouragement, taking her hand. Holding the grenade in one palm and pressing the lever down, I put her ring finger through the safety pin. As I had suspected, it didn’t fit, but I looked carefully to see by how much it would have to be resized.

“And pull,” I said. “It’s safe. As long as I hold on to the lever, it won’t blow up.”

She took a shaky breath and pulled the pin out. It dangled from her finger while her nervous eyes darted between the grenade and my face.

“Okay, so what happens is, that pin held this lever in place. Now, if I throw the grenade, the lever will spring back and start the reaction that will make it detonate. There is a bit of a delay which allows you to throw it safely and get behind a barrier so you don’t get hit.”

She nodded frantically. “Okay, fine, yes. Can we please put the pin back in?”

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