Page 108 of Call You Mine

My heart aches for him.

I know at times that phrase is thrown around without context—after all, it’s easy to say yet difficult to bear witness. A feeling no one will ever be able to tangibly prove exists. Yet I can’t help but feel it in every part of my being. In my bones, in my heart, through my entire body and mind. My soul needs him to exist.

I stand from the bed I’m in, the same bed I lay sleepless last night in my brother’s guest room, and yank the IV drip from the top of my hand. In all the haze of the last few hours, the one thing I don’t remember the doctor saying is how my baby was doing. He’d said there was no immediate danger, but that wasn’t enough for me. I needed to see for myself. Heading over to the door, I halt when it slowly opens as Damon appears on the other side.

His eyes widen in shock when he sees me standing before him in a pair of shorts and a thin tank top Scarlett must have put on me.

“Baby,” he says, reaching for me and cradling me in his arms. “What the hell are you doing up?” He grabs my hand and yanks it toward him, staring at the small red scab where the IV was connected and back at the bag hanging from a rack beside the bed. “Come, I need to get you back in bed and get the doctor back in here.”

“No, Damon,” I plead, stopping him. “I’m fine, I promise. I just need some fresh air.”

Looking up at me with worried eyes, he leads me toward the double doors leading out onto one of the four balconies of thehouse. Grabbing one of the plush throws from the bed, he moves to open the door, motioning for me to step out.

I gasp as he drapes the blanket along my shoulders, though not because of the soft breeze of the warm summer night, but because of the beautiful scene before me. The sun, fully set on the horizon as the moon illuminates the beautiful night sky. The ocean is serene and steadfast, soft waves flowing back and forth along the shore. I forgot how beautiful living along the beach was.

I spent endless summers here my whole life, specifically in high school before my brother claimed ownership of it. Though I never took the time to slow down and admire how beautiful the scenery around here really was.

The past three years I spent in New York, confined to a penthouse in the middle of a metropolitan city. I missed living on the beach, a mere few minutes away from the marvel that was the ocean.

Light's beam along the small awning covering the top as the string of lights flickers in the darkness. Damon’s arms fall around me suddenly, but I push away from him, turning so I meet him face to face. I don’t want his pity. Don’t want him by my side because of some false sense of duty now that I’m carrying his child. He came to my rescue, just as he wouldn’t have if I’d been anyone else. That’s just who Damon Drake is. A protector, an unlikely savior with a complex for helping damsels in distress, and that’s exactly what I was. It’s what I still am.

“Damon, please, don’t.”

Confusion washes over his expression as he stares at me in disbelief. “Wynter, I…”

“I can’t, Damon. Not right now. I can’t have you standing here looking at me like I’m some broken version of the girl you used to know. I can’t stand to see your pity as you stare at me, hoping the last forty-eight hours hadn’t occurred. I need you togo back to the way things were before you found out I’d gone after my mother.”

Damon rushes to my side, pushing me backward until my lower back is pressed against the edge of the railing. “There is no going back, princess. Not now, not ever.”

Damon’s lips crash down on me in a fierce need as his tongue immediately forces its way through. His right hand finds the back of my neck and pulls me in closer to him, while his left hand lands against my lower back and pulls me against him. I can feel the hardness of his erection pressing against his jeans as his mouth continues to devour me in the sweetest yet sultriest way possible. Teeth clatter, tongues dance sloppily, but it’s the adrenaline of having him in my arms that pushes me to the edge. I throw my arms around his neck and pull myself up, wrapping my legs around his waist in the same second.

Without thinking twice, I move my hips in a frenzied rhythm, aching to find any sort of friction to quench my need for him, too quiet the urge I have to feel him, any part of him, between my legs.

I gasp for air the moment our lips part and cradle his face between my hands. “Damon,” I pant, unable to speak.

“Fuck, Wyn. Baby, I thought…” he pauses, unsure what to say. “I’ve never been more scared in my life than when I saw the psychotic bitch point the gun at you.”

I nod, understanding exactly what he’s trying to say because it's the same way I felt when I thought I’d lost him. “I was scared too, Damon. But not of them, not of Enzo or Clarissa or anyone else. I feared losing you. Of being all alone through this.” I reach down between us and lay a hand on my stomach. “Of us not having you with us.”

Damon lowers me to my feet and nearly falls as he takes an unsteady step back. My heart thunders loudly in my ear whenI think I’ve gone and fucked everything up by reminding him about the baby.

But he doesn't leave nor turn away from me. Reaching for me, he sets his palm atop mine, cradling my stomach as he stares at it in disbelief.

“I thank God you saved me from them, Damon. You saved us.”

My statement brings him out of his thoughts, the thoughts currently threatening to consume him with doubt and uncertainty. “Princess,” he says, looking deep into my eyes with more emotion than I’ve ever seen from him. It’s nearly tangible and overpowers my urgent need for him. To show him exactly how I’m feeling inside. “There is no higher power, no God. All I’ve seen is chaos and violence. All you’ve lived is pure agony and torment. I swear I will rain hell on every single person who’s ever hurt you. To all of those who will dare to threaten what’s mine.” Damon drops to his knees, his head falling against my stomach as he cradles it. My knees go weak seeing him in this position. One of the most dominant men I’ve ever met at my mercy. “Because you belong to me, Wynter Servite. Not because of some contract, not because of some sick ploy to trick your mother. Not because you came running to me from a monster who thought he could have what was mine. Because you’re mine, Wynter. I can’t, and won’t, live without you, without the two of you.”

I nearly lose consciousness when he looks up and his eyes meet mine. My heart swells with equal amounts of joy and relief. This stubborn, controlling and all-around possessive man loves me and our unborn baby, and I know he will do everything in his power to ensure we are safe, loved and cared for. And I love him more than anything in this world, more than I ever imagined possible.

“Damon…”

“Marry me, Wynter,” he says, kissing my stomach and taking the breath right out of my lungs. I’m stunned, completely and utterly taken aback by his statement. Because it wasn’t worded as a question, not it felt like a command. “Make me the happiest man in the world by becoming my wife and having my baby.”

After the initial shock wears off, I’m slightly mad, thinking about the bullshit proposal he’s surely only doing because I’m pregnant, but when he pulls a ring out of his pocket, an incredibly beautiful emerald stone intertwined with two smaller glittering diamonds on a beautiful white gold band, I can’t deny this is exactly what I want.

“I love you, Damon. Everything about you. Your possessiveness, your sharp tongue, your loyalty to me and to everyone you’ve ever cared about…”

“Say yes, Wynter,” he pleads, unable to take the tension any longer.

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