Page 23 of Naughty Secrets

His slow, sweet kiss brings tears to my eyes.

“I thought we were done crying.” He wipes my tears away.

“Happy tears.” I wrap my arms around him. “After all these years, we never lost our connection. It was still there, just waiting to be found.”

“That’s because we were meant to be together.” He angles his hips and pushes inside me, slowly, sweetly as his tongue slips between my lips to stroke inside my mouth.

“True. Not many people meet their soul mate when they’re sixteen,” I say when we come up for air. “Or lose them, and find them again.”

His thighs flex and he buries himself inside me, the movement all the more erotic when he matches every stroke with his tongue.

My inner walls quiver when his cock swells inside me. He draws in a ragged breath and his muscles stiffen, rock hard.

“What’s wrong?”

“I don’t have a condom.” His voice is hoarse and strained. “I didn’t come to the bar planning to seduce you.”

“You did pretty well for a man with no plan,” I tease. “Looks like you got yourself a girl, and you’re about to come.”

“I’m serious, Natalie. I can pull out, but there’s still a risk.”

Butterflies flutter in my stomach. A few missed pills and the unexpected pregnancy with Ethan ended my interest in using the pill for birth control, so we’d switched to condoms for the few months we were intimate before we lost Ethan, and on the rare occasions we were intimate over the last ten years.

“If you’re not ready . . . ” He moves to pull away, and I tighten my hold. If there is ever a time to take a risk, it is on the night we’ve found each other again, when we’ve come back together in love. Ethan can never be replaced. I will love him with all my heart until the day I join him in heaven, but Sam has shown me tonight that love is infinite and enduring, and it doesn’t always need to be spoken out loud. It is there every day in the little things we do for each other—the dinners I cook with the foods Sam likes, the flowers that always appear on the table when I’m feeling down, the music that plays to soothe his soul, and the certainty that I will never go to bed alone.

“I am ready.” I kiss him, long and deep. “I’m ready to love again.”

“Nat . . . ” He chokes on his words. “I can’t even . . . ”

“You don’t have to. I know.”

One arm curves beneath my shoulders and he thrusts into me, buries himself deep and then stills. Our gazes meet and lock. I feel whole again. Complete. Home.

When his body shudders above me, I rock my hips, urging him on. His muscles go rigid and he hammers into me, harder and harder until he climaxes with a groan.

“Promise me something,” he says as he rolls onto his back, pulling me across his chest.

“Anything.” I reach out at the same time he reaches over and our fingers lace together. Our hearts beat in time, with the soft steady thud that comes only from healing.

“Promise you’ll always be home for dinner, or if you can’t be home, you’ll call me.”

“I promise.” I snuggle against him, feeling replete and languid in his arms.

“Promise something else.” He runs his hand up and down my back, a gentle caress that makes me feel warm and tingly inside.

I laugh, savoring the joy of emotional and physical release. “What else?”

“Get a new dentist.”

“Don’t you trust me?” I push myself up and frown in mock disapproval.

“I do trust you,” he huffs. “I don’t trust him.”

“What are you really worried about?” I tease. “Are you afraid you can’t keep up with him? I think he’s older than you if it helps—”

He cuts me off with kiss. “Are you fucking kidding me? Look at this body. I’m out in the field every day doing real work—hard, physical labor. I have the stamina of a goddamned bull. I can go all night every night. No damn dentist can pleasure you the way I can.”

“So I see.” My gaze drifts down to his shaft, thick and hard and ready for me again.

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