Page 81 of The Healer

“I’m serious about you. Like forever serious.” He gripped the counter, and had it not been granite, she expected him to crack it.

“Forever?” Who was this man who spun a magical world around her senses, her heart? He spoke as if ancient, like time meant an eternity to him.

“I want your heart, your passion, your caring nature, the woman behind that stunning body.”

Something twanged in her heart, like a musician thrumming tight bands of surgical thread. Her chest expanded on a deep breath, and she closed her eyes as heat swirled in her core.

She had to ask. “Because I look like Callie?”

He laughed. “You have the same hair color, but her eyes are greener. Your hazel eyes reveal more of your emotions. She has tons of sass I now find annoying. Your lips are prettier, and I have this fierce need to fuck you sideways, upside down, against a wall, I don’t care.” He lunged across the kitchen and pinned her to the counter with his hips. “Right here, right now, decide, and put me out of my misery, Lona.” Cupping her cheek, he thumbed her bottom lip. “Will. You. Date. Me?” He peppered each word with a kiss.

She opened her mouth to reply, but he lifted her, sliding her ass onto the counter, then with his hips, he spread her thighs wide. He tilted his head and deepened the kiss, plunging his tongue in. The smoky taste of him, foggy Sunday mornings, sunlight-bathed terraces, coffee and croissants, flooded her. She moaned, raising her legs to draw him closer. His chest rubbing against her breasts, him stroking an earlobe while he ran his other hand up her back to crush her to him, empowered her and filled her with eager delight.

She clung to him, dueling with his tongue to dominate him as he did her. His growl rumbled through their chest cavities and traveled down her vertebrae to nestle in her pelvic bone. This was what she wanted. To feel something other than sadness, to wallow in sparkling light than miserable darkness.

Tugging on his jacket, she shoved it off his shoulders. He didn’t break the kiss but let his jacket fall off one arm at a time. Joyful triumph engulfed her, and she hurried to slide her fingers under his T-shirt, searching for his velvet skin. She brushed the hair along the waistband of his jeans, and he shuddered at her touch.

He caught her fingers and leaned back. “Minx,” he rasped, despite the smile curling his kiss-swollen lips.

Despair was swift to strike, and she groaned, leaning forward to press her chest to his. “I need this, you.” And she did, desperately. The heavy weight of dread didn’t line her stomach thanks to hot, white lust. “I’m on the pill if that matters.”

He scooped her off the counter and carried her to the couch. There, he sat and spun her so her back lined his chest. With a nudge of his knees, he spread her thighs while unbuttoning her jeans.

She gasped, cupping his hand. “What are you doing?”

His answer was a kiss, luring her into the sweet depths of desire. The brush of his fingers across her labia snapped her from of the spell his addictive lips wove. Before she could protest, he swiped a finger across her clit, and set her senses ablaze. She moaned, arching into his touch, not wanting him to stop. Gripping his thighs, she pinned her back to his chest and twisted to nip his neck, needing to taste him. Every attempt to kiss him was met with air as he shifted just out reach.

She growled, but couldn’t do more than glare at him, not wanting him to remove his fingers. He cupped a breast, kneading it with a gentle touch, then tweaked the nipple. She cried out. Her hips gyrated as he teased and tormented her clit, but when he returned to the same spot that rolled her eyes back, she cried out, riding his fingers with every cell in her body focused on the steady climb, on the looming ecstasy.

“Fuck, you smell so good.” He latched onto her earlobe and sucked, then swiped across the shell.

She moaned at the triple assault. “Rhys…”

He growled, rolled her nipple between his forefinger and thumb, swirled the finger between her thighs, and when he nipped her neck, her world exploded. Bright joy engulfed her, shuddered through her until stars and divine bliss saturated her. He cupped her mons, peppered kisses along her neck, and massaged her breast, as if to apologize for the mind-blowing orgasm he’d given her.

As she drifted like a fallen feather to reality, his ragged breathing registered, along with the thumping of his heart against her ear. She opened her mouth to agree to date him, but all that slipped past was a sob. Along with the high, came the low, and she crashed. Blubbering in his arms, he carried her to the spare bedroom and crawled onto the bed with her. He hugged her against his chest, saying nothing, no meaningless condolences. Right then, she knew, he was a keeper.

When Ilona awoke, her eyes were puffy, and her nose clogged. Rhys sprawled beneath her warmed her, holding the cooler temperatures of early morning at bay. She twirled a finger across his chest. He slept on, his breathing steady and deep.

In the moonlight, the angle of his jawline was softened, his bearded face not so overwhelmingly handsome. This man wanted to date her. She was a fool not to agree. But her silly heart wanted no one to care for, no one to lose.

Sliding her fingers under his T-shirt, she brushed along the hairs leading up his torso to his pecs. With a smile at her boldness, she dipped to kiss a path upward. He smelled good, delicious, and she pressed her nose to his skin for a deep inhale.

His chest expanded, announcing she’d awoken him. She lifted her gaze to meet his.

“What are you doing?” His thick voice raised the hairs along the back of her neck.

She shivered, relishing the puckering of her nipples. Yup, just with his voice, he could seduce her.

His navel trembled when she placed a wet kiss there. “Making love to my boyfriend.”

He stretched, and the lamp illuminated them, but she looked nowhere else but at him, at his wide eyes, at the slow smile sauntering across those sensual lips.

“We’re dating?” He paused, with his long fingers wrapped around her upper arms. “You’re not just saying that to get laid?”

Laughing, she rose onto her knees and crossed the distance between his stomach and his lips. “Would I lie to you?”

He didn’t hesitate, flipping and pinning her to the bed. The kiss he blessed her with melted her into the soft mattress. She moaned, wrapping her arms around him as best she could.

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