He doesn’t touch me.

Not with his own hands.

Instead, he glides my hand down my throat, slowly wrapping my fingers around until I can feel the light pressure. Then he leans in, close enough that I can feel his breath on my face.

“I want to know everything about you, Natalie.Everything. But I want to see it through your eyes. I often wonder how you see yourself because there’s so much light in you that it’s blinding.”

I inhale sharply when my hand settles on my collarbone, and Ethan leans back, studying my reaction. He moves it lower, just over my breasts, and I feel the tingles there… the sensation mingled with anticipation.

“You have no idea,” he rasps, “how incredible it feels to touch you. To have you pressed against my desk, straddling my thighs. Your skin is soft and warm, and…god.I want you to know.”

He lifts my shirt with his fingertips, careful not to let his fingers brush my skin and guide my hand underneath. I whimper softly as I cup my breast, throwing my head back when he makes me tease my nipple with my fingers.

“I spent nights,” he continues, “thinking about touching you again. So when I heard that they… I could’ve killed them. I would’ve torn their heads off with my hands.

My shirt goes over my head, and Ethan lets go of my hand as he groans.

“Hell. You’re gorgeous, woman. You’re—” The rest goes unspoken as he pulls me flush against him, his palm cradling the back of my head.

His lips find mine in a possessive, searing kiss, his teeth grazing my bottom lip just enough to make me gasp. The momentary sting meltsinto something deeper—an onslaught of pleasure as hefinallytouches me.

He moves deliberately, his touch confident yet reverent, as if he’s committing every inch of me to memory. My breath hitches when his hand drifts lower, his fingers trailing along my skin with a purpose that sends a slow, delicious shiver up my spine.

I gasp when he presses his fingers between my thighs, rubbing me hard until the friction feels like being ignited and consumed endlessly.

“Ethan,” I moan into the kiss, tilting my hips as his hand slides into my shorts and his thumb presses against my clit, rubbing, circling, teasing…heavens.He breaks the kiss as his head lowers, and his tongue—the tip, grazes my nipple.

I exhale in shaky gasps and spasms, clinging to him for sanity.

My fingers thread through his hair, pulling hard when he uses his mouth, closing and sucking hard. I’m being pulled in all directions, and it feels too much and too fucking good.

Ethan guides me on the couch with his mouth still on my chest, and his hands work on my shorts, pulling them down and away. I wrap my legs around his waist, holding on—wordlessly begging him for some semblance of release.

For more. For everything.

“Do you have protection?” he breathes in my ear.

I have a moment of clarity there, although it’s not preceded by logic, because I shake my head and mutter, “You didn’t need it the other time.”

He gives me a wicked grin. “You’re devious,woman.I thought you were all light, but you have the feistiness in you.”

I never did, but Ethan makes me feel like all the bad and risky things are filled with pleasure and happy endings. He kisses me again,and my brain turns into a cloudy fog once more, with my fingers sinking down his back.

Everything else comes off, and it’s just him and me, with bodies pressed against each other. I can feel every inch of Ethan, more than I’ve ever felt, and it feels like a drug poured into my system.

“Natalie?” He cups my chin. “Natalie. Look at me.”

I lift my head and drown in his gaze just as he sinks into me slowly, inch by inch. I shudder audibly, feeling my body stretch, feelingperfectlyused. His eyes are praising, and he brushes my hair back until he’s completely inside me.

“You’ve been in my head,” he whispers with every thrust—steady and deep, “in my mind, in places where nobody else goes. I don’t think I could ever get you out, Natalie.”

I don’t think I could ever get him out,either.

Ethan leans down to kiss me as his pace increases, and he swallows my scream when he raises my leg and moves slightly, altering the angle so each stroke feels like he’s touching every part of my body.

My fingers dig into his back, clutching at him desperately as the ache for release coils tighter in my belly, each thrust pushing me closer to the edge. He pushes my legs up, pressing them close to my chest and an explosion of stars goes off in my head.

Hell.