Page 23 of Jack's Devotion

"You're a warrior, baby." He nips my shoulder before lifting his lips to my ear. "I'm proud of you."

I whimper wordlessly, my heart in a vise. He's trying to snatch it out of my chest and claim it as his. I freaking know he is. And I'm not doing anything to stop him.

"Knowing how you survived out there on your own doesn't make me want you any less. If anything, it makes me want you in this bed even more," he growls, his fingertips digging into my hips as his teeth scrape down the tendon in the side of my neck. "I want you right here where I can pamper and spoil you. That's what you deserve. It's what you always deserved."

"You aren't playing fair," I whisper, my voice shaking.

"Yeah? Why is that?"

"You're supposed to be horrified."

"Oh, I am," he grunts. "I'm fucking horrified that you were forced to live that way. I'm horrified that you think I could ever think less of you for it. And I'm horrified that your bastard of a father is still breathing right now. But horrified by you?" His gorgeous blue eyes lock with mine, the truth reflecting like stars. "Never."

"I'm not supposed to fall in love with you."

"Yeah?" He grins like I just told him the best thing he's ever heard. "What if I tell you that it's not falling? It's accepting the inevitable."

I stare at him with wide eyes, my heart pounding like an out-of-control metronome. Mostly because I think he's probably right. Whatever this is between us does feel inevitable. He feels inevitable. He always has. And that's…terrifying.

My father stripped everything away from me when I was cowering in that closet, listening to him plan how to kill me. But Jack? Jack is something he wasn't ever able to take. He was the one piece of my past I still had, the one part I clung to with bothhands. Even though he was never really mine, he alwaysfeltlike he belonged to me.

What happens if I lose it? Lose him?

"I looked for you," he says softly, nuzzling his face against my throat.

"What? When? Why?"

"Because you've always been my ghost." His breath pelts my skin. "Christ, Madison. I shouldn't have felt the way I did. It was so goddamn wrong. But after you disappeared, you haunted me. So I looked for you. I knew you emptied his safe and drove out of town. I hoped that meant you were where you wanted to be." He sighs. "I should have looked harder."

"You didn't know."

"I should have. The longer you were gone with no trace…" He sighs again. "I should have looked."

"Jack." I lick my lips, suddenly nervous in a way I don't think I've ever been. "Have you…um…you've been single for seven years, haven't you?"

"I've never been in a relationship, Madison."

"Have you d-dated anyone at all since I disappeared?"

He lifts his head, his gaze tangling with mine. Before he even opens his mouth, I see the truth written across his gorgeous face. "You already know the answer to that question, baby," he says quietly. "It's the same reason you haven't dated anyone since we met, isn't it?"

"I…I…" God, why does it feel like I can't breathe?

"Isn't it, baby?"

"Yes," I whisper, my voice a mere scrap of sound.

The truth lands loud between us anyway. Jack shudders on top of me, something wholly possessive flaring bright as the sun in his eyes.

"You've always felt like mine, haven't you?"

I nod, my mouth bone dry.

"That's why you belong in this bed," he growls. "That's why you're marrying me. And that's why this shit between us won't ever end, Madison. You're mine, the same goddamn way I'm yours." His lips crash against mine, his kiss a vow, a claim. A brand.

I cry out against his lips, arching beneath him. He rocks his hips into mine as he devours my mouth, his erection gliding against my clit with startling accuracy again.

"Jack," I gasp, clinging to him.

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