Page 103 of Cross-Checked

I thread my fingers through his dark hair, wishing this cast was coming off soon but knowing I still have weeks of wearing it.“Yes,” I say as he brings his face back to me, licking and sucking until I’m panting his name.

“Tell me you’re mine,” he demands, as he slips two fingers inside me and curls them up to hit the place he knows will bring me to orgasm.

“I’m yours,” I say effortlessly, my hips pressing forward to meet his fingers as I try to increase the pressure of his tongue on my clit.

He pulls back long enough to say, “Promise me.” And then he’s licking and sucking and bringing me right to the edge of release. My jaw hangs open, and I’m gasping for air, incapable of speaking, so he stops right as I’m about to come.

“Promise me,” he grinds out, the words sounding like he’s in pain. “Unless you don’t want to.”

“I promise,” I assure him on a shaky exhale. And then waves of pleasure ripple through me as he brings me right over the precipice, and I cry out incoherent promises of forever as lightning runs through my veins and every part of me lights up like I’m on fire.

I collapse forward, catching myself with my good hand on his shoulder, but he’s standing, picking me up and carrying me into the room in the next second. My mind dazed and my limbs weak, I melt against him, kissing his neck along the way. Putting me back on my feet at the end of the bed, he turns me around and unzips my dress, letting it drop, and then unhooks my bra, tossing it to the side so I’m standing naked before him.

His clothes are off just as quickly, and he fists himself, his cock huge and hard in his grip. I pull my lower lip between my teeth as I look down at it.

“I’m not going to fuck you tonight,” he tells me.

“W-what?” It’s a strangled gasp, and my core aches in response.

“That’s not what this is between us,” he says, bringing both his hands to my neck and running his thumbs along my jaw as he holds my gaze. “Every time I’m with you, it feels less and less like fucking, and more and more like...I don’t know. I want to make love to you.”

“Is there a difference?” I ask, attempting a flippant tone as I try to keep that last, thinning wall around my heart, even as I wonder why I bother. He’s so ingrained into my soul at this point, I don’t think I could live without him. I couldn’t protect myself from getting hurt now if I tried, and I’m pretty sure there’s no need to keep trying.

“You tell me. You just came apart on my tongue and told me this was forever.”

I did?

“Ronan,” I whisper as my chest tightens. I have so many emotions rushing through me as I bask in his adoration.

After my failed marriage, I never thought I’d say “forever” again.But, I’m ready to say it now. Things with him are different than anything I’ve ever experienced—the closeness, the intimacy, his protective instincts.

He’s my person, the one who would do anything for me. I was ready to go public with our relationship days ago, just so he didn’t feel like some secret I was hiding.

I’d take the fallout. I’d lose the award I’ve worked my whole career for. I’d do it for him, and I’d do it without any regrets. Because he’s worth it.

“Yes?” He smirks down at me.

With my heart racing, I reach out, stroking him in my good hand. “I need you inside me. I need to feel how only you can make me feel. And I need you to promise me that you’re in this for good, too.”

“Oh, Sunshine...” Picking me up with both arms, he puts a knee on the bed and leans down to lay me out below him. “I’venever not wanted you. I’ve just been waiting for you to want me, too.”

“Wanting me,” I tell him, before sucking in a sharp breath when his lips meet my nipple, “is not the same as wanting forever.”

He hums a disapproving sound, and the vibrations send shockwaves through my body.

“With you, it is,” he says, and something about the simplicity of his words has me melting. He plants an elbow next to my head as he slides into me, bringing his lips to meet mine. And as I wrap my legs around his hips and thread my fingers into his hair, nothing has ever felt so right. The way our bodies fit together perfectly, the way he takes care of me physically and emotionally, the way my body feels as he slams into me over and over leaving me panting with need. It’s exactly what I need.

Heis exactly what I need.

The fact that the sex is so good, that he has me coming again in a matter of minutes, has more admissions of my feelings tumbling out as the pleasure overtakes my senses. No matter how good it is, I could live without the sex. But I’m not sure I could live withouthim.

Chapter Thirty-Six

McCabe

McCabe

My sister’s flight home tonight got canceled, so she’s staying with me.

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