Page 90 of 2 Books in One Bundle

But he should have known she wouldn’t go quietly. She had fire in her heart, the way he did, and abruptly she was coming around the desk and standing in front of him, small and curvy and as full of anger as he was.

‘So you’re just going to get rid of me like you did with Luke?’ she demanded, apparently not caring that perhaps speaking his son’s name wasn’t a good idea. ‘You’re going to cut me out of your life? Pretend I don’t exist either?’ Hurt glittered in her blue eyes. ‘What was it? Was it because I pushed? Because I got angry? Because I wanted too much?’

He held himself rigid, fought the need to reach for her and soothe her pain since that wouldn’t make this any easier, not for him or for her. ‘It’s not you, Isla.’

‘I don’t believe that,’ she flung back, her voice hoarse with pain. ‘Not for a second. It’s always me, Orion. Always. And no one ever tells me what I’m doing wrong, but it has to be something, otherwise why else would I always be the one who gets sent away?’ A tear slid down the side of her nose. ‘Why else would I always be the one no one wants?’

He’d wanted to push her away, to get her to storm out and away from him, but the pain in her eyes... Abruptly he hated himself and the lies he’d told her more than he’d thought possible.

He dropped his phone and reached for her, putting his hands on her hips and propelling her back against the windows and pinning her there with his body. She felt warm and soft against him and his rage began to change, to morph into something else, hotter and deeper and more demanding.

‘It’s nothingyoudid,’ he said fiercely, staring down at her, wanting her to believe this if nothing else. ‘I’m the destructive one. It’s better if you’re not anywhere near me.’

She was looking up at him, searching his gaze as if trying to find the truth there. ‘I told you, you’re not destructive,’ she said huskily, somehow bypassing his rage and seeing the agony that still lived in his heart, the grief for the son he’d had to let go. ‘Look, I know this is about Luke and I know you’re afraid. But both of us understand what it’s like to not have our parents in our lives. Wouldn’t you want the chance to talk to your dad if you could? Wouldn’t you want the chance to know him?’

She’s right.

He couldn’t remember his father or his mother, and part of him had been glad that he had no memories of them. Who’d want to remember parents who’d put an addiction to a drug over the needs of their own child? At least he hadn’t put his son through that.

‘Why would Luke want a father like me?’ he heard himself say in a voice that didn’t sound like his, so hoarse and raw. ‘A father who gave him up?’

Isla lifted her hands to his face, her fingers cool on his hot skin. ‘You didn’t give him up, Orion,’ she said softly. ‘You gave him happiness. You gave him a place where he was safe and loved, and that’s all a child really wants.’ Her eyes were full of tears. ‘And I know because that’s all I ever wanted too.’

He wasn’t sure when it changed, when the rage and the pain turned into heat and desperation. But it did. Perhaps it was the understanding in her eyes, the worry and the hurt that he knew was for him, and how she’d managed to tell him the one thing that made a difference. That walking away from his son had been the right thing to do. And of course she would know, she out of anyone would.

And you hurt her. You hurt her badly.

He’d only wanted to make this easier on both of them. A quick, clean ending. Yet by acting as though none of this past week had meant anything to him, that he’d been pretending all this time, he had hurt her in a place where she was exquisitely vulnerable: her own past and the rejections in it. It had been unconscionable of him and he regretted it with every part of him.

So he kissed her hard and deep, tasting her tears. Tasting her sweetness and the fire inside her. Tasting the understanding he’d never had from any other person. Wanting to give something back to her to make up for his cruelty, his selfishness. Especially when she was right. He’d been wrong to cut Luke out of his life. Wrong to let it go on so long, to pretend that his son didn’t even exist. Because he couldn’t. He’d never been able to.

‘I loved him,’ he whispered against her mouth. ‘I loved him so much and it killed me to walk away from him.’

‘I know.’ Her hands were in his hair, smoothing it back. ‘And Luke needs to know that too. He needs to know his father cared. You can’t deny him, Orion. You can pretend he doesn’t exist, but no matter what you do, you’ll always be his father. No one can takethataway from you.’

The truth of it settled down in him like a weight. She was right about that too. It didn’t matter how much distance he put between himself and Luke, no matter how much he pretended he didn’t have a son, that didn’t change the fact that he did. And while life and circumstances had taken away his boy, the fact that he was Luke’s father didn’t change.

No one could take that away from him.

Need flooded through him, for her and for the gift she’d given him. Because she had given him a gift. The acknowledgement of his son. That he was Luke’s father, that his blood ran in Luke’s veins and that couldn’t be ripped from him. That he was as much a part of his son as his son was part of him.

Orion deepened the kiss, sweeping his tongue inside her mouth, wanting to give her back something as precious as what she’d just given him. Except he didn’t have anything except himself and his hunger and that’s what he gave her.

Her arms went around his neck and when he picked her up and held her against the glass, she twined her legs around his waist, arching into him. Pressing the soft heat between her thighs against his achingly hard groin, raising his desire to fever pitch.

Orion forgot everything. Everything but the need to be inside her. He held her pinned to the glass as he undid the zip of her jeans, tugging them down and her knickers too until she was open to him. Then he got his own jeans undone and after adjusting their positions slightly, seconds later he was pushing inside her, making them both gasp aloud.

Her blue eyes were dark with desire and he couldn’t look away, transfixed by all that burning sapphire. And as he moved inside her, he was conscious of something unfurling inside him, an awareness. Of her. Of the tight wet heat of her sex gripping him. Of her arms around his neck. Of her soft gasps of pleasure. Of her intoxicating scent.

Of her heart of fire.

And he knew.

He’d never get to the bottom of his fascination with her. There would be no end. She would continue to occupy his thoughts for the next week, the next month, the next year. She would continue to occupy his thoughts for ever.

Because his heart burned too and it always had. It burned with love for his son, a love he’d been trying to deny and yet in the end, hadn’t been able to. It was too powerful. And now it burned with love for her too.

She’d set it alight that day in the gallery and that fire had never gone out; he just hadn’t recognised it. Until now.

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