Page 29 of Guarding Rory

The light must’ve allowed Dev to finally recognize the new, permanent accessories adorning our wrists, because he quickly caught my hand, pulling it closer as he asked with a smile, “Matching bracelets?”

He thumbed at the charm I’d chosen to add at the last minute, his grin falling from his face as he noticed what had been hammered onto the small metal disk.

“It’s a ‘D,’” he said with restrained awe in his voice, as if unwilling to jump to the conclusion that stared him in the face.

“Mhm,” I mumbled in agreement, my bones feeling heavier now that Dev was there to carry their weight. My brain also gave up its effort to keep my thoughts to myself, and the unnecessary explanation slipped from my mouth without my permission, “For Dev. ‘Cause I’ll belong to you soon.”

My words had both Alex and Bex jumping into action, examining the bracelets on their partner’s wrists. It didn’t take them long for both to find the matching charms we’d gotten.

“You’re wearing my initial, beautiful?” Alex’s voice was gravelly with unmistakable lust, the need in his voice enough to make me shiver.

“Maybe it stands for ‘Ames,’” Ames replied with a smirk, tugging her wrist from Alex’s grip.

But even as she responded, I watched as her feet slowly backed away, as if giving her space from the predator suddenly bearing down on her. Alex’s footsteps ate up the space between them, even as Ames increased her pace, until she suddenly tucked tail and sprinted into the house. She yelled a breathygoodbye over her shoulder as Alex stalked after her, and then they were gone.

We took that as our cue to leave, Dev guiding me around the side of the house with an arm around my shoulders to keep me steady. I slid into the seat of his SUV and couldn’t help but huff a laugh as he buckled me in.

“What’s so funny?” He asked, lips quirked in amusement at my drunken laughter.

“It’s a good thing you got a new car,” I told him. “I definitely would’ve fallen out of the truck in this state.”

Dev tilted his head back on a laugh, and I watched as his Adam's apple bobbed under the dark brown of his skin. I could already see where his stubble was beginning to grow back after the long day, and I gave into the urge to feel it, my fingers trailing over the rough texture.

I only regretted it when Dev’s laugh cut off, the abrupt silence making me freeze with my fingertips still on his skin.

“Sorry,” I whispered, unsure what exactly I was apologizing for. All I knew was that I hated how often I made him frown, how often I was the cause of the furrow that currently sat between his brows. The expression didn’t fit on his face, and I had a feeling that he rarely had to contort his face this way. At least not until I came along.

“Don’t apologize,” he told me. But he still didn’t smile as he reached a hand toward my hair, hesitating at the last second before tucking a strand that had escaped my ponytail behind my ear and quickly pulling his arm back to his side.

We stayed quiet on the drive back to the house, my eyes trained out the window so I didn’t have to see the tightened fists Dev had wrapped around the steering wheel. I expected to sober up as we escaped the haze of the fire and I got my first breaths of fresh air all night. Instead, the cool air seemed to sober me up to the fact that I was drunk, a sentiment Dev shared as he helpedme into the house and my bed with an arm wrapped around my waist to support the steps that had grown more unsteady since leaving Ames’s house.

“You’re drunk,meri jaan.” Dev’s lips curved in what looked like bemusement as he eyed my sprawled form on the bed. I was almost too drunk to detect the heat flaring to life as I shimmied out of my jeans, throwing them on the floor in a heap. But I was primed for it, after dancing against him all night, feeling his arousal pressed in a hard bar against my back until I could barely breathe around the lust rolling through my body.

So when I saw it again, the arousal as Dev’s eyes trailed over my bare legs and up to the underwear that barely kept me decent, the flare of lust was all I could focus on, my thoughts circling back to Wren’s question, to everything it implied.

The room spun, and everything felt hazy. I realized I’d never been this drunk, save for my 21st birthday, when John and Sean had taken me to a bar and bought me drinks until I felt a little less morose at spending my birthday alone. Callan had only been 15, and his offer to get a fake ID just so I had someone to take me out had only made me feel more pathetic, my only friend my little brother.

But I knew, as the words left my mouth in a whisper, that I wouldn’t remember this in the morning.

“Don’t sleep with anyone else when we’re married.” My eyes were closed, so I couldn’t see the emotions flitting across Dev’s face, if there were any visible. I tried prying them open, wanting some kind of glimpse into how he was feeling, but my eyelids were just too heavy, sleep dragging me under as two more words slipped out on an exhale, “Just me.”

Chapter 14

Rory

I wokeup the morning of my wedding half-hungover, the events from the night before hazy as they flashed through my mind. I remembered dancing with Dev, one arm across my chest and the other around my waist as he pulled my body against his. The lust that warmed my blood and bloomed across my cheeks as his erection pressed against my ass, the evidence of his arousal enough to make me shameless as I grinded against him.

Still half-asleep, my fingers inched their way across my thigh, body desperate for the kind of release I’d been dreaming about, my underwear soaked as I traced a finger across the fabric. I wasted no time pushing the fabric to the side, teasing at the wetness in my opening before finding my clit, tapping the nub just light enough to tease.

I was already too close, the small touches sending electricity through my body, making me imagine rougher, calloused hands touching me the same way. What might have happened the night before, if Dev’s hands on my hips had trailed lower, found the skin above my waistband and slipped underneath it, searching out the wetness that had gathered there because of him. For him.

Dev would be soft at first, gentle, and I slowed my finger’s movements to match. He would tease me, wind me up, treat mewith the same kindness he’d been showing me these past weeks. But it wouldn’t last long, his desperation matching mine as I got close, and I imagined his fingers ramping up, growing rougher as he panted in my ear, the types of praise he’d whisper as he made me come. The way he’d groan as I whispered his name as I came, enjoying the sound of it on my lips.

I had barely come down from my orgasm when a knock at my door had me jerking to my feet, as if I’d been caught. But Dev didn’t open the door, just stood outside as he waited for me to respond.

“Y-yes?” I stuttered out, placing my palms on my cheeks to see if the flush from my orgasm had faded. They were still warm, and I frantically attempted to fan them, as if Dev would be able to tell the difference between my typical, embarrassed blush around him and the flush after I came.

“Wake up, Red,” Dev called with a smile in his voice. “I’m going to bring you breakfast in bed, and then I want us to get in a workout this morning. Oh, and happy wedding day.”

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