Page 87 of Every Last Breath

He cupped the side of her neck, awaiting her decision. “I’ll grab a rubber.” He went to get up, but she held him in place.

“I’m good too.” Clean. On birth control—a set-it-and-forget-it IUD. “Without is fine.”

She guided his swollen flesh, glistening from her mouth, between her thighs and rubbed the plump crown back and forth across her opening.

He buried himself inside her in a single powerful thrust. She gasped at the forceful entry and wrapped her legs around his hips. His iron-hard thickness throbbed inside her. The sheer fullness of the penetration nudged her toward the threshold, but his self-control was phenomenal.

“Oh, I’ve missed this,” he said in a pained way, like waiting another second to slide inside her would’ve killed him. “Missed you.”

He lowered his face to hers.

“Don’t.” She turned her head to the side. “Fuck me hard and dirty, but don’t kiss me.”

No condom meant heightened pleasure, but kissing meant opening a door she wasn’t sure she’d be able to close, and he’d made it clear he didn’t want to step over that threshold.

Cole went stone-still for so long without his chest rising and falling on a breath that she looked at him.

“I can’t treat you like some whore, let you suck my cock and not…” He squeezed his eyes shut for a heartbeat and swallowed hard. “I can give you what you need, but I can’t do it without the intimacy of kissing you.”

She was torn between rolling away from him, losing out on an amazing orgasm that she desperately needed, and hitching to get closer by bringing her lips to his.

“But last night…” She let her voice trail off at the sting of remembering how he’d looked at her, how he’d wiped the kiss from her mouth.

“I handled things wrong. Hindsight is a twenty-twenty bitch. Please don’t deny me. Please.” This time, he was the one to beg.

A woeful glint in his eyes killed her resolve, pulling emotion she’d rather bury to the surface. With his face centimeters from hers, his expression earnest, and him deep inside her, there was only one response.

“Fine.” She caught his bottom lip with her teeth and bit down, none too gently either. “But nothing lovey-dovey.”

A deep sound of male satisfaction rumbled in his chest.

His mouth captured hers, possessive and hungry, almost vicious, stealing her breath. In the demanding slip of his tongue and the wet heat of the kiss, he fed her something she hadn’t realized she’d been starved for. It wasn’t sweet and tender. This was all-consuming.

He molded to her, driving into her with heartrending intensity. A reckless energy she was powerless to fight built in their rhythm, tightening her muscles. She shoved her hands in his hair and kissed the hell out of him, licking into his mouth and sucking on his tongue. He tasted of mint and longing and her.

Her breasts grew heavy and swollen. The need to have all her clothes off, for their bodies to touch everywhere without restriction, was overwhelming. Cole must’ve felt the same way. In seconds, he had her shirt and bra off. No finesse, no control. His breath fanned her throat, and he pinched her nipple, coaxing a cry from her lips.

“You okay?” The words were gentle, and he slowed, grinding his pelvis against her, but didn’t stop the inexorable drive into her. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“Don’t hold back.” She caressed his face, running her thumb over his lovely scar. Not that scars were pretty, but everything about Cole had always been perfect. Because it was a part of him, and he’d been hers. Once. “Let it hurt.”

His grip on her tightened, his rhythm quickening, his strong thrusts growing urgent. She clenched around him as they melded into one another. This man was the only one to give her a safe space to let herself feel soft and sexy. To lose control regardless of the consequences. Free from the responsibility of her actions. To delight in the heightened sensation, the wild heat in her body, which had been numb for so long. Sex with him was hotter, better than any one-night stand.

Tension, sweet and thick as honey, gathered in her core. “Harder.”

He hooked one of her legs behind her knee with his hand, raising it to her chest, and powered deeper into her while putting his other rough hand in her hair.

“Look at me.” The banked fire in his eyes was scorching. Like he wanted to set her soul on fire too. “You’re so damned beautiful. So beautiful, it hurts.”

He made beautiful sound special, as if he saw more than a pretty face or nice body. As if everything about her was exceptional, and he was the luckiest man in the world to be with her.

His hips pistoned against her, and she drove hers up with equal fervor. The slick, fierce friction of their bodies made the need for release brutal.

He rutted on her. Hard. Fast.

And she loved the rawness of the way he took her. The untempered heat of his touch, threatening to melt her to nothing.

She gripped his shoulders, her nails scraping his back, writhing under him, struggling to take more, needing more. Arousal churned through her body, pressure deep in her belly built to a throb, her sex clamped around him and she came even harder and faster, shattering like glass.