His erection was pressing into her belly, though, and she felt him. Of course she did. Still crying, she leaned back, pushing on his chest, trying to make room.
“Easy. That’s not why I’m here. I’m here for you. I can’t control that reaction, but it doesn’t matter.”
She shocked him then by hitting him, slapping both palms hard on his chest. “Why not?! Who the fuck are you?”
“Please? Beverly, calm down.” He tried to pull her close again, but she stepped back.
“No!” The intensity of her tears had warped her face and made shrill each word that she wrenched from her constricting throat. “Who are you?!”
“I don’t understand.” With a sudden concern that her mind had really broken, he added, “I’m Nick.”
Her tears stopped as if she’d turned off a spigot, and her eyes sharpened with anger. Nick was expert at reading people and anticipating their reactions, but from the moment Beverly had listened to that voice mail, she’d had him baffled. “No, you’re not. You’re not Nick.”
“I am.” His worry deepened. “Bella, let me help you.”
As suddenly as her tears had stopped, her anger deflated, making her body sag. He caught her with one arm around her waist, and she leaned into him. “I want my Nick back. I want all of you.”
“Please?” But as the word was out of his mouth, Nick understood. “Are you sure?”
“I feel like half of myself is missing. I don’t want to be half of me, and I don’t want half of you. I want all of you to love me.”
He was actually afraid of what she wanted. “All of me does love you.”
She shook her head. “I don’t feel it. Make me feel it.” In her blue eyes, he saw deep loss—but keen determination.
He turned them away from the shower spray and pushed her hard against the tile wall, making her gasp.
This couldn’t be what she wanted. “Bella…”
“Fuck you.” She slapped him—he’d never been hit by a woman before. As a child, he’d been beaten by his father, and as a boy and then a man, he’d fought more than his share with boys and men, until he’d risen to a level beyond that, but his total control over his emotions had kept him out of altercations with women. There had been the occasional tearful scene, but never fury.
He grabbed the wrist of the hand that had connected with his cheek, and he slammed it to the wall at the side of her head. She had been so badly hurt; it didn’t make sense to him that she would want this. But the flare in her eyes said that she did.
“You want Bad Nick?” With his free hand, he pulled her leg up to his hip, and she reached between them and took hold of his cock. He hissed at her touch. She guided him to her, and as soon as he felt the wet scald of her, he let go of her wrist and grabbed her ass, lifting her off the floor of the shower until she wrapped both legs around his hips. And then he shoved into her.
She was slick with want, and he slid in smoothly, welcomed into her body after all this time. He groaned, feeling mastered by her need as much as his own.
“Fuck, bella. You’re so wet. You want this. You want me deep?”
“Quit asking and fuck me. Please.”
He didn’t understand, but it no longer mattered. The diner didn’t matter. Chris Mills didn’t matter. His secret didn’t matter. Her grief and loss and pain didn’t matter.
He let his instincts take over. Sex was the only time he ever loosened his hold on himself, and now, after weeks, months, without her, without any sexual touch, his hold was more tenuous than he’d realized.
He spread and locked his legs and pounded into her, slamming her against the wall over and over. She dug her fingers into his short hair and held his head to hers as he plunged his tongue into her mouth, feeling her lips crushed against her teeth. Her ragged breaths caressed his cheek. And then she began to make the guttural, visceral noises that he’d come to know as signs of her intense pleasure. He tore his mouth from hers and watched her, saw pleasure roll across her features, saw her concentration on the way he made her feel, and knew that she would get her light back. She would.
He took hold of her right breast, tweaking at her nipple, but she shook her head hard. “No—I can’t feel it.”
“I’ll make you feel it.” He bent his head and drew the nipple into his mouth, sucking forcefully. And then he bit down—and he wasn’t gentle. He bit and sucked, and she arched back with a gasp.
“Yes! Yes!” Her pussy clamped hard around him, and the undulating spasms of her climax milked him steadily toward his own. As her orgasm waned and his waxed, he shifted the hand that was supporting her and slid two fingers into her ass. Again, she arched off the wall, and she came a second time, almost immediately. He went with her, groaning into her neck, feeling every muscle from his jaw to his knees cording up with the effort of release.