“Exactly.”
“You gave up a lot to come back and help Cam. Thank you.”
He stopped the game and turned his focus on me. “I gave up a lot when I left home all those years ago and I told you, I didn’t come back for Cam.”
“If that’s the case, why didn’t you let me know you were home?”
I couldn’t quite read his expression, his gaze shifted to the floor. “I stopped by the day I got home, but you were with someone. I intended to reach out again, but the truth is I didn’t like seeing you with another guy.”
Another guy? There had only been the one, Ethan, and that had ended years ago. “Whoever he was, he wasn’t a boyfriend. He was probably a client. I learned if I couldn’t be with the one I loved, I wasn’t interested.”
His eyes turned back on me and I liked the hot possessive look in them.
“I want to kiss you so badly right now, so I’ll get us another beer instead.” I jumped from the sofa. A few minutes with my head in the freezer would help take the edge off.
I knew he had joined me because every part of my body responded to him like a mare preparing for a stallion to mount her. He pressed into me, sandwiching me between the fridge and his body, his chest to my back. He rubbed his cheek against my head, his forehead touched my shoulder and yet it was only his body holding me in place, he had yet to put his hands on me. His discipline was warring with instinct and the breath caught in my lungs as I waited to see which would win. The second his hands touched me I knew that instinct had won. He turned me into him and right before he kissed me I saw the wild look of him. He hadn’t just given in to instinct; he’d given in to his baser needs. His hot, wet mouth closed over mine, his tongue driving into my mouth while his hands ripped at the barrier of my clothes. We were frantic; both of us crazed with the need to taste and touch after so long a fast. I heard the t-shirt tear before he yanked my bra down. My whole world was focused on my breasts and the need to have his hot mouth on them, but instead he lifted the key hanging from the long chain.
Pain moved into his expression when he asked, “What’s this?”
“It was from my dad, his last gift to me.”
Understanding replaced pain as he let the key drop back into place. He moved his hands up my body and cupped my breasts, teasing my nipples with his tongue. I was so wet and the need to rub myself against him was strong. He sucked one of my breasts into his mouth and my eyes rolled into the back of my head. He dropped to his knees, taking my sweats with him, and buried his nose between my legs to smell my arousal. With a tug, the thin layer of silk that separated us was gone and his tongue was inside me as my body splintered apart from the orgasm. I went boneless and my head fell back against the fridge because I had missed this. He lifted me into his arms and carried me to my bed. My back hit the mattress as he stripped and then he was all over me, hands, lips, teeth and tongue and I was just as frenzied trying to taste and touch as much of him as I could.
“I need to be inside you, feel you. No condom. I’m clean.”
Unlike the last time we had had unprotected sex, I was on the pill. But even if I hadn’t been, I would have thrown caution to the wind. “Please.”
The word was no sooner out of my mouth when he lifted my hips, looking me right in the eye, and surged into me. For just a second we both stilled at the beauty of being here again, but the beast that ruled him took over as he lost himself in my body. Right before he came his mouth found mine for a kiss that was poignantly tender. He buried his face in my hair and for several long, blissful minutes we stayed just like that…replete and connected.
His head lifted and tenderness stared back.
“I never knew that zombie hunting was an aphrodisiac.”
He chuckled.
“What changed your mind?”
He brushed my hair away from my face, his hand settling on my cheek as his eyes took a slow journey over my features. “You remembered what I liked on my pizza.”
I almost laughed, but I realized he wasn’t entirely kidding. I got it because I felt it too. We were connected, bound, and had been since we were seventeen. Even after all these years, our bond was still just as strong.
A wicked smile spread over his face. “You do remember what I told you.”
I was too wrapped up in how he was looking at me to really follow along with the conversation. “What?”
“Once wasn’t going to be enough.”
I followed that and he knew how his words affected me because he was still buried in the part of me that shuddered. He shifted his hips. “You like this idea.”
I had always been a fan of his ideas. “Very much.”