It was stupid to wish. She felt like she’d been wishing her whole life.
She had to stop wishing and just accept reality.
He shifted beneath her, rubbing against her, reminding her that this was her current reality. And that she could either take what she could get or get nothing.
When his strong hand pulled her head to his, she didn’t resist. But he only pressed his forehead to hers and massaged her scalp.
“This past week has been hell on earth.” The distress in his voice pulled her eyes open, and she found his closed in a look of pain. “I can’t stop thinking about you. I feel like shit over this situation with Tate and how much it’s hurting you. I don’t know what to do to make any of this right.” His jaw clenched. “I fucking slept with my phone, hoping you’d call or text me back.”
A huff of humor and disbelief passed her lips, and her heart skipped.
But Rafe didn’t smile. He opened his eyes and looked deeply into hers with a kind of misery she understood too well. “I can’t believe you’re leaving.”
Her heart wrenched open against her will. She framed his face with her hands, tilted her head, and kissed him. The hand at the back of her head tightened and pulled her deeper into the kiss as he opened to her. The sparks instantly caught fire. Their tongues met, and hunger exploded deep in Mia’s body.
A sound of longing and desire rolled in Rafe’s throat. A growl that reverberated through her. He released her waist and gripped one of her wrists, but just left his hand there as he kissed her and tasted her and moaned with the pleasure of it. All Mia’s worries and hurts fell away. She could only focus on the heat and taste of his mouth. The way he kissed her like he never wanted to stop. Like he couldn’t get enough.
When he broke the kiss abruptly, Mia fell into him. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders and kissed his jaw, his neck. Licked the spot behind his ear.
He groaned and lifted into her.
“Oh…” she breathed, swamped in the delicious pleasure he pushed through her lower body.
His fingers flexed and released. “Mia, God,” he rasped, his voice low and hungry. He combed his hand through her hair and wrapped his arm around her head, clutching her close. “Need you.”
That didn’t just snap her restraint, it bulldozed every barrier. She turned her head and kissed him again, open and hot and wet, while she dropped her hands to his waist and worked his belt open.
He broke the kiss again murmuring her name. “Mia, Mia, Mia…”
“Wallet,” she managed through her quick breaths.
She flipped his button open, pulled his zipper down, and moved his clothes out of the way to slide her hand over his thick, hot length.
Rafe’s hips pulsed. He clenched his teeth around a curse and dropped his head against the sofa, eyes closed, face tight with pleasure. The sight pumped lust and power and need through her body.
“Condom,” she reminded him, anxious to get him where he belonged. Anxious to close all the distance between them, to bond with him the way they had the first night.
He lifted his head, his eyes heavy lidded. “Do we need one?”
Her hand froze with his hard length in her palm. “What?”
He combed both hands through her hair and pulled her to him, kissing her, long and slow. When he pulled away again, Mia was light-headed.
“Do we need one?” he repeated. “Are you taking something?”
Birth control. He was talking about birth control. Jesus, her head was not working. “Yes.” The thought of feeling him with no barriers hammered her with lust. She met his eyes directly. “Do we need one?”
His lips quirked for a millisecond before he went serious again. “No.” And with a little shake of his head, he pushed his hands up her thighs, under her skirt, and hooked his fingers in the fabric of her panties at one hip. “Just got a clean bill of health.”
One jerk and her panties snapped.
She startled and gasped. He moved his hands to the other side and did it again. Snap.
Mia started laughing. “Rafe.”
But then his hand slipped between her legs, and she siphoned a breath at the touch. Then he moved, and damn if Mia didn’t forget everything but the decadent glide of his fingers. She moaned and rocked against his touch.
So perfect. Slow and direct and thorough. Pleasure coiled tight between her legs. He was so damn good with his hands. His mouth. His cock…
He sat forward and pressed an openmouthed kiss to her throat. “This is all I could think about for the last two days,” he murmured against her skin, then moved to another spot and kissed. “Touching you is like coming home.”
She leaned her head into his and begged at his ear. “Please, Rafe…”