He saw. He wanted her to see what he saw—the strength she showed even now, in pushing him back. Seeing Jenny must have put what he’d had in this short time with Bina in a new perspective, a stark contrast, because he felt a frenzy building up. He was impatient. She was right—it was all too fast. But he didn’t fucking care. He wanted his family intact. He wanted her in it. And he wanted her to fucking see how right they were, and that he would not get in the way of her having herself, being who she wanted to be. He wanted to shake her and make her see.
He dropped his head and took a deep, shaky breath. He was a man on the edge tonight. “Just for tonight. I need you. I need to feel you with me. We can talk to Trey in the morning about how sometimes you’ll sleep over and sometimes you won’t. He’ll roll with it. Already you’re here sometimes and sometimes you’re not. I can’t sleep alone tonight, and I can’t be gone when Trey wakes up, because I was here when he went to sleep. I need you here with me.” He looked up. “I’m asking you to save me, Bina. Tonight, I need you to save me.”
That was the right thing to say; he saw it in her eyes, and, when she brought a hand to his cheek, he felt it in her touch. “Trey’s mother—”
“She’s not his mother.”
She nodded. “Jenny. She said something to worry you. Yes?”
With his cheek resting in her soft palm, he nodded. “Yes.”
“She wants to be his mother again.”
“It doesn’t matter. She’s not, and she won’t be.”
“But still you’re worried.”
“I’m…guarded. Paying attention. Bina, you understand? She’s a problem to deal with, but she’s not a threat.”
“You will go to Uncle Ben.”
“If I have to, yes.”
She was quiet, and he could sense her thinking about that—what he meant. “Our lives are very complex.”
“Yes. And complicated. Will you come to bed? I want to be simple with you. Just you and me, and all the rest of it just gone for a while.”
“Simple—it means also ‘stupid,’ yes?” She was smiling, though, and he knew she wasn’t leaving him. Not tonight, and not later.
“Yep. Let’s just be stupid. I want to be simple and stupid.” He lifted her onto his lap, and she settled in, draping her arms around his neck and resting her head on his shoulder.
“I would like to be stupid tonight.”
~oOo~
The house was quiet when they went in, so Bina went up ahead of him while he stayed down to turn out the lights and lock up. They’d had a quick strategic meeting about which bedroom to take—his or the guestroom—because all the other bedrooms were on the second floor, and Bina got a little loud. Which he loved wholeheartedly. But he wasn’t sure his father would.
Not that he hadn’t had sex in his bedroom before. There were ways to keep the sound down.
The bigger concern was Trey. In the end, Carlo decided he’d rather risk Trey coming in in the morning and seeing them in bed together than risk him coming in and finding his room empty. One would provoke curiosity, the other panic. Not really a hard choice.
When he got up to his room, she was already in his bed, naked and sitting with the covers pooled around her waist, her beautiful, full, dark-tipped breasts bare and waiting. As he watched, with her eyes steady on him, she curled her hands around those perfect mounds and grazed her thumbs over her nipples. Her eyelids fluttered and closed.
“Jesus God, baby.” His voice cracked roughly and he stripped to his skin as quickly as he could. The sheets were cool, but her body was hot, and he wrapped her up and moved to roll her under him. He wanted to taste her.
But she locked her arms and pushed him back. “No. I think tonight you lie back.” He let the pressure of her hands on his shoulders push him until he was on his back. Then she straddled him, and he lifted his hands to take her breasts. She let him, arching back as he fondled and teased, and then she took his hands in hers and laced their fingers together. She leaned forward until his hands, still caught with hers, were on the bed at his shoulders, and she was hovering over him, her breasts grazing his chest.
In the week of their intimacy, he had taken almost all the lead, though she was a responsive and energetic participant. She was learning new things about her body and the ways it could experience pleasure, and being with her for those discoveries was hotter than any fantasy he might have conjured. She had ridden him, but he had led then, too, bringing her over him and leading her with his hands on her hips. This marked the first time that she was taking real charge.