‘Fight it.’ Tears are still flowing from her eyes, but I think she’s stopped crying. She sucks in several breaths and when she looks at me, her eyes are clearer than I anticipated. She’s scared shitless – that’s clear – but it’s like she’s stopped fighting the fear, giving into it instead.
Her lips part and I almost stop whatever she’s about to say, silence her with my lips, but I don’t, forcing myself to hear, needing to know what’s got her all worked up.
‘I think I’m in love with you,’ she says, her chest heaving with every ravenous breath she takes, yet her voice is astonishingly even and she manages to maintain my gaze.
My voice however is the exact opposite of even, coming out all high pitched like I’m thirteen years old and going through puberty all over again. ‘What?’
She sucks in a breath, then releases it slowly, the fear in her eyes subsiding, as if she’s just won it. ‘I think I’m in love with you …’ She bites on her lips and shakes her head. ‘No … I don’t think. I know.’
I gradually process her words and the full extent of what she’s saying. I think I’d honestly believed that she might never say them, that this love thing was going to be a one-way street. Hearing her say it … I don’t even know how to describe it. It’s like my entire life I’ve associated the word with hatred. Every time my mother said it, it felt like she was trying to take something from me and it made me hate her and myself – love equaled hate for me. But hearing it from Violet’s lips, seeing that look in her eyes, the one I’ve never seen from anyone, is so different. She’s not taking something from me right now, she’s giving me something.
She’s giving me everything.
I can’t control myself. I smash my lips against her, probably too roughly. But she doesn’t seem to mind, kissing me back just as intensely, her fingers tugging through my hair as she pulls me closer, consuming me with her lips as her body lifts to meet mine. It’s like she needs every part of her touching me, but it’s not enough. Nothing feels like it could ever be close enough.
As her legs fasten around mine, I grip tightly onto her and stand up, carrying her with me as I head back to the room. Our lips stay sealed, only parting so she can yank my shirt off when we reach the hallway. We bump into walls, slam into tables, knock over the lamp on our way into the room, but we laugh against each other’s lips, never parting. When I reach the bed, I fall blindly onto it, catching us with my hands. I take the opportunity to pull her shirt off and unclasp her bra. Then I lean back and take in the sight of her, every speck of flesh, every freckle, every line of ink she has. So fucking gorgeous I can’t stand it. I feel like I’m about to combust. I want her so badly that my body is throbbing, my veins pulsating with desire and need.
The need be with her.
Forever.
And ever.
And ever.
And when I open my mouth to say it, this time it’s different – this time it means more than the first time I said it, because I know that I can say and it’ll be welcomed not feared.
‘I love you too, Violet Hayes,’ I whisper then my lips crash against hers showing her with my mouth just how much I mean it.
God, do I fucking mean it. More than anything else in my life.
Chapter 25
Violet
So this is what making love feels like? That was the last coherent thought I had.
I wasn’t planning on telling him that I loved him. I was having an internal argument over the many reasons why I should keep it to myself, that I should just go back to my old ways and deal with it in my own way. That Luke was Mira Price’s son and that should matter, right? But then I started thinking about how I didn’t want to go back to my old ways, how I hated that life even though I wouldn’t admit it at the time, and how he really isn’t Mira’s son. Yes, he shares her blood but everything about him is the opposite of what that woman is. He’s so much more than that.
So, so much more.
He’s the guy who helped me to class when I jumped out the window and hurt my foot.
He’s the guy who beat the shit out of Preston when he hit me.
He’s the guy who protected me.
Who gave me a roof over my head with no stipulations.
The guy who taught me that kissing wasn’t just lips and tongue it was emotions and intensity and passion.
The guy who would do anything for me.
The guy who has done anything for me.
The guy who loved me when I thought no one ever would.
He’s the guy who made me understand love enough that I could feel it myself, and he should know that, how much he means to me.