More than ever, I needed to feel close to him. Not just to wipe away some of the lingering sadness, but to reassure myself that I was right. I threw my arms around his neck and hugged him, sighing when he instantly hugged me back.
“Thank you,” he whispered into my hair.
“For what?”
“Forgiving me,” he said with a sigh as his hands flattened on my back and rubbed soothing circles. “Is there any way I can convince you to retract your resignation?”
“I wouldn’t mind pretending like that never happened. But if you want to really convince me, my bedroom is through there.”
He pulled away to follow the direction of my finger, his eyebrows raising at me in surprise. He looked torn for a moment before he abruptly bent down and lifted my feet from the floor.
“I’m not going to ask if you’re sure this time,” he told me as we crossed the threshold and he walked straight to my bed and gently deposited me on top of the blankets. “But I do want you to know that if you ever told me to stop—I would.”
“I know,” I confirmed, pushing myself up on my elbow and reaching for him with my other hand. “No more talking.”
Brian nodded and pulled his wallet out of his back pocket, tossing it on the bed beside me before coming down on top of me.
It was hard to say who removed what article of clothing considering we barely stopped kissing to do it. But after what felt like hours of foreplay, I could feel every inch of his naked body pressed against mine and I blindly reached for his wallet.
My searching fingers touched his and our kiss paused—our eyes popping open at the same time. We smiled as we separated and he pulled the packet out, sheathing himself as I pulled myself up to rest my head on the pillow.
“How long has that been in there?” I asked, wishing I hadn’t broken the silence when he sharply looked up.
“I put it there this morning. Not that I was planning to...” he trailed off with a frown. “I’m honestly not sure why I did it. I just wanted to be prepared for anything.”
“I’m glad you did.”
He pushed my thighs apart and settled between them as he murmured, “So am I.”
While we kissed again, his cock probed at my entrance and slid in without resistance. I hitched my legs around his hips as he started to move, the slow rolling motion making him grind against my clitoris on every upstroke.
I had no idea how long he continued like that. He eventually broke the kiss as our breathing became labored, but he still didn’t increase the pace. After long moments of turning my head back and forth on the pillow while I whimpered, I opened my eyes, prepared to beg him to go faster.
When I caught sight of the look on his face, all the words I was going to say left my brain. He was staring down at me with a look of quiet adoration—one so tender that I could feel the pleasure beginning to reach a peak even without the extra speed I thought I needed.
I thought that he was holding himself back again—denying the passion in fear of hurting me. But this was passion of a different kind.
He was showing me how he felt about me without words. My fingers clutched his shoulders as I shakily said his name and he adjusted the angle just enough for him to reach his and between our bodies to stroke my clit in time with his thrusts.
He didn’t ask me to come. He didn’t tell me how good it felt. He just gazed at me adoringly and smiled when he felt my walls beginning to tighten. My eyes rolled back and I moaned loudly as I came harder than I ever had before. Brian muttered a curse and lowered his head to mine, kissing me softly as I came down from the high of my orgasm.
But his hips didn’t stop moving. He kept going until I could see the strain on his face. Right on the edge, he managed to hold on until I came again and I let go of his shoulders to fall back against the bed while he roared his release to the ceiling.
He didn’t remove himself from my body right away. He snaked an arm beneath me and rolled us over, holding me on his chest and shaking his head when I tried to scramble off.
“Stay,” he breathlessly commanded. “Just... stay.”
I rested my ear over his heart, sighing with contentment as I listened to it pound. But instead of being lulled to exhaustion by it, I felt more awake and alive than I ever had before. I tipped my chin up and smiled at his peaceful face. Everything was startling clear.
“I love you.”
His eyes opened and he looked down at me with surprise. I watched his mouth open and close a few times before his brows began to furrow.
“Mallory—”
“You asked me to trust my heart and I did. Now it’s your turn to trust yours.”
His confused frown deepened, but he didn’t protest when I slid off his body and clutched the sheet to my naked form. He must have been able to sense what I was about to say, because he sat up and fixed me with a pleading look.