Page 94 of Betrayal and Vows

"You're so beautiful," he breathes. "So fucking beautiful it hurts to look at you."

I reach for the hem of his shirt, my fingers trembling. "I need to feel you. All of you."

He reaches behind him and pulls the shirt up and over his head, discarding it on the stone floor. I press my palms to his chest, feeling the steady rhythm of his heart beneath my hands. The scars that tell the story of his survival.

"I love these," I whisper, tracing each mark. "They brought you to me."

His breath catches. "Lena..."

I silence him with a kiss, soft and slow. We undress each other like we have all the time in the world, when we both know we have none at all.

Someone could come in at any second. We are risking everything. But if I’m killed while naked in his arms, I’ll die a happy woman.

It honestly sounds like a good way to go.

When he lays me down on his jacket, he hovers over me for a long moment. Just looking. Just breathing.

"I want to remember you exactly like this," he says. "Perfect. Mine."

"I am yours," I whisper. "Always. No matter what happens. You own my heart and soul."

“Yes, I do.”

He kisses me. His tongue plunging deep and claiming every inch of my mouth. And then he pulls away and trails kisses along my jaw, down my throat, pausing to worship the hollow at the base of my neck where my pulse beats wild and desperate.

"So sweet," he murmurs against my skin. "My perfect girl."

Every kiss feels like a brand, marking me as his in ways that go deeper than flesh. I know, even if I’m forced to marry Mikhail and he takes my body, he’ll never have me.

I will always belong to Anton. No other man will give me pleasure. That’s Anton’s gift alone. And my gift to him. I will only ever moan his name and want his lips on my skin.

He takes his time moving down my body, his lips and tongue mapping every inch. His teeth graze over my erect nipples. The action draws soft gasps from my lips that echo in the sacred space around us.

I don’t know if it’s sacrilegious to make love in a chapel, but it feels right. It’s our own commitment ceremony.

"Anton," I breathe, my fingers threading through his dark hair.

He looks up at me, those piercing blue eyes holding mine captive. "Let me worship you,solnyshko. Let me show you how much you mean to me."

His mouth continues its downward journey, pressing reverent kisses to my ribs, my stomach, the sensitive skin of my hip bones. By the time he settles between my thighs, I'm trembling with need.

"You're everything," he whispers against my inner thigh. "My salvation."

When his mouth finally finds me, I arch off the bench with a cry that I have to muffle with my own hand. He's thorough and devoted, using his lips and tongue to drive me higher and higher until I'm sobbing his name into the moonlit chapel.

He doesn't stop until I'm shaking apart completely, my body singing with pleasure so intense it feels like a religious experience. Which seems fitting, given our surroundings.

When I finally come back to myself, he's kissing his way back up my body, his eyes dark with desire and something deeper. Something that looks like love, even if we haven't said the words.

I don’t need him to say the words. I feel like the word love is inadequate. What I feel for him is so much more. He consumes me. He owns me. I am his.

"Beautiful," he breathes against my lips. "So fucking beautiful when you let go for me."

I pull him down for a kiss, tasting myself on his lips, not caring about anything except this moment, this man, this feeling of being completely and utterly his.

He enters me slowly, so slowly, like he's afraid I might break. Or disappear. His forehead pressed to mine, our breath mingling in the space between us.

"I love you," he says.