“Go away.”
“Can’t do that, I’m afraid.”
She shot a sharp look at him over her shoulder. “Really? I think you can and do go away all the time.”
He caught his upper lip between his teeth, like he was holding himself back from saying something nasty.
Maybe he was. Nausea pitched in her stomach.
“No,” he ground out. “We’re not doing this.”
Olivia didn’t know if she wanted to puke or cry or both. “Doing what?” she asked, the words teetering on the edge of being incomprehensible. She needed to pull herself together before she completely fell apart.
He stared at her, a hard, determined look that she couldn’t decipher. “Hurting each other.”
“That’s what we do.”
“We’re going to do things differently.I’mgoing to do this differently.” He flexed his jaw. “We’re just having a fight. Couples do that. We can do that, but not the way we used to.”
She laughed. “Sure, we’ll just completely change who we are.”
“We’ll go to counselling. Figure out how to talk without name-calling and blame.”
The words were right, but his tone…it was hard to believe that Rafe would sit there and listen to someone tell him how to be. And he still sounded so angry. “Just like that.” She couldn’t keep the disbelief out of her voice. She didn’t really try. He needed to know her doubts and fears.
“No, not just like that.” His voice could have cut glass. “It took being divorced for two years, getting back together, and then almost losing you again for me to realize I might need help being a better husband.”
Her breath caught in her throat as he stepped into the room, his hand outstretched. Shaking like a leaf, she met him halfway. He laced their hands together and she felt the tremor under his skin. Hewasmad, but not just with her.
“Counselling doesn’t feel like something one does at the start of a relationship,” she admitted, her voice still small, but not as watery now as before.
He curved his other hand around her waist and brought her tight to his body. He lifted their connected fingers, nudging her chin with his knuckle, lifting her gaze to his. “Baby.”
“What?”
“This is hardly the start of a relationship. This is the messy middle.”
“The middle,” she breathed, relief pulsing through her veins. Meaningnot the end. “Yeah, messy is the word for it.”
“I love you.” He lowered his face until their noses touched and he repeated his words until she smiled. “See? That’s all that matters. We won’t give up this time.”
Her gut spasmed with guilt. He was the only reason they weren’t throwing things right now. “I don’t deserve you.”
“Shut it. Next time it’ll be your turn to be the voice of reason.”
His lips brushed hers, lightly at first, then harder as he cupped her face in his hands. Her hands restlessly bounced up his chest and across his strong shoulders. He murmured sweet, calming sounds as he kissed that spot on her neck that drove her crazy, then found his way back to her hungry, wanting mouth.
“Rafe?” She nibbled on his lower lip. “Can we have make-up sex now?”Can I make this up to you the only way I know how?
He grinned. “Does this do it for you, rational conversation?”
“Oh, yeah.” She slid her hands under his t-shirt, over the hard planes of his abdomen to the narrow band of fur running south from the middle of his chest. She followed it to where it widened at his waistband and tucked her fingers under his belt. “Take your shirt off,” she whispered as she pulled the leather strap from the loops. She took her time with the button, knowing that just beneath her fingertips his erection was rapidly rising to attention. She gripped the zipper and painstakingly tugged his fly open halfway before pausing to admire the bulge of black cotton covered maleness in front of her.
“Stop teasing.” He groaned and jerked his hips against her hands.
She turned and yanked the laundry basket out of the way, then whipped off her clothes and crawled to the middle of the bed on all fours. “Who’s teasing?” she said, glancing over her shoulder.
With a chuckle, he shoved his pants to the ground and climbed up to join her. He smoothed one hand over her ass and she pressed into his touch. He made her feel so beautiful, the way he stared at her body. The rest of it was important too, but this elemental recognition of his mate…she loved how magical it felt. And hated it, too, because the thought of losing that connection…no. They weren’t going to lose each other again. She lowered her cheek to the bed and arched her back. He teased her with his fingers until she was rocking against him, and then he slid home, curving over her back. He whispered filthy, beautiful things in her ear until she exploded, then he flipped her over and they made it happen all over again.
