He says it so easily. Has always said it so easily.I love youfalls from his lips like breathing, like it costs him nothing, like the words don't terrify him the way they terrify me.
He’s said it God only knows how many ways since we broke this thing back open.
And I’ve never said it to him… never… not even back then.
Once the words are out,there’s no taking them back. There’s no pretending indifference. There’s no hiding all the ways this can cut me to the core.
My gaze drops to his mouth. Those lips I've kissed a hundred times. Those lips that have always saidI love youeven when they knew I wouldn’t—couldn’t—say it back.
I force myself to meet his eyes, and really look at him.
He watches me with that expression—the one that's always undone me. Open. Vulnerable. Completely unguarded.
Waiting for whatever I need to give him.
Even if it's nothing.
“Everett.”
“Sierra.” My name is little more than a whisper, but he flexes inside me as he says it. A subconscious subtle claiming as he waits me out.
I take his face in my hands. His beard brushes my palms with a delicious scrape I want to feel every day for the rest of my life.
Pulsing inside me, he’s still buried to the hilt—still trembling with the effort of holding still.
I trace my thumb over his bottom lip, and meet his gaze again.
“I love you.” The words fall out of me. Simple. True. Finally free.
Something tight snaps inside him. His shoulders drop. The tension bleeds out of his jaw. A rough breath shudders out of him like I just pulled an old splinter straight from his chest.
“I loved you then,”I continue, my voice cracking but steady. “I love you now. I never stopped. Not for a single day. Not for a single?—”
He moves.
Not slow. Not gentle. He pulls back and slams into me with a force that makes the trays rattle, that makes me cry out, and obliterates all thoughts running through my head.
“Say it again.” Half growl, half demand, he drags himself almost free, teeters there, and slams home again.
My body jerks with the force, a cry falls from my lips, but I never look away.
“Sierra—say it?—”
“I love you.”
He groans and thrusts again. Harder. Deeper. His hands grip my hips with bruising force as he drives into me over and over.
“Again.”
“I love you.” I'm gasping now, my nails raking down his chest, my legs wrapped around him so tight I can feel every muscle in his body coiling. “I love you, I love you, I?—”
He swallows the words with his mouth, kissing me, consuming me, memorizing the shape of them against his lips.
The pleasure builds. Coils tight. Every thrust pushes me closer to the edge, and I'm clenching around him, squeezing him, pulling him deeper.
“Fuck—” He breaks the kiss, panting against my mouth. “Every time you—god, Sierra—you're choking me?—”
I tightenaround him again, deliberate this time, and watch his eyes roll back.
