“Because my hands are still shaking,” he whispers.“Because I’m still bleeding.Because I’m one breath away from losing control.And if you say you love me right now, sunshine,” He swallows hard.“I don’t know if I can hold myself together.”
My heart pulls toward him, fierce and aching.
I step closer.“Then don’t.”
His eyes burn.I lift trembling fingers to touch his jaw.He doesn’t move, doesn’t breathe, just watches me like I’m rewriting every rule he ever had for himself.
“You didn’t scare me,” I whisper.“Not even for a second.”
He exhales shakily, like he doesn’t believe me.So I give him truth the way he understands — slow, steady, sure.
“You want to know what I saw?”I ask.
He doesn’t answer.He might not be able to.
“I saw someone protecting me,” I explain.“I saw a man fighting someone who tried to destroy my life.I saw someone choosing me over fear.Over pain.Over everything.”
He presses the heel of his hand to his forehead, breath breaking.“Kelly,”
“And I remembered us,” I continue softly.“More than before.More clearly.”
His head snaps up.
“You remember it all?”
“I remembered you holding me in the dark,” I share with a rasp of emotion in my voice.“I remembered telling you not to fall in love with me.I remembered,” My voice trembles, “that you did anyway.”
He closes his eyes, pain and relief strangling his features.
“And I remembered loving you,” I whisper.“I remember knowing you were in love with me as much as I love you.It was in your eyes.And it scared me.It scared me to think I could feel so deeply and what if you took it away.I needed to have control.The anxiety we consuming me waiting for this good thing we shared to fall apart.So I pushed you away and I did it hard, baby.”
He remains silent.The kind of silent that feels like gravity shifted.Then he moves slowly, as if he’s afraid to spook me, stepping forward until our bodies almost touch.His wounded hand rises, shaking, and he cups my cheek.“You loved me,” he repeats, voice barely audible.
“I did and I still do.”
His breath catches like I sucker punched him.
He doesn’t speak.He just looks at me.Like he’s been starving and I’m the first real meal in front of him.Then his hands are on me.
Strong.Certain.Shaking just enough to tell me this isn’t about control, it’s about need.
He grips my hips and lifts me clean off the floor like I weigh nothing, my back hitting the wall with a soft thud that knocks the breath from my lungs.The cool surface contrasts with the heat of him pressed against me, the solid strength of his body bracketing mine in.
“Riot,” I breathe.
My legs wrap around his waist without thinking, muscle memory and instinct taking over.His forehead drops to my collarbone as he exhales, slow and wrecked, like holding me upright is the only thing keeping him grounded.
“I thought I lost you,” he murmurs into my skin.“I thought I’d never get you back.”
“You have me,” I say, threading my fingers into his hair, holding him there.“I’m right here.”
That’s all it takes.
He lifts his head and kisses me like he’s been holding himself back, slow at first, then deeper, rougher, full of all the things we didn’t say when we were pretending this was just fun.His mouth moves to my neck, my jaw, the place under my ear that makes my knees weak, and I gasp as his grip tightens, grounding me against him.
The wall is solid behind me.He is solid everywhere else.
Every inch of space between us disappears.Clothes come off and skin to skin the fire between us is hotter than ever before.His fingers slide between my slick heat before he lines his cock up entering me, stretching me, and filling me in a level of ecstasy I have never felt before.
