“I love you.” I pressed my palm to his chest. “I love you, I love you, I love you.” Each repetition came out stronger, more certain.
He kissed me with a tenderness that contradicted everything that came before, soft and slow and devastating. His tongue traced the seam of my mouth, asking permission I gladly granted. The kiss was thorough, consuming, like he was trying to breathe me in, to absorb me into his very being. When he pulled back, his forehead rested against mine.
“I love you, Faith. So much, I don’t have words big enough tohold it. You’re my morning and my night. My first thought and my last prayer. You’re the answer to questions I didn’t know I was asking.”
Then he lifted me. My legs automatically wrapped around his waist, arms looping around his neck, and he carried me the few steps to the kitchen island. He moved with such care, like I was precious cargo, something breakable and irreplaceable.
The marble was cool against my back as he laid me down, goose bumps rising across my skin at the temperature change, but his body covered mine immediately, warming me. His weight settled over me, not crushing but grounding, making me feel safe and desired, all at once. He settled between my thighs and entered me again, slower this time, inch by exquisite inch, letting me feel every ridge, every pulse, every tremor that ran through him. He thrust deeper, watching my face like he was memorizing every detail. His eyes tracked every flutter of my lashes, every parting of my lips, every flush that painted my skin.
“I need to see you.” His hand slid down to hook my leg over his shoulder, his palm warm against the back of my thigh, fingers pressing into the soft flesh, changing the angle until I gasped. The new position let him slide even deeper, hitting a spot inside me that made my vision white out at the edges. “Need to watch you come apart, knowing you love me. Need to see your face when I make you mine in every way possible.”
He set a rhythm that was both tender and relentless, rolling his hips in a way that created the most delicious friction, each movement deliberate. He pulled almost all the way out before sliding back in, the slow drag making my nerve endings sing. With one hand holding my leg in place, the other slid between our bodies, his thumb finding that sensitive bundle of nerves and circling with precision. The pressure was perfect, not too hard, not too soft, like he’d mapped my body and knew exactly how to play it.
“Look at me,” he commanded softly when my eyes started to drift closed. “I want to see those beautiful eyes when you fallapart. Want to watch you shatter, knowing I’m the one who gets to put you back together.”
I couldn’t look away from his eyes. They held me captive, deep blues shot through with silver, pupils dilated with desire but also something deeper. Love. Possession. Forever. I couldn’t think about anything except the feeling of him moving inside me, the perfect fullness, the way he touched me like I was something precious and wild, all at once.
The pleasure built in waves, starting at my toes and spreading upward like wildfire, each one cresting higher than the last. My breathing became erratic, little whimpers and moans escaping with each exhale, and my hands clutched at his forearm, his countertop, as I tried to anchor myself against the storm building inside me.
“That’s it, Warrior.” His voice was strained, breathless. “My beautiful, fierce warrior. Show me. Show me how good I make you feel.”
White-hot pleasure exploded through every nerve ending, my body arching off the marble, as if pulled by invisible strings. I cried out his name over and over, a litany, a prayer. My spine arched higher off the marble as the orgasm tore through me, each rolling wave of sensation more intense than the last. And through the haze of pleasure, I watched Ryker’s face as his own control splintered.
His eyes hardened, his mouth falling open on a silent scream. His rhythm stuttered, and he buried himself deep, his whole body shuddering as he found his release, my name falling from his lips like something sacred. “Faith …”
Releasing my leg from his shoulder, he collapsed against me, careful to brace his weight on his forearms so he wouldn’t crush me. With his face buried in the crook of my neck, he planted soft kisses against my skin. We lay there, still joined, hearts hammering in tandem, our breathing gradually synchronizing.
Afterward, he gathered me against his chest, lifting me from the island and carrying me to the couch. He settled with me in hislap, my head on his chest, where I could hear his heartbeat slowly returning to normal.
“I meant it,” I whispered against his chest, pressing a kiss over his heart. “Every word.”
“I meant mine too. You’ve changed everything, Faith. My whole world reorganized itself around you the moment you walked into it.”
The morning sun painted golden stripes across our entwined bodies, and I thought about how this moment felt like a beginning and an ending, all at once. The beginning of something so profound, it scared me. The possible ending of our time together if the trial went badly.
We stayed like that, wrapped around each other, neither of us willing to break the spell, to acknowledge the world waiting outside these walls.
“Whatever happens,” he whispered against my hair, his voice thick with emotion, “you’re not alone anymore. And you never will be again. If they take you from me, I’ll wait. A year, ten years, a lifetime. You’re it for me, Faith. You’re everything.”
I pressed closer to him, feeling the truth of his words in every beat of his heart, letting his warmth seep into my bones. “You’re it for me too,” I whispered back. “My everything.”
Because soon, our ability to stay together would reach its verdict. And now, with everything laid bare between us, I finally understood what I had to lose.
Everything. Him. Us. This love that had somehow become the very air I breathed.
49
RYKER
I dropped the thick manila file onto Wolfe’s desk with a satisfying thud. Papers scattered across his perfectly organized workspace like shrapnel from a legal grenade.
“Good to see you too, Kincaid.” His voice dripped sarcasm thick enough to drown in. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”
“Discovery.” I slid into the leather chair across from him without invitation. His office reeked of power and expensive aftershave. Typical ADA peacocking.
Wolfe’s eyebrows lifted slightly. “How … traditional. Most attorneys email these days.”
“Where’s the satisfaction in that?” I pressed my finger against the file, leaning forward. “Besides, I wanted to see your face when you realized that not everything can be delayed, lost, or conveniently misplaced.”
