“Baby, I was never going to let you go anyway.” His legs slid between mine, spreading them as he settled on top of me.
I held on to him like a baby monkey, kissing him back with abandon when he lowered his mouth down to mine. Low groans rumbled in his chest and his hips rolled. Pleasure sparked deepinside me as the hard heat of his body pushed me into the mattress.
“I think you want a distraction,” he murmured between kisses. “You want me to make you forget.”
“Maybe, but I still love you,” I said, unable to stop myself from repeating it now that the words were out. “I love you, Alex Westwood. You are an answered prayer I never even consciously asked for but always hoped I’d find anyway.”
He groaned, his tongue sliding between my lips again. I almost got lost in his fervent kisses and the sensation of his hands traveling up and down my sides, but he’d been a lot more verbal about his feelings and what I meant to him than I had been so far. It was about time I set the record straight from my end.
“One of the biggest reasons I was so upset about my mom’s vote wasn’t only because of the company, or my job, or even the name. It was because the only reason you agreed to marry me in the first place was for those votes and they ended up not meaning anything.”
“Water under the bridge,” he murmured breathlessly, sliding his lips from my mouth to my throat, his palms hot against my sides, but his fingertips gentle as they delved beneath the hem of my shirt. “Those votes meant you agreed to be mine. That matters, Jane. Itmeanseverything.”
My heart skipped and my back arched, my body silently begging him to peel off my shirt when he slid his hand closer to my breast. My head, however, was still entirely focused on making sure he didn’t fall asleep tonight with any doubts about where I stood.
“Just so you know, I’m still all in on this. On us. Even without the company.”
“We’re getting the company back, baby. But I’m all in too. No matter what.” He finally gripped the hem of my shirt and pulled it smoothly over my head before his lips crashed back into mine.
His hands were hot against my bare skin, feeling every inch of my torso. He kissed me like he was making a point. A pleasurable shiver rushed through me and I moaned into his mouth, nipping his lower lip before reaching for his belt.
As soon as I got the buckle undone, I folded my fingers around the hem of his shirt and he helped me take it off, pulling it away after bunching the fabric at the nape of his neck into his fist. Every kiss and every touch started a tiny fire in me, little flames that begged for him to stoke them.
Together like this, we felt inevitable, like we’d always been meant to be. Like no matter what life threw at us, we would always end up together. Alex understood me like no one else did, knew me in ways even my own family hadn’t ever figured out, and yet, he was still here. He’d never run, never hesitated, and never even second-guessed.
Somehow, he and I fit together in a way I’d never expected to find, and even though everything else had fallen apart, as long as I had this, had him, I would be okay. I knew that now. After today. After the way he’d folded me into his arms without question downstairs and had taken care of me even when I hadn’t known how to take care of myself.
Sliding his fingers under my knee, he hooked my leg around his waist and then did the same with the other, rocking into me with his hips perfectly positioned so I could grind against his hard length. I took the opportunity he was offering, every muscle in my body taut with the tension not only of the day, but having him on top of me like this.
I rolled against him and he groaned again, eyes burning into mine like twin green flames when he lifted his mouth away frommy skin to look at me. “Take what you need to forget, Killer. I’m yours. Every single part of me.”
“I don’t only want to forget, Alex. I want to feel. I want to know that we’re still good and that we always will be.” As soon as the words were out, I slanted my lips over his, reached for the waistband of his pants, and slid my fingers in between us.
When I reached the hard metal of his button, it took a second to get it open, but then I unzipped him and tugged his pants off along with his underwear. Alex kicked the garments off, now completely naked as he rolled us over so I was on top.
For a moment, I just looked down at him, letting my gaze linger on the sharp lines of his face, the regal line of his nose, and the five o’clock shadow on his jaw. My gaze caught on his before I moved it to the elegant column of his throat and finally further down to his broad chest and the insanely well-sculpted blocks of his abdomen.
Alex watched me look at him, taking my hand and placing it right over his racing heart. “Do you feel that?”
I glanced back up into his eyes and nodded. “Yeah, mine is going crazy too.”
“That’s because weareall good, Jane. We took some hits, but we’re still here. Still standing. Still together. So if you want to feel, feel that first.”
As I looked down into his eyes, I took a second to do exactly what he’d said, just feeling his heart beating under my palm. I stroked my fingertips across his skin, bending over to kiss him again and letting my hand slide further down as our tongues tangled together.
I toyed with the trail of hair that ran from his belly button to his pelvis, and he groaned. His hips arched when I lifted myself off his lap to kneel between his thighs. Those eyes burned into me when I reached for his shaft, long and curved toward his navel. I wrapped my fingers around his girth and nearly moanedat the sensation of the hard heat of him against my palm. I gave him a few leisurely, lazy strokes.
“Jane,” he ground out, but he didn’t stop me. I ran the pad of my thumb across the wetness gathering at his tip and leaned down to taste it.
A deep, loud groan came out of him when I took him into my mouth. Wrapping my tongue around his broad tip, I moved my hands to his hips, holding them firmly, and I sank my mouth over him. I couldn’t help but glance up into his eyes as I ran my tongue along the underside of his shaft, loving that I saw his eyelids slam shut and his teeth sink into his lower lip.
Outside of this room—and usually inside it too—Alex Westwood was all-powerful and always in control, yet right here and right now, he was giving himself to me. This man had meant it when he’d said he was mine and the only thing that mattered to me right now was showing him how I felt.
His lips parted when I let my teeth graze gently over his skin. Then his fingers wound into my hair and gripped it tight. Slowly withdrawing, I held his gaze before sinking down on him again, wanting to drag it out instead of rushing. This wasn’t a race, and for once, we actually had some time on our hands.
I kept going, mentally taking note of every reaction I elicited from him and what I’d done to earn it. From the way the muscles in his stomach rippled, to his thighs tensing, and his hips thrusting gently into my mouth, I didn’t miss a thing. My panties were soaked and my nipples were hard, my body bursting with pleasure.
He was muttering curses and holding my hair in a firm grasp, finally relinquishing just a tiny bit of control and actually letting me see him vulnerable, right on the edge of falling apart.
