Somehow I got his shirt off. My fingers fumbled with his belt, desperate and clumsy, while his mouth left new marks on mycollarbone, my throat, the curve of my shoulder. Nothing like the other bruises. This was something else. This was a claiming. The kind of touch that saidI know exactly where I amandyou are minewithout needing either sentence spoken aloud.
I finally got his pants undone, my hands wrapping around the hard, heavy length of him, and his hips snapped forward, grinding against my palm.
"Fuck, Raven." The control in his voice was fraying, snapping like an overstretched wire.
I said his name again when his hand slid inside my panties, fingers pushing deep into my slick heat, and he said "I've got you" against my ear in a low voice that made the phrase mean half a dozen things at once.
"I know," I managed, gasping as he moved his hand, wreaking havoc on the sensitive nerves there.
I felt him smile against my skin, sharp and predatory.
He didn't wait any longer. He moved me through the bedroom without hesitation, with the same quiet competence he brought to everything, laying me down on sheets that smelled like us. He came over me with the crushing, careful weight of a man who'd spent three weeks thinking about this exact moment, settling between my legs and pressing the tip of his cock against my entrance.
He held himself there, his muscles trembling with the effort of not burying himself inside me, his breathing harsh in the quiet room.
"Milo, please," I begged.
He gave me exactly what I asked for, sliding inside me slowly as I stretched around him, filling me balls deep. A shudder went through his big body when he could go no deeper, and then he started to move.
It was desperate and slow and achingly careful in equal measure, and somewhere in the middle of it I gave in to him entirely, because this was Milo. A man capable of terrible things and impossible tenderness in the same breath, capable of taking me apart and holding every piece while he did it.
And when he said "mine"with his mouth at my throat and his hand locked in my hair and every inch of him pressed against me, inside me, it sounded like the most perfect music to my ears.
"Yours," I said, and meant it the way I'd only meant a handful of things in my entire life.
He didn’t stay gentle. The moment I said I was his, the last thread of his restraint snapped.
He withdrew almost completely, leaving me aching and empty for a heartbeat, before slamming back into me with a force that knocked the breath from my lungs. I gasped, my nails digging into his shoulders, anchoring myself as he began to drive into me. It wasn't the rhythmic, polite friction of a lover. It was the desperate, possessive cadence of a man trying to erase the last month of our lives.
"You feel so fucking good," he gritted out, his voice rough against my ear. "So tight. So mine."
"Milo—" I cried out his name, unsure if I was asking him to stop or go faster.
"Take it," he growled, his hands sliding down to grip my hips, bruisingly hard. "Take all of it, Raven. Take all of me."
I threw my head back, arching into the punishment of his thrusts. It was too much and not enough all at once. The friction built a heat in my belly that coiled tighter with every stroke, a heavy, electric tension that made my toes curl. I wrapped my legs around his waist, pulling him deeper, needing to feel the weight of him pressing the air out of me. I needed to know he was real. Thatthiswas real.
Every thrust hit that sensitive bundle of nerves deep inside, wringing a broken cry from my throat.
"That’s it," he whispered, nipping at the sensitive cord of my neck. "Sing for me, little bird. Let me hear you."
The tension in my stomach tightened to a painful point. My breath came in short, jagged gasps. I was close, terrifyingly close, hovering on the edge of a cliff I couldn't see but could feel in every terrifying detail.
"Milo, please," I sobbed, my hips bucking against his, seeking the friction that would push me over.
"I’ve got you." He didn't slow down. If anything, he sped up, his movements jagged and possessive. "Let go. It's okay. I've got you."
And I did.
The climax hit me hard, a white-hot spark that started in my center and flooded my limbs. I cried out his name, my body bowing off the mattress, shuddering around him as the waves of pleasure drowned out the memory of pain.
He groaned, a guttural, animal sound, and drove into me three more times, hard and deep, before stiffening. I felt his pulse hammer against my skin, heard the harsh intake of air as he poured himself into me, spending himself completely.
And when he collapsed on top of me, his weight was heavy and crushing and perfect.
I lay there in the aftermath, chest heaving, listening to the twin rhythms of our hearts slowing down in the quiet dark. He didn't pull away. He buried his face in the crook of my neck, his breathing still ragged, his sweat mixing with mine.
My hand came up to stroke the damp hair at the nape of his neck and his arms tightened around me, a vice grip that said more than any apology ever could.
