Oh.
Oh.
Oh.
The kiss was soft at first. Almost careful, as if he were testing a hypothesis, gathering data, running calculations the way she'd already learned he ran everything. But Chelsea's mouth had absolutely no interest in being a hypothesis, and the small, involuntary sound that escaped her—-helpless, wanting, nothing she could have produced on purpose—-changed the terms of his experiment entirely.
The kiss deepened in an instant, her arms somehow finding their way around his neck as he pulled her onto his lap. His hands were at her waist, her back, her ribs, learning the geography of her with the same methodical intensity he'd used to assess her in the elevator, except this wasn't assessment anymore. This was something that had broken through the floor of assessment and was falling into territory that didn't have a name.
She had come here to find out if this marriage was real. His mouth on hers was the most real thing she had ever felt. The thought of stopping him didn't cross her mind because everything felt so, so right. How they ended up married was immaterial. He was her husband, she was his wife, and what God had joined together was exactly this: his breath against her lips, his hands pulling her closer, and the knowledge, settling into her bones like warmth, that she was exactly where she was supposed to be.
Oooh.
Olivio had only planned to kiss her. A strategic demonstration. A branding exercise, if he was being honest with himself, which he was not and had no intention of being. But the moment he had a taste of her lips, it seemed to unlock a hunger inside of him that had never existed before, and a kiss was no longer enough. He wanted more. He wanted everything.Everything, dammit.
She tasted like the latte she'd been drinking and something underneath it that was just her, something sweet and clean that had nothing to do with coffee and everything to do with the fact that no man had ever kissed this woman before. The knowledge hit him like a fist to the sternum.
No one.
Just him.
"I want you, Chelsea," he gritted against her lips.
"I w-want you, too." She didn't think anything of it, her need for him making her whimper the words out as his lips trailed down her neck, andoh!
She realized belatedly that he was marking her, his mouth pressing against the column of her throat with an intent that went beyond kissing, and she couldn't help it. Her arms tightened around his neck, her body molding against his as her eyes squeezed shut at the pressure of his mouth. Her heart hammered against her chest, faster and faster, and when the pressure finally eased, it felt as if his lips had burned an imprint on the side of her neck.
Her eyes drifted open, her gaze locking with his. He watched her with intense dark eyes as her fingers rose to touch his mark.
It was like he had claimed her.
And she...liked it.
The realization caught her off guard. She hadn't expected this about herself—-that the sensation of being claimed by this man, of wearing his mark on her skin, would make something inside her chest bloom rather than recoil. She'd read about desire in the abstract, had imagined it as a polite, manageable warmth, something she'd be able to examine from a safe distance.
This wasn't that.
This was standing in the middle of a fire and realizing she'd been cold her entire life.
"Give yourself to me, Chelsea."
The command in his tone was like being wrapped in velvet, and all she could do was whisper, "Yes." She didn't understand exactly what he was asking. She just knew there was only one way to answer that...because she was already his, had been so from the moment they were married.
Chelsea let out a gasp when he suddenly swept her up into his arms, and then he was carrying her to—-oh? A secret panel that was actually a door and—-OH.
A bedroom?
He had a bedroom outfitted like a penthouse suite in his office, andah!
The relief was physical before it was anything else. Her leg, which had been bracing and negotiating and compensating since the lobby, went quiet in his arms the way it only did when she was lying down, and the absence of that constant low effort was its own kind of surrender—-her body letting go of one burden just in time to be overwhelmed by another.
She couldn't think again, with his mouth claiming hers for another long, drugging kiss as he laid her on the bed. The sheets were cool against her back. The ceiling above was white, unmarked, a blank canvas, and for a dizzy moment she imagined it cycling through artwork the way the screen in the other room did—-Monet dissolving into Vermeer dissolving into whatever was happening to her right now, which was something no painter had ever been brave enough to capture.
She could sense his hands moving, but it was only when she heard a slight ripping sound—-oh!
"I'll buy you this same dress, I promise."
She could only choke back a laugh, but then he was kissing her again, and this time she understood what his hands were doing. Her dress was open now, the blue flowers parted like a curtain, and his gaze traveled down her body with an expression that made her forget how to breathe.
