“Dominic—”
“And then I saw your face.” My thumb traces over her fingers. “And I knew I would doanythingto have you, Hazel. To keep you. Things I should be ashamed of. Things…you would run away from me if you knew.”
Her lips make a line. “What do you mean?” I’m teetering on the edge of a full confession. The background check, how I gave her the contract with the intention of trapping her. “Dominic, you’re scaring me. What do you mean?”
I’m right on the edge of a full confession. The financial background check, the rent problems—all of it. It’s right there on the tip of my tongue. I just have to let it go.
But her eyes are so bright and vulnerable. She’s wearing my shirt, and her hand is gripping mine like I’m the only solid thing in her world.
It’s time to speak the truth.
“I love you, Hazel.”
Words that have never left my mouth before.
I feel awkward saying them. Clumsy, like a man trying to sew with a hammer.
I hang there in the silence, waiting for her to respond, my heart racing in my chest. Finally, her face crumples. But not from sadness—from the overwhelming emotions of my confession. An admission she didn’t think she deserved.
Tears slide down her cheeks as she presses her forehead against mine.
“I love you too, Dominic,” she whispers. “So much it scares me.”
I kiss the salty tears from her face one at a time and lay her down beneath me.
This isn’t the way I normally take her. No commands, no orders, no hands pinning her down. I simply lower her down onto the pillows and stretch my body over hers, caging her in with my arms, staring down at her face.
Ireallylook at her. At the freckles across her nose, the tiny scar on her chin from when she was a kid, and the way her lips are trembling like she’s feeling too much inside.
Unzipping my pants, I slide inside her slowly, one inch at a time. Her mouth falls open, but her eyes remain locked on mine. The feeling of her body accepting mine is pure bliss.
That’s right. That pussy stretches to fit me.
I roll my hips in with no roughness or urgency. Just a linking depth that causes her to gasp. She wraps her arms around my neck and pulls me closer until our chests are touching and I can feel her heartbeat against mine—fast, strong, and synced with the rhythm of my body against hers.
“I love you,” I tell her again, saying the words into her mouth between kisses, moving with long, deliberate strokes that make her toes curl against the back of my thighs. “So much, angel.”
“Don’t stop,” she breathes. “Tell me more, more, more.”
“I love you,” I say again. I say it with every stroke. I whisper into her throat, groan into her hair as her soaked walls tighten around me and her nails bite into my shoulders.
She comes quietly this time—not screaming or thrashing around. A slow, rolling wave that builds from her center and spreads out, causing her body to arch against mine. Her mouth opens in a silent cry, her eyes locked on mine the entire time.
I follow her over the edge with my forehead pressed against hers, spraying my seed so deep, holding my body still as my cock pulses inside her and my arms hold me up to keep me from collapsing.
She feels every throb. I know because she taps against my arm in time with each of them. In the following silence, lying together, my hand in her hair, I say it.
“Marry me, Hazel.”
Her breath catches, and she goes still against me. When she lifts her head, she’s searching my face with those gorgeous eyes.
“You–you mean that?”
“I wouldneversay something to you I didn’t mean, Hazel.”
She stares back at me. Then her hand comes up to my face. She traces the line of my jaw, my cheek, and finally the crease between my eyes like she’s trying to smooth my brow.
The edges of her lips twist into the most adorable little smile I’ve ever seen.
