“I just got nervous,” I whisper, the words scraping the corners of my ribs. “There’s so much I want to give you. I’ll make all of this stop, baby. I will.”
“It will all be over soon, Liam.”
“I can’t lose you, Sara.” From the way her eyes shift, we both know I’m also talking about my brother’s return.
She moves toward me carefully, like approaching a wounded animal, and perhaps that’s what I’ve become for her. I’ve become wounded, weak with a love I’ve never felt for anyone. Entirely rewriting who I am as she’s converted herself into my other half. This half of me that bleeds, breathes for her and burns for nothing but her.
Her fingers brush through my damp hair, so gently it makes my chest ache, a pain that has nothing to do with that bullet splitting my skin open.
I reach out, my hands finding the backs of her legs, gently pulling her toward me and I close my eyes, pressing my forehead against her stomach, breathing her in, letting her presence calm the storm raging inside me. The wet fabric of her nightgown clings to her every curve, translucent where it meets her skin.
She's shivering, fragile and remains the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. The candlelight plays across her face, highlightingher cheekbone, the fullness of her lips and my heart pounds with a different urgency now.
My hands slide up her thighs, bunching the wet nightgown while my desire and possessiveness tangle together until I can't separate one from the other. I peel the clinging silk upward, revealing inch by inch of her perfect skin.
“Arms up,” I utter softly, and she complies without hesitation, leaving her bare and breathtaking before me as her eyes meet mine with the same hunger we hold for each other.
For a moment, she glances at the closet and then behind her, suddenly self-conscious, perhaps remembering Joe's presence somewhere in the house. I gently take her chin between my fingers, turning her back to me,
“Look at me,” I command. “Just me.” And I pull her lips to mine.
Tenderly at first, tasting the rain on her skin, feeling her body respond to my touch. My hands cradle her face, thumbs stroking her cheeks as I deepen the kiss. Her breath catches while I trace my tongue along her lower lip, and when she whimpers against my mouth, something primal ignites in me. That sound—that desperate, needy sound—shatters what little control I have left.
I rise to my feet and guide her across the room as I position her in front of the full-length mirror.
I stand behind her, the contrast of her bare skin against my soaked clothed body making my heart hammer harder.
“Look at you,” I mutter, my palm spreading across her stomach, pulling her against me.
Her head falls back onto my chest, eyes half-closed as my other hand slides down the curve of her waist, over her hip, then lower. She melts against me as my fingers trace the inside of her thigh, teasing her with featherlight touches over her small scars, making her softly moan.
Her head remains tilted back sideways, her eyes locked on our reflection. The candlelight dances across her naked form, creating shadows in the hollow of her throat, across the rise of her breasts, and every perfect inch of her.
“I need to see you,” I murmur against her ear, my lips brushing the sensitive skin. “And I needyouto see what I see.”
“What do you see?” she asks breathlessly.
“I see the most beautiful woman, a beauty in strength and a defiance that drew me to you from the very beginning.” She whimpers, pressing back against me. I’m already hard, and her body responds to my touch made for her.
“Your shadows are a part of you, but there’s light too, a softness, that I love the most about you. One that I get to have for myself.”
Her lips part as my fingers finally finds their destination, slipping through her wetness. The storm outside continues to rage, but within this room, within this moment, nothing exists but us.
“Liam,” she gasps, her hips instinctively pushing against my hand as my fingers plunge inside her. She feels so warm and tight, it drives me absolutely wild.
“That's it, baby,” I encourage her, “I need to feel your body recognize mine without thought.”
As I lean down to capture her lips once more, the intense desire I feel for her etches itself onto my face. Our tongues dance together, and my groan rumbles up from my chest as her hips buck forward to take my fingers deeper. I press my palm flat against her clit with each thrust, grinding the heel of my hand against her. My free hand moves slowly up her breast, fingers trailing over her collarbone until they reach her throat. In the mirror, I catch her gaze, her flushed skin, and feel the rapid pulse beneath my fingertips.
“More,” she mouths quietly in a moan, her voice so soft it's almost lost in the storm.
I tighten my fingers against her throat, not enough to hurt, just enough pressure to make her feel owned and claimed. With an immediate reaction, a breathy moan escapes her as her eyes flutter shut and then reopen, locking with mine in the mirror. Though I’m not a man to ever get on my knees, for her, I would.I would crawl to her.
A movement in the mirror catches my eye and there, in the reflection, Joe stands watching us, his shoulder resting on the doorframe, his arms crossed and face half-hidden in shadow and candlelight. Our eyes lock for a heartbeat before Sara's eyes meet his in the mirror too. Her breath hitches in her throat, and I see the recognition pass between them, a battle at war within her she hasn’t quite let go of, and my grip on her tightens instinctively, as my fingers keep their driving rhythm.
Joe's expression darkens as he watches my fingers coated with her wetness. There's anger there, raw and primal, but something else too. Perhaps a flash of heat, of longing that he can't quite hide and that I can’t take away from him. For a moment, we're suspended in time, a silent, inescapable hostility hanging over the woman between us.
I bite her neck and whisper in ear, “Maybe it's selfish, but I need to feel you're still mine.” I angle her face to look at me. “Not to erase your history, but to write myself into your present so deeply you would feel me in your bones. Where, no matter where you look, you can’t ever escape… me.”
