Page 68 of Fallen Crown

A hint of a smile touches her lips, and I grab a bandage from the first aid kit, trying to keep the contents from getting too wet. I wrap it around the slice on her finger.

“Thanks for coming back for me,” she says.

“I’d never willingly leave you behind,” I say, and I take the tube and tire from her, and I slot it in as though I’ve done it many times before. And I have—too many. Jag and I spent a whole afternoon taking tires apart and putting them back together after Maren mocked me for my lack of perseverance.

“I’ve been blowing a little hot and cold on you, huh?”

Her comment catches me by surprise, and I let out a snort. “A bit?”

“We can label whatever we do in front of the camera as a fling or a rebound or whatever.” She takes a deep breath. “I think I just—I just.” She huffs out a breath. “I mean, do you actually care about me? You’re fire and ice with me too. One minute I think you might have some sort of feelings toward me, and the next minute, I feel like I could be any woman anywhere.”

“Can you handle the truth, Tucker?” Can I? We run forward and retreat on each other all the time, but I don’t want to do that anymore. If she’s done with her husband—if I can convince her to be completely and forever done with him—then there are things I’d want to have with her. Labeling those half-baked ideas seems impossible, but they’re there, in the back of my mind, percolating. I remember staring at Grace and picturing a baby with dark hair and pale-blue eyes.

I finish the tire, and when I glance at her, there are tears in her eyes. The sight causes a twinge of hesitation in me over whether I should be completely honest. I’m not sure why she’d crying. We can’t keep dancing around each other, and I’ve got nothing but my pride to lose by confessing.

“I don’t know if I can handle it,” she says. “But tell me anyway.”

“I meant what I said in my room the night my father died. You are my most favorite person in the world. There is no one else I’d rather spend time with. Truly. Not a line, not a joke. The complete truth.” The rain has soaked through our clothing, and I’ll probably wish I’d worn better layers. “I don’t want to run hot and cold with each other anymore. I want to let the fire burn.”

She runs her thumb along my cheekbone, but I can’t read her expression. I’m throwing myself out into the void, and I have no idea if she’ll meet me there. But I won’t keep doing this back-and-forth with her. I want what I want, and if I can have her, I’m damn well going to take this slice of happiness.

“What do you want?” I ask.

Chapter Thirty

Maren

Whatever is between us can burn until it burns out. Hot and fierce and out of control. But I don’t say that. Coherent thoughts are impossible when he’s looking at me as though he wants to lap me up. Instead, I kiss him. The bike tools fall out of his hands and plop into the mud. Brice grabs my ass, dragging me up his body while he rises to his feet, so my legs are wrapped around his waist. My hands are in his soaked hair, and just like last time, I’m completely lost in him.

An earthquake could hit, and I’m not sure I’d notice. Was kissing always this good? Unlike last time, his kisses quickly turn from frantic to sensual and slow, as though we’ve got all the time in the world. His tongue slides into my mouth, and I tighten my legs around his waist. I wish we were anywhere but on a muddy dirt road in the middle of Fiji. Everything in me is yearning to be closer, to shed my wet clothes and rip off his, and live in this moment forever.

Earlier when he said he was only fling material, my chest ached. It shouldn’t have. I only decided to end my marriage a few days ago. Something brief should be exactly what I want, and maybe it’s what I need. No strings. No attachments. Even if he wanted something more serious, I can’t give him the one thing he’s already told me is of the utmost importance. It’s presumptuous to think he’d want a baby with me, but I can’t help going there as he backs me up against a tree, under the cover of a denser canopy, and grinds against me. The desire to be with him overwhelms me, knocking out all logical sense.

How risky would it be to let him fuck me here in the middle of an adventure race being streamed by an international conglomerate? I wish I cared. All I can think about is getting him naked, feeling every inch of him against me, inside me, racing toward a different kind of finish line.

“How fast can you be?” I gasp.

“Tell me you did not ask me that, Tucker.” He chuckles against my neck. “Aren’t you the same person who told me passion is overrated, once?”

“That was Maren,” I say, and I try to steer his lips back to mine. I’m only sort of joking. Over the last few months, I’ve come to see Brice’s point. Maren is guarded and prickly around him, but Tucker—she’s the part of me my mother claims is wild at heart. The risk-taker, and God knows, Brice is a risk.

My admission that he’s right about me being two people sets off another laugh from him, and when our gazes connect, so much warmth floods me that it’s hard to think straight. He’s such a beautiful man, and right now, the way he’s looking at me, it feels like I’m precious, irreplaceable. I’m not sure anyone has ever looked at me with quite so much reverence.

Brice is cut in two like me—the happy-go-lucky guy who couldn’t care less about most things and the man who’s staring at me now as though there is truly nowhere else he’d rather be.

The mix of silly and serious is far more appealing than I ever gave him credit for. I don’t wonder anymore how women have been sucked into his orbit over and over again. The pull is magnetic, impossible to deny, a curved path that keeps leading them back to him. And here I am, not repelled, just as caught up in his gravitational field.

He runs his fingertip over my brow and down the side of my face before giving me a gentle kiss. “I want you, Tucker.” To emphasize his point, he brushes his hard length against me. “But not in a rush against a tree.” Then a slow smile spreads across his face. “At least not the first time.” He nuzzles my nose with his, and then he kisses me again.

We kiss a thousand different ways. Softly, deeply, tongues dipping in, half smiles on our faces, and with a mixture of tenderness and passion that makes everything in me ache for more. I haven’t spent this much time kissing someone in years.

“You,” Brice says, digging his hands under my ass to keep me up. “Are.” He tilts his head to the side to skim his lips across mine. “An excellent.” And he brushes another kiss against my temple. “Kisser.” He breathes heavy in my ear. “And if we don’t stop, I’m going to come in my shorts.”

“If it makes you feel better,” I say, “I came ten minutes ago.”

He nibbles my earlobe and then slowly lowers my legs but keeps me pinned between him and the tree. “Unless you came while watching me change the bike tire, you’re a liar.”

“It was incredibly sexy,” I say. “A man who can rise to a challenge is a beautiful thing.” His diligence with training and learning new skills has been impressive.