My hands tighten on her hips, drawing her closer as I capture her mouth again, pouring everything I can’t yet put into words into the kiss. The gratitude for her taking me in when I had nowhere else to go. The wonder at finding her strength matched with such tenderness. The terrifying hope that this might be the beginning rather than another ending.
Her fingers thread through mine, and she searches my face. “Come to bed with me.”
My pulse leaps, and before she can change her mind, I slide my hands beneath her thighs and stand.
“Put me down,” she protests, hands finding my shoulders for balance. “You’re going to hurt yourself.”
“Don’t care.” I pull back enough to meet her gaze.
“I care,” she murmurs, tracing the fading yellow bruise along my jaw with her fingertips. “You’re still healing.”
“You’re worth a little pain.” My hands tighten on her thighs, fighting the desire to rock her over my hardening length. “Put your legs around me, Em.”
Her pupils blow wide, her pulse quickening inher throat. My mouth finds hers again, and the kiss deepens, turning hungry and desperate, like we’ve been starving for each other.
And when her legs wrap around my waist, the ache in my ribs fades to a distant memory, replaced by a different kind of hunger.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Emily
Jared carries me to the living room, pausing at where the halls diverge in different directions with a crooked grin. “My bedroom or yours?”
The question hangs between us as he waits for me to choose. The guest room where he’s been staying as a temporary border, or the bedroom I’ve kept private from him.
“Mine,” I answer, my voice rough.
His eyes flash with surprise before darkening again with desire as he turns left, striding down the hall.
Jared’s breathing remains steady despite carrying my weight, though I catch the slight tension that hardens his jaw.
When we reach my door, he eases me down, my body sliding along his in a slow friction that leaves us both breathing harder. My hands tremble as I turn the knob, pushing the door open to a space I’ve shared with no one since moving to this cottage.
Auren always preferred his own room, forcing me to ask for permission to enter. I’d kept my own room barren after that, a quiet punishment for it never being the place he wanted.
But after he left, I began reclaiming it, shaping it into something that felt like mine. Now, the afternoon light filters through gauzy curtains, washing everything in golden hues. My bed sits along the far wall, neatly arranged with the quilt I pieced together during those first lonely months after Auren.
Jared steps in behind me, hands finding my waist again, turning me toward him. His fingers slip beneath the hem of my shirt, palms flat on my stomach as he backs me toward the bed.
“Too many clothes,” he murmurs, tugging at the fabric.
I raise my arms, allowing him to strip the shirt over my head. The cool air prickles across my skin, and I fight the urge to cover myself. His gazetravels over me, drinking in the sight of my sports bra and the curves it contains.
“Your turn.” I reach for the buttons of his shirt to finish what I started in the kitchen with unsteady fingers.
Each button reveals more of his torso, the golden skin marred by the fading reminders of his attack. Yellowing bruises spread across his ribs in abstract patterns, though he’d stopped wearing the binder since the last time I saw him bare.
My throat tightens as I push the fabric from his shoulders, letting it fall to the floor behind him.
I trace the outline of the largest bruise with light fingers. “Does it hurt?”
“Not anymore.” He catches my hand, bringing it to his lips. “Not when you touch me like that.”
I lean forward, replacing my fingers with my mouth. My lips brush the discolored skin in a whisper-soft kiss, and Jared sucks in a shaky breath above me. I move to the next bruise, and the next, mapping the evidence of what he endured with gentle attention.
His hands tangle in my short hair, cupping the back of my skull as I work my way across his torso. When I straighten, his expression holds a vulnerability that matches the pulse racing beneath his skin.
My fingers find the button of his jeans next, and he mirrors the action on mine. We shed the rest of our clothes in a feverish rush, hands fumbling with zippers and waistbands until nothing separates us.