Outwardly Rhys appeared as calm and controlled as ever as he took my hand and led me across the residents’ car park towards his home. But he’d had to jog back to the car to switch off theheadlights he’d accidentally left on and had needed three attempts to key in the correct passcode to access the building.
‘I’ve never been this nervous,’ Rhys confessed as we waited for the lift to join us in the foyer. ‘Not even back when I didn’t know what I was doing.’
‘It feels different,’ I said, so quietly I wasn’t even sure he had heard me.
His eyes met mine and there was a fire burning in them that made the breath catch in my throat.
We held out longer than I thought we would. We waited until the doors of the lift had slid to a close before we let the flames consume us. We came together like magnets and his mouth hungrily sought mine, his tongue searching and finding its mate. I pressed up against him, moulding my body to his as his hands gripped my hips, holding me against him in a way that told me exactly how much he wanted me.
He stole the gasp I gave, smuggling it into his mouth as though it was treasure that was his for the taking. Which it was. All of me was.
There was too much of everything. Too many floors to reach his flat, too many steps from the lift to his front door. Too many items to be discarded: his keys, my bag, our shoes. And there were way too many clothes on his body and too many fiddly clasps on mine. I groaned as he kissed me, greedy and impatient for the feel of his skin on mine.
‘We should slow this down,’ Rhys said, his voice a feral growl.
‘No,’ I said as my fingers released the second and then the third button of his shirt. ‘We can do slow later.’ I pressed a kiss on every inch of chest that I exposed, revelling when I felt the pounding of his heart beneath my lips.
He shuddered when I trailed the tip of my tongue down his torso and tried to stop me from going lower, but I resisted the tugas he tried to bring me back to his mouth. Instead, I allowed my knees to do what they’d been in danger of doing since the moment we’d arrived and buckle beneath me.
‘Ellie,’ Rhys ground out, his voice half warning me to stop, half urging me onwards. His fingers threaded through my hair. Was he holding me there, or hanging on for dear life? I was beyond knowing or caring.
We hadn’t made it to his bedroom and were still only in the hallway. The light was dim, coming from a single table lamp he’d left burning, but it was bright enough for me to see the look on his face as my hands went to his zip.
I looked up at him and could no longer tell if the trembling I felt came from him or me. It didn’t matter because we were just moments away from being one, and nothing had ever felt so good, so right.
The sound of the zip sliding down was lost beneath his moan. He tightened his fingers in the long strands of my hair, winding the auburn curls around them. He said my name like it was a prayer and it was all I could do not to cry.
‘You said you wouldn’t take me to bed even if I was down on my knees begging you,’ I reminded him, my voice a husky replica of the one I usually used. ‘Well, I’m on my knees now. And I’m begging you. I really hope you’ve changed your mind. Please, Rhys, let me do this.’
His silent nod was all the permission I needed. Later he would take the lead – I knew that, and I didn’t doubt for a minute that he would show me a whole new level of pleasure. But this was him at his most vulnerable, most open, allowing me to take control. And as my lips found him and he pressed into me, I knew beyond all doubt that I was ruined for anyone else.
Chapter Thirty
It could have been the morning sunlight that woke me, because no one had spared a thought to closing the shutters when we’d moved from the hallway to his bed. But it was more likely to be the lazy passage of his finger travelling slowly down my spine and then detouring for a pit stop on my hip bone. I smiled into his pillow, which smelled deliciously of him and which I might try to smuggle out of his flat. One night: that was all it had taken for me to become so addicted to Rhys that I was already worrying about how to cope with separation.
I rolled over onto my back, unencumbered by the sheets that were still tangled in a ball by our feet.
I smiled up into the face that was looking down at me with an expression so open, so tender, that I wanted to photograph it and save it forever.
‘I woke you,’ he said, trying to sound regretful but failing miserably.
‘It’s a nice way to start the day,’ I said, my voice low.
The finger left my hip and journeyed north, skating over every rib it passed and then pausing as it reached the underside of my breast. I drew in a sharp breath.
‘I can think of a better way,’ Rhys said, his fingers travelling upwards over the soft curve and finding my nipple, which was already erect and waiting for him.
‘Again?’ I teased softly, seconds before his mouth silenced me with a long, slow kiss.
‘I can’t seem to get enough of you,’ he said, biting gently on my lower lip. ‘It could be quite a problem.’
I ran my hands down his back and gripped his hips, pulling him closer.
‘No problem here.’
Much later, sated and sleepy, I burrowed my face into the hollow of his shoulder, trying to stifle a yawn, but he saw it and smiled.
‘Tired or bored?’