I’m sorry.
I want you.
I need you.
I might even love you.
What the fuck did those words even mean from someone like me?
I had everything I wanted here in this house. The woman of my dreams (literally). Every book I’d ever want to read. Money and privacy and anything else I could ever ask for would arrive with a simple phone call.
And yet, there were still too many secrets between us, too many things she didn’t know, too much to the point where even if she said, as she already had, that she actually wanted to be my wife, wanted to be here, wanted me for me, she still wouldn’t know what she was getting into. And that was all my fault.
I swallowed thickly, feeling like I was going to choke on the final epiphany of the night.
It didn’t matter what house I was in. Whether it was in Vegas or Seattle or Boston or Kathmandu. Home wasn’t a place for me anymore. It was wherever Laney Fisher was, and no amount of jokes or drugs or drink or fights was going to change that.
That was when I grabbed her arms, yanked her to me, and kissed her with everything I had.
Not because I wanted to.
Because I had to.
And she was just going to have to deal with it.
27
HAVE A LITTLE FAITH, BOY
LANEY
Something was definitely wrong.
All afternoon, I’d been torn up by his silence. Even more, maybe, after Simone had left, and the image of Ronan as a wounded animal had been imprinted on my mind. It hadn’t taken long for me to start wondering just when, like any dangerous animal, his cuts would turn lethal. Whether I could handle the claws he used, inadvertently or not, until he learned to sheath them properly.
Or whether I wanted to wait for that at all.
I had just managed to set aside my worries for the evening in favor of a long, luxurious bubble bath (taking a cue from Simone’s advice about self-care) when Ronan had appeared.
And just like he always managed, he had cut down every one of the walls I had resurrected with deft jokes, boyish charm, and a body that was impossible to ignore.
Honestly. Who looked like that after working in an office all day long? And had what could only be described as a perfect cock?
I mean, I wasn’t normally the type to drool over a man’s appendage, but there was something about Ronan’s. Or maybe it was just something about Ronan himself. Either way, it was simply unfair. And overwhelming.
All of which I’d been ready to tell him when I walked downstairs, fully covered and feeling about as sexual as a bathmat.
Until he’d kissed me like that.
His mouth was urgent while his hands traveled up and down my body, grabbing, kneading, desperate for purchase. There was no sign of the patient man from last night, nor was this the boyish if skilled lover whose eagerness had erased any pretension that might have marred our night in Seattle. This Ronan Black was searching for something.
Whatever it was, my body wanted to give it. Even if my mind had had questions.
“Ronan,” I murmured when we finally broke for air. “Ronan, what’s wrong? What happened?”
His only response was to try to kiss me again. I wanted to give in (and very nearly did), but at least I managed to put two hands on his chest and shove him back.
Our mouths broke with a pop, and he stared at me with a loose curl hanging over his brow, panting like a beast. His eyes, dilated to pinpoints, refocused. “I can’t do this anymore.”