I sensed the exact moment the grief released its grip on her. Not gone, but simply spent. Her sobs quieted into slow, exhausted breaths that came warm and uneven against my throat.
She didn’t pull away.
Her fingers were still tangled in my shirt, but the desperation had faded. The grip had changed, softer now. One fingertip traced along the edge of a button, slow, absent.
My pulse kicked hard beneath her palm, and I should have said something. Should have set a line. Reminded both of us that this was comfort, nothing else, that she was grieving and exhausted and not thinking clearly, and I had no right to feel what I was feeling right now.
Instead, my hand shifted at her waist, enough that my thumb found the narrow strip of bare skin where her shirt had ridden up.
Warm. Soft. Real.
She sucked in a small breath.
We both froze, almost afraid to move; then she did.
A slight shift of her hips. Tentative, but deliberate. Enough to settle herself more fully against me, so that the soft, warm center of her pressed down against a hardness I could no longer pretend away.
I exhaled through my nose. My jaw locked.
“Sloane.”
My voice came out low. Wrecked. Nothing like the way I usually said her name.
She lifted her head slowly.
Her eyes were red-rimmed, lashes still wet, her face swollen from crying. But they were clear now, focused entirely on me.
She didn’t speak, merely looked at me.
And whatever she saw there—whatever she read in my face that I’d spent so long masking—made her eyes widen.
Her hand slid up from my chest, along the side of my neck. Her fingers were cool against my skin, which seemed like it was burning from the inside out. Her thumb traced the edge of my jaw, her fingers grazing my stubble.
I caught her wrist, holding her still.
“You don’t know what you’re asking for,” I said.
Her lips parted. Wet, her tongue darted out as if nervous.
“I think I do.”
I searched her face; grief was still there—raw, open. But underneath it was something else, something I recognized because I’d been pushing it down for years.
Need, hot and persistent desire.
I let go of her wrist.
Her hand continued up into my hair. Her fingers curled and tugged lightly.
A groan pulled out of me, low and involuntary, from somewhere deep in my chest.
That sound broke something in her; she leaned forward and kissed me.
Her teeth sank into my bottom lip—sharp enough to draw blood—and something feral loosened in my chest. A growl, low and guttural, poured straight into her mouth.
I fisted her hair and pulled back. Hard. Her throat arched, exposed, vulnerable, and I crushed my mouth to hers—deeper, meaner, taking everything she offered and demanding more. Salt and grief and raw, desperate need bled between our tongues.
My fingers raked down her back, dragging her body flush against mine with bruising force. Every inch of her pressed to every inch of me, and it still wasn’t close enough.