Irish changed the pace. Still just as deliberate, but with an added urgency. Soft grunts came from the back of his throat with every thrust. Her breaths mixed with moans. Fingernails dug into the hard muscles of his back.
Kat’s vision started to blur. She was almost certainly suffering from sensory overload. No human could possibly take this immense amount of pleasure and survive. But he showed no signs of slowing, no signs of stopping. She was a goner. There was nothing for her to do but ride the wave and pray she washed up on land somewhat intact.
Having had two orgasms only minutes earlier, she recognized standing at the precipice of another. Only this time all she could do was look over the edge. Something held her back from achieving that explosion of perfect release and the serene fall back to earth. And the longer she stood at the edge, the more the line between pleasure and pain blurred.
“Goddamn, I’m close. I can’t hold back anymore, Kat. I need to feel you come around me.”
“I can’t,” she said. “It won’t work.”
“Hell, yes, it will.”
Reaching between them as he continued pumping inside her, he found her clit with the rough pad of his thumb and rubbed.
“Irish!” Her hips jerked hard as a current of vibrations blazed straight up her center.
“Aiden.”
“What?”
“My name is Aiden,” he growled as he pushed into her again. “Say it, Kat.”
Aiden Murphy O’Brien. He gave me his whole name.
And he wants to hear it from my lips.
Something new swelled inside her in the vicinity of her heart, but she’d have to process that later. Every available brain cell had been taken hostage for the myriad of sensations firing through every nerve, every cell in her body.
“Oh, God, yes,” she cried. “Aiden!”
His muscles tensed, becoming smooth skin over stone, as he buried himself to the hilt one last time and succumbed to his release. He pressed on her swollen bud and she followed him happily into the ether.
In the minutes that followed, Kat was vaguely aware of him saying he’d be right back. All she could do was lie boneless on the mattress. If her life depended on her running or even standing at this point, she’d be a dead woman.
Irish knelt down next to her—wearing his damn jeans again—and helped her into his gigantic T-shirt. His scent comforted her almost as much as he did. Closing her eyes, she lifted the soft cotton to her nose and breathed in deep.
“Take it easy or you’ll need a lint trap up there.” Lying next to her, he pulled her into his strong arms. He kissed her on the top of her head, ruffling her hair when he spoke. “Everything okay?”
Kat sighed and nestled herself farther into his embrace. “Everything is perfect.” Tipping her head up to catch his gaze, she said, “Thank you…Aiden.”
She watched him swallow thickly, then offer a hint of a grin. “It was entirely my pleasure, kitten. Now get some shut-eye.”
Just as she tucked her head on his shoulder, Murphy climbed onto Irish’s chest and curled himself into a tiny ball where their bodies pressed together. She laughed when he grumbled, “You’re lucky I’m in a good mood, fur ball.”
And with that, Kat awarded that moment as the happiest she’d been her entire life.
Chapter Thirteen
He was covered in sweat and smears of blood and not all of it belonged to him. His right eye had started to swell and the cut on his lip from the week before had been reopened. The invisible injuries, like the one over his left rib cage and the one on the inside of his right calf, would turn shades of purple later. And yet he barely felt any of it. Not yet. Not while the rush of adrenaline coursed through his veins and fueled his muscles. Not while he still had a job to do.
The crowd’s deafening cheers echoed in the old arena, but like the pain, the sound was diluted, nothing more than a muffled din in the back of Aiden’s mind. A fighter couldn’t afford distractions. A fighter was trained to focus all his senses on his opponent while keeping his ears open just enough to hear instructions from his corner. Everything else was a blur, like a lens out of focus.
When it was done right, every part of a fighter’s mind and body worked together to accomplish a single goal: win.
The air horn blast sliced through the roars, signaling the end of the second round. The ref broke apart Aiden and the other fighter known as Bulldog and sent them to their corners in the black octagonal cage. Breathing heavily, Aiden dropped his ass onto the stool and accepted the bottle Xander offered him. He took out his mouth guard and squeezed some water into his mouth. He swished, turned his head to the side, and spit it onto the mat. The next squeeze he greedily swallowed.
Xan had fought earlier. He had a gash over his left eye and a swollen jaw, but that was nothing compared to what the other guy looked like. Xan had passed to the next round and would be fighting in a week. Now Aiden had to do the same thing or else—