“The one . . . in the elevator?”
“I told you, baby,” he said, unzipping her fly, “the location was irrelevant.”
With one yank, he pulled her jeans and panties past her knees and bared her sex to him. She gasped, staring down at his black, wavy hair until he leaned back and looked up at her with stormy, starving eyes.
Using his thumbs, he parted the soft folds of her flesh, baring her clit. She fought to keep her eyes open, staring at him as she panted, her small breasts moving up and down with every shallow breath.
“You are a fucking miracle to me.”
Margaret’s neck fell back as his hot breath made contact with her sensitive, exposed flesh.
“Ahhn,” she whimpered, bracing her hands on the bed behind her and unconsciously widening her legs to give him passage and permission. She trembled as she waited, her whole body rigid and poised for that first exquisite touch of tongue to flesh.
Slowly, so slowly, his tongue lapped at her skin, pausing briefly on the distended bud of throbbing nerves. He groaned, the hum of his deep voice against her quivering flesh making her gasp, Ohgodohgod, in a shameless litany. Her fingers curled into the bedspread as he did it again and again, his tongue licking so slowly, she feared he would pause or—please, please no—stop entirely, and the anticipation made the pleasure that much stronger when his tongue started moving again, slowly loving her, until she thought she’d die from needing release, from needing him to take her all the way to heaven.
Just when she was sure she couldn’t take anymore, his tongue slid directly over her clit and paused there. She trembled with anticipation when his thumbs slid away so that his hands could cup her backside and hold her steady as he clamped his lips around her clit and sucked it into his mouth.
“Cameron!” she screamed, her whole body exploding in one huge, pulsing, quivering orgasm.
Her body twitched and convulsed, a flooding wetness between her legs warm and welcome proof that her body was Cameron’s trophy, that she was helpless of anything but total surrender. Her limp form fell back onto the bed, and she was only vaguely aware of Cameron lifting her gently into the middle of the soft duvet, and pulling her panties and jeans from her ankles.
When the mattress sagged beside her, she suddenly found herself folded in his arms, her naked breasts pulled against the hard muscles of his chest, the damp fluff between her legs pressed against the silk heat of his naked erection, his lips landing gently on her forehead.
When he spoke, his voice was a desperate whisper, taut and tender at once. “I’m not just falling for you, or crazy about you. This didn’t just sneak up on me, and while it’s better than I ever expected, it’s not as new to me as it is to you. I’m in love with you, Meggie. I fucking love you. And I don’t know how to go slow. I don’t know how to slow down. I don’t know how to do anything but love you as hard as I can for as long as I can. I tried my fucking best to be careful with you, to be cautious and patient and gentle and not to scare you away. But the truth? The truth is—”
“I love you too.”
He was silent, his chest pushing relentlessly into hers with every breath he drew. Finally he leaned back and looked into her eyes as though stricken, like he couldn’t believe what she’d just said.
“What are you . . . I mean, are you—”
“I’m in love with you too. And yes,” she said, leaning forward so that her lips brushed against his when she finished, “I’m sure.”
***
Cameron had never done things in half measures, because it wasn’t his style and, moreover, it wasn’t in his nature.
When Alex English started dating his sister? He almost killed Alex.
When Jessica needed a place to get married? He built one.
When he decided that he couldn’t shoulder C & C Winslow anymore? He sold it.
He’d never deliberated on major life decisions. He’d never lived his life cautiously.
Except with Margaret Story.
He’d fallen in love with Margaret Story when he was thirteen, and it had taken him almost twenty years to tell her. And some part of him hadn’t thought beyond the moment of telling her. Some part of him didn’t want to hope—or demand—that she requite his desperate love for her. It was enough that she let him love her. He told himself it would be enough.
So hearing the words, hearing the woman he loved so desperately assure him that her heart belonged to him?
Fuck if he couldn’t stop the tears from burning his eyes so bad, he had no choice but to close them and let his kiss tell her everything that his voice couldn’t.
When he finally trusted himself to speak, he flipped her onto her back and braced his weight on his elbows, cradling her beloved face with his hands. “How is that possible?”
“Cameron,” she said, smiling tenderly as a tear escaped from the corner of her eye, “it was always possible.”
“I want you,” he growled, overcome with emotion.