“I’ll earn it back.” He sprinkles kisses over my cheeks, his fingers creeping into the hair at my nape to draw me closer. “Give me the chance to earn it back, baby.”
“But you can’t control me, Rhys.” I allow myself a quick kiss before finishing my point. “Love isn’t control.”
“You’re right. I’ve got control issues.” He sucks my bottom lip between his like he can’t help himself before he goes on. “I’ll work on ‘em. I swear.”
“Yes, but . . .” I pull his top lip between mine, sucking and groaning into the contact I’ve missed so much. “We need to—”
“We’re doing what we need to do.”
He fuses our lips together, stoking the passion higher with every second we touch. It’s even better than I remember, kissing him. His tongue brushes inside my jaw, over my teeth, licking the roof. Repossessing me with every stroke. I taste his desperation, his regret. I know he must taste my forgiveness because I can’t hold it back. It rushes up to meet him, burning my throat and streaking tears down my face.
“I’m so sorry I hurt you.” His voice wavers as he wets his lips with my tears. “I won’t do it again. I promise. Not like that.”
“I want to believe you.” I slide my fingers into the cool, silky hair.
“Then believe me. I miss you so fucking much, Kai,” he breathes the words over my neck. “I need . . . I have to . . . baby . . .”
He gives up on words, pressing me back onto the soft hay. He dips his nose into the shallow cleft barely visible between my breasts, inhaling.
“Pear and cinnamon,” he whispers, continuing down my torso, past my waist. His hands slide the dress up my legs, and I’m already gasping just from his palms caressing behind my knees. His head disappears under my dress. He pushes my panties aside, and his lips close over me. My back arches up, pressing my breasts into the air like an offering. He slides the panties off altogether, pulling my legs over his shoulders. He nibbles at the lips, separating me with his tongue. Spreading his mouth over me as his hands traverse the backs of my thighs to grip my bare butt, pulling me into his hunger.
“This is mine,” he says hotly against the wet flesh. “And I’m yours, Kai. Nothing changes that. Ever. You know that, right?”
“I know,” I pant, twisting the tablecloth beneath us between my fingers, gale force pleasure ripping through me. “Oh, God. I know.”
He keeps worshiping me with his lips and tongue until my legs spasm, my body stiffening with the intensity of it. My fingers twine in his thick hair, trapping him against me, pushing him deeper into me. My hips rock into his urgent kisses. He’s eating me like I’m so good, his moans vibrating against me, layering sensation on top of sensation until I’m nothing more than a wave beautifully cresting, violently crashing; a tide pulled in, licking at the sand. I’m limp and sated, arms fallen to my sides, head lolling back, drained of all movement, but he’s still tasting me like he can’t stop, his lips and tongue warm and compulsive.
Steps below startle us, still us.
“Rhys,” Grip calls up. “It’s almost time. They’re leaving soon.”
From between my knees, Rhyson’s eyes burn a possessive trail up my body and to my face, his hands venturing over the sensitized skin of my inner thighs as he presses me open wider. He looks between my legs like he wants more. Like I’m something sweet in the store window he’s not sure he can walk past.
“Okay,” he calls down, voice hoarse. “Be down in a minute.”
Grip chuckles from below.
“Wrap that shit up and get back out there before you miss the send off.”
As I slip my panties on, I can’t even manage embarrassment that Grip knows. The love, the tenderness in Rhyson’s eyes, in his touch as he pulls me to my feet, crowd out everything else until we reach the floor below. As soon as my feet touch the barn floor, all the reasons I have to slow this down, to control it, come rushing back, chief among them a sex tape I can’t risk Rhsyon seeing. Maybe San is right. Maybe Rhyson can get past it. Or maybe he can’t, and he’d never see me the same again. And the thought of losing this, the way he’s looking at me right now, isn’t worth the risk. If there’s one thing I’ve seen for myself, one thing I learned from my father, even in a love this deep, there are no guarantees.
My back to the ladder, I tighten my fingers around his, pulling him in for a moment to face me. He stands on one foot and rests the other on a rung of the ladder behind me, pressing into my belly, so I can’t escape feeling him hard and long and ready.
“Come home with me,” he whispers near my ear, one hand above our heads on the ladder, the other wandering beneath my dress to squeeze my butt. Just that gentle squeeze has me clenching again in my panties. With reason my only weapon, I fight my way back through the fog.
“Rhyson, we need to talk about how this will be.”
He drops his lips to mine, feeding the scent of my body to me in light kisses.