“So beautiful,” he whispered. “I’ve always thought so.”
Hearing that, her overly involved heart soared with hope. “I’ve always thought you were, too. I wish you knew how often I’ve had to remind myself not to stare when you’re around.”
He looked up at her for a brief second before he kissed her.
As he kissed her, she began to unbutton his shirt, desperate for the feel of his skin against hers. When the last button sprang free, she pushed the shirt aside and pulled him down on top of her.
The contact of his chest hair against her breasts once again left them both stunned.
“God, that feels good,” he whispered gruffly.
“So good.”
“Ella . . . I’m trying to go slow and not pounce on you the first second I’m allowed to, but I . . . I really want to.”
“I do, too. I want what you want.”
“Are you sure?”
She couldn’t help but laugh at that question and the earnest way in which he asked it. “Yes, Gavin, I’m sure. I’ve been sure forever, or so it seems. I don’t remember not being sure where you’re concerned.” It was a ridiculously vulnerable statement, but she didn’t regret speaking the truth. He was her truth.
“I’m sorry I made you wait so long.”
“Are you going to make it worth the wait?”
“I really hope so.” He pushed himself up and off her and then extended a hand.
Ella tugged her gown back up over her breasts and took the hand he offered.
“Which way to your room?”
She pointed.
“We’re going to need some of these candles, I think.”
Ella picked up two of the candles she’d lit earlier. Her heart beat so hard and so fast that she worried she might pass out or hyperventilate or do some other embarrassing thing like swoon. She was taking Gavin Guthrie to bed with her, and this time she knew exactly what would happen. But surely this couldn’t really be happening. It had to be a figment of her overactive imagination.
But then his hands were on her hips and his lips on her neck as he followed her into the bedroom.
This was really happening. It was too soon, and yet nowhere near soon enough at the same time. How could it be too soon to do something she’d wanted forever? The official relationship was new. The attraction, the friendship, the spark, the love . . . None of that was new.
In fact, they’d been building to this inevitable moment since they’d kissed on the beach last summer and in every encounter since then, even if most of them hadn’t ended the way she’d wanted them to. He was it for her. She’d had no doubt about that for a long, lonely time.
No way in hell would she do anything other than exactly what she’d wanted to for ages now.
She placed the candles on the bedside table and turned to him, her breath catching in her throat at how sexy he looked with his shirt unbuttoned and hanging open, his jaw covered in the stubble she loved so much, his lips swollen from their kisses and his hair mussed from her hands.
If a more perfectly beautiful man ever existed, Ella had never met him. She took a step closer to him, laying her hands on his chest inside the shirt and feeling his heart beat every bit as rapidly as hers.
His hands framed her face, and he looked at her. “I don’t deserve you, Ella.”
“Don’t say that. You deserve to be happy.”
“You can do better.”
“I don’t want anyone else. I’ve never wanted anyone else.”
“It makes me feel lucky to hear you say that.”
“I’m glad.”
“I want you to feel lucky, too, that you took this chance on me. I don’t want to disappoint you.”
“Then don’t.”
“I’m going to try really hard not to.”
“That’s all I can ask for.”
His hands dropped from her face to her shoulders to remove her robe. It billowed to the floor, a cloud of ivory silk.