“Don’t do that. Don’t hide from me. You have scars. So do I. Do you think mine are hideous and deforming?”
Her head snapped up. “No, not at all. They’re beautiful. So beautiful.”
“All those scars on your skin are beautiful to me too. You know why?”
She shook her head, her gaze locked with his like what he was about to say meant more to her than anything in the entire world. Without even trying, she made him feel so damned… Fuck, he didn’t even have a word for it. The best he could come up with was some hybrid of special and important and adored.
“Because they’re evidence of your strength, of your ability to survive. They are badges of courage. And you know—” He placed her hand on his shoulder where the lightning had entered him and the damage was the deepest. Again he felt that rush of electricity through the network of his scars. “—we match. Life has marked us both.”
She rose on her tiptoes and kissed the spot on his shoulder before she hugged him. He didn’t need to hear her thoughts to know he’d said exactly what she’d needed to hear. Instead of hugging her, he swept her up in his arms and laid her on the bed.
He scooted in next to her and leaned down, keeping eye contact as he neared her breast for a taste. No fear in her eyes, only wanting, and then her hand on the back of his head encouraging him. She tasted sweet and warm and of something that had no name but was purely her.
She moaned and arched up, and he caressed her other breast, rolling the nipple between his fingers. She started moving, gyrating her hips, pumping and thrusting—her actions showing him what she really wanted. Which was exactly what he really needed. He slid his hand down the jut of each rib, then lower, feeling the springy softness of her hair.
Her movements became frantic.
He smiled around her nipple. “Easy, I’ll take care of you.” His hand traveled lower and lower until he found the heat of her. “Open your legs for me.”
No hesitation, she did as he asked. He slipped a finger inside. She was wet and slick and so fucking tight. He knew his dick didn’t have a brain, but he swore the thing was imagining what it would feel like when it pushed into her—or maybe that was just him doing the daydreaming. She grabbed on to his hair and yanked him to her mouth.
He swallowed her moaning, taking her voice into him, letting the sound meld into his bones. Their tongues thrust in a cadence that matched the movements of his finger.
He couldn’t wait any longer. He slid his finger from her. He shifted over her, bracing his forearms on either side of her face, needing to see for himself that she wanted this, wanted him. What he saw was himself reflected in her eyes. Saw how she trusted him, respected him, and felt complete with him.
He was there—right there—poised at her entrance. Ready. He tangled the tips of his fingers in her hair. Her hands were on his sides, sliding around to his back, her touch light, almost ticklish.
“Please.” She arched under him, pushing up closer. That was all the encouragement he needed. Slowly, he pushed into her. Jesusfuckingchrist. Every nerve ending went on the alert, then exploded with sensations. He was lost in a wild combination of tranquility, euphoria, and awakening. He felt invincible, like nothing could ever hurt him, and he’d never let anything hurt her.
He felt her stiffen, heard the hitch in her breathing and how her heart’s rhythm shifted—not in a good way.
He stilled.
“Xander?” Her voice was small, and fuck if he didn’t hear a bit of fear in there.
Underneath him, her face scrunched up with no resemblance to flushed and relaxed.
“What’s wrong?” Was that his voice? He sounded like a wounded animal.
“It hurts a little.”
A thought air-dropped into his mind. She wasn’t a virgin, was she? “Um… We probably should’ve had this conversation before we went this far”—and son of a bitch, he should be using a condom—“but you’ve done this before, right?”
A hesitant little smile hitched up the side of her mouth. “Not in real life.”
His brain must’ve been set on slow-mo—her words and their meaning took longer than they should have to register.
She was a virgin. Holy fucking Christ, she was a virgin. She was his. Completely his.
His heart went skippity-do-dah throughout his chest cavity. It was one of those things he hadn’t known he wanted until he’d been freely given the gift. “I don’t like that you are hurting, but you have no idea how happy it makes me that I am your only one.”
“You will always be my only one.” Her words were an arrow straight through all of life’s bullshit, hitting the center of her target—his heart. He wanted to say something more, to let her know that he felt the same, but couldn’t figure out how to say it right.