The strings that bound him to Kinsey strengthened, tightened as they shared their bodies. The future crystalized before him, and he knew Kinsey had to be a part of it.
She’d softened toward him already, but Ryder knew it still wasn’t enough. He was going to have to prove himself in a big way. Then spend the rest of eternity making up for being the fool who’d walked away from her and the love they shared.
Ryder groaned aloud when she cupped his sac, rolling his balls in her hand. He pulled out of her mouth and tugged her to her feet.
Then he had her against the wall, one hand hooked beneath a knee as he slid inside her. Kinsey’s eyes went wide as he filled her.
There was no need for words. Their hands and lips—their bodies—said everything. The beauty of their lovemaking, the deep connection it wrought, couldn’t be denied by either of them.
And as he looked into Kinsey’s violet eyes, she knew it as well. Whatever walls she’d kept erected around her heart the previous night were coming down, one by one.
Ryder could feel it, sense it. He didn’t bust through them, but instead opted to let them fall when she wanted. Three years ago she began to love him not knowing the real him. Now she knew—everything.
This time her decision would be based on all the facts.
Their gazes were locked as he began to move his hips in long, hard thrusts. Ryder felt his love for her growing, encompassing every inch of him.
He’d left Glasgow without ever telling her. He wasn’t going to make that mistake again.
“I love you.”
Her lips parted, her gaze searching his to see if he spoke the truth. Ryder was done hiding anything from Kinsey. He wanted her to know every part of him—the good, the bad, and the ugly. She was the only one for him, the only one he could ever see himself standing with.
Ryder didn’t expect her to respond, nor did he let her. He increased his rhythm, pushing her toward her climax. He needed to hear her scream of pleasure, to know that he gave her fulfillment.
He held her close, heart to heart. She was his life, his very breath.
Her fingers dug into his scalp and her breath hitched a moment before he felt her clench around him. She moaned, her eyes falling shut as the climax swept over her.
Ryder watched the pleasure cross her face, the ecstasy and delight that pulled her lips into a small smile that made his gut clench.
His arms held her as she sagged against him. He bent and grasped her other leg, keeping himself deep inside her as he walked to the chair.
He then sat, his hands moving to her hips. Kinsey dropped her head back, her lips open in a soft sigh. With her hands on his shoulders, she began to move her hips.
His balls tightened when she rolled her head from one shoulder to the other before straightening. Then her eyes slowly opened, the seductive glint in her violet depths making his heart beat faster.
Only Kinsey made him feel this way. Millions of years, and a single woman moved him as no one else ever had—or even came close.
The moonlight streamed through the window over her. Ryder caressed a hand up her back as she rotated her hips. As if she knew she held him in thrall, she pushed him back when he attempted to rise up for a kiss.
She then reached up and pulled her hair free of the ponytail that was half-fallen. He groaned as she shook out her long dark locks.
All the while she continued to move her hips, keeping him at the edge of a climax.
To his delight she ran her hands down her chest, pausing to cup her breasts and pinch her nipples. Ryder sucked in a breath when the tiny buds hardened.
Did she have any idea how sexy she was? How she kept him teetering on a climax with little effort?
Ryder followed her hands as they continued down her front to where their bodies met. She caressed her swollen clit and moaned.
And it was more than he could take.
In a split second he had her on her back on the floor as he pounded into her body, the need to claim her body and heart burning fiercely within him.
She met his thrusts, urging him onward. And when he drove so deep inside her that he touched her womb, she held him tight as he climaxed.
*
Rhi stared in silence at the piece of paper on the table in front of her. Just as Balladyn had said, it took them going through over sixty books, gathering the clues and pieces together.
The only hiccup came with some of the older texts that were faded too badly to make out. Not even magic fixed them. Those were the parts Balladyn had guessed at, and she agreed with his assumptions.
Then there were the books in an ancient Fae language that hadn’t been used in eons. Rhi understood only a word or two out of an entire paragraph. Balladyn, at least, knew a little more than she, enough to put things together.
It hadn’t taken much to place the words in the correct order. Even as she read them a fourth time, it still sent a shiver over her.