“Are you finished?”
She blinked.
“Close your eyes.” I leaned her head back under the spray and rinsed her hair. Then I pulled her back to me and brushed the water from her face. “Listen very carefully,” I commanded. “Because I’m only going to say this once.”
Biting her lip again, she nodded.
“We’re both going to let this go. We’re alive. We’re together. Abernathy doesn’t get any more head space from either one of us, and neither does the past. Understand?”
Inhaling deeply, keeping her eyes on me and her hands on my arms, she nodded. “Okay.”
“Good.” I reached behind her and shut off the water. Then I grabbed a towel and wrapped it around her.
Looking small and exhausted and unsure, her eyes searched mine. “Are you sure we’re okay?”
I grabbed a towel for myself, but I didn’t answer.
No words were going to reassure her. This wasn’t about the past anymore, or unspoken reassurances or outdated apologies. This was about commitment, and there was only one way to show her that.
My eyes on hers, I dropped my towel. Then I pulled hers away.
She sucked in a sharp breath and made to cross her arms over her breasts, but stopped herself.
Dropping to one knee, keeping my eyes on hers, I inhaled the scent of her desire then I kissed her sweet cunt.
A shiver ran up her body and her hands landed on my shoulders. Looking down at me with trust, but also with insecurity, she spread her legs.
Her show of submission like a straight shot of adrenaline to my system, I tongued her clit.
Her eyes fluttered shut and I slid a finger inside to test her wetness, but I didn’t need to. She was already soaked for me.
Reluctant to take my mouth off her just yet, I forced myself to anyway, because this wasn’t about dominance right now.
Standing to my full height and picking her up, I issued a command. “Legs around my waist, arms around my neck and eyes on me.”
No hesitation, she complied.
I carried her to the bed, except I didn’t set her down. I stood there with our bodies touching but not connected, and I held her gaze.
Then I let her see me.
Every wasted year, every woman after her, every mistake I ever made, including the biggest one. I let my Songbird see it all, then I gave her the truth of my conviction.
“You were always mine, but I didn’t fight for you like I should have.” Holding the back of her thighs, I lowered her to my cock and pushed an inch in to her tight heat. “I’m never…” I drove in another inch. “… Ever.” I thrust deeper. “Going to let that happen again.” I sunk to the hilt and bottomed out against her. “I own you, and you own me, Songbird.”
“Ronan.”
I slammed my mouth over hers and dropped us to the bed. Driving my tongue into her heat and my cock into her cunt, I showed her that I was sure. So goddamn sure, there wasn’t an inch of space, or ounce of uncertainty between us.
Pulling back from her mouth, but not her tight heat, I leveraged myself above her and ground my hips. “What are you supposed to tell me?” It wasn’t a question, it was a demand. One I made her promise earlier.
Her gorgeous eyes hooded, her body bending to my will, her tight cunt already spasming around me, she didn’t hesitate. “I love you, Ronan Conlon.”
I gave her the words back. “I love you more, Songbird.”
Then I fucked my angel and showed her how she was mine.
Standing just offstage with a fucking lanyard around my neck and no goddamn gun, I wanted to kill every motherfucker screaming her name.
But I especially wanted to kill her manager, her agent and her useless head of security. This whole damn shitshow backstage was a blink away from complete chaos, and I had no idea how she’d been doing this for ten years.
Two minutes ago she was in her dressing room, both of her assistants talking at her, her manager repeatedly telling her to make the show her best, and her agent, drunk off his ass, was telling the manager to shut up because his queen would perform her ass off.
Then there was the parade of wardrobe people, dancers and band members who went in out of her dressing room like it was ground zero with no regard for her privacy, safety or personal space.
And my Songbird?
She smiled through the whole damn thing as she sipped some honey-lemon tea concoction and did her makeup.
Her agent was right about one thing.
She was a queen.
A goddamn patient, rockstar, gorgeous queen.
But she sure as hell wasn’t his.
She was mine.
And she was quietly standing next to me, nerves of steel, calmly holding my hand and awaiting her cue.
I didn’t know if I should tell her I was going to fuck her, marry her, or run away with her.
I was leaning toward all three when a guy in a headset carrying a laptop who looked like he was fucking twelve came up behind us and grinned at her. “Thirty seconds, babe. You know the drill.”
She smiled politely. “Thank you, Wynn.”
Of course she called him by name. She knew everybody’s name. All two hundred of them.
I leaned to her ear. “Do you remember what I did to you on the plane?”
She shivered, and the corner of her mouth tipped up. “Yes.”
“I’m going to do that to you the entire flight home,” I promised.
She opened her sweet mouth to respond, but the lights in the stadium went out, and the crowd went fucking insane. Chanting her name, yelling, screaming—the vibrations rocked the floor.
Then the lighting engineers lit the stage with deep red and purple spotlights, highlighting the band, and the crowd screamed louder.
Wynn leaned between us and yelled over the noise. “Fifteen seconds.”
I cupped her face. “You’re fucking beautiful, and I’m proud of you.”
The band played the first notes of one of her most popular songs, and the noise from the crowd compounded.
Grinning from ear to ear, Wynn handed her a microphone and nodded.
Excitement in her eyes, my Songbird looked at me and mouthed, I love you.
“I own you.” I squeezed her hand.
Then the microphone was to her lips, and she was strutting on stage in a sheer white dress and sky-high heels, singing the first line of her song and fucking killing it.
A hand landed on my shoulder, but I didn’t take my eyes off her. I couldn’t.
“Told you she was a queen,” her agent said, loud enough for me to hear.
I spared the prick a single glance and fucking glared at him. “She’s my queen.”
He laughed, then drank from his flask.
I watched my Songbird sing her heart out.
A shadow fell over me a second before the tip of his finger skimmed from hip bone to hip bone.
Gooseflesh rippled across my heated skin, and my nipples tightened to hard points. “Please don’t stop,” I begged.
His voice, dark and seductive and hotter than the sun whispered across my skin. “Did I give you permission to go topless?” His breath touching my neck, his mouth hovered just above my ear.
“No,” I answered, deliciously aware of what my defiance would mean when he was in this kind of mood.
Swift and firm, his rough hand covered my throat. “Are you asking to be punished, Songbird?”