He whips the shirt over my head, discarding the material a heartbeat later. My bra follows next.
Silence steals over our small corner of the world, until there’s only the gentle trickle of the stream and the birds waking in the trees, and the harsh sound of Saxon’s pained groan when he spies the new, finger-length scar that descends like a line drawn in the sand between my breasts. The stitches will come out soon, but not yet.
I lick my lips. “Looks like you’re not the only one with visible scars now.”
It’s a modest attempt at humor, as ill-timed as the rest of my jokes. But Saxon barely gives me the chance to crack another because his lips descend on mine, urgent yet confident. Palm hovering over my scar, he doesn’t touch me directly. But he waits, lingers, then ducks down to kiss my collarbone.
I breathe out his name.
He places another kiss a millimeter north. And his eyes never leave my face. “I see you, sweetheart. The scars you bear, inside and out. Just like you see mine.”
My mouth trembles as I soak in his frame. “Broken,” I whisper, tracing the raised, hardened flesh beneath his arm, down his left side, “ruined.”
Dragging my knickers down the length of my legs, Saxon shakes his head. “Beautiful. Brave. Fierce.” Stripping off his joggers, he lowers me down to the grass, using my shirt as a blanket, before lining up his cock with my core. Instantly my toes curl, spine arching as his thick crown slips through my wetness. “You pieced me back together, Isla. You saw the broken and misshapen parts of me, and you filled them with warmth. You made me want.”
On the final word, he thrusts home.
A cry spills from my mouth, and I move my hands to clutch his powerful arms.
“And to a man like me,” he growls, gliding his hips in a sensual rhythm that has me straining for more, “wanting is a dangerous thing. It made me curious.” Gathering my wrists in his hands, he pins them above my ahead. Holds them there while his gaze holds mine and that rhythm . . . God, I feel it in my toes. So good, so good. “It made me desperate. And the wanting, it led to more. It led to love. Christ, I love you.”
Love. Love. Love.
His gruff admission tears through me, burrowing so deep within my veins that there’s no telling where I begin and he ends. Fate. Destiny. “Say it again.”
“I love you,” he grunts, “my only, Isla. You’re my only.”
I throw my head back, even as I loop one leg around his waist.
We’re in the middle of the estate, the early morning chill rapidly warming under the weight of Saxon’s frame. Anyone can see us, hear us, find us, but instead of panicking, I bathe in the moment. The sun kissing my naked skin. The stream gently lapping at the grassy bank. Saxon’s groans as he winds us both higher, tighter.
The fact that he loves me.
I wrestle against his hold, fighting off the urge to last longer before my orgasm claims me, but his green eyes darken and his fingers don’t release their cage around my wrists. “Say it back, sweetheart. Say it back.”
“I love you.”
His strokes plunge deeper, hitting harder, rougher.
“I love you.”
He groans deep in his chest, a sound so tangible, I swear I can feel it between my legs.
“I love you.”
With little fanfare, his tongue thrusts inside my mouth, much the same way that his cock grinds against my core. The kiss is a duel, a power struggle of love and lust and adoration, and I live for every second of it. I nip his upper lip, fearlessly, and he moans against my lips, his thrusts gaining speed.
Sparks ignite down my spine and I whimper into his mouth.
He jerks back, releasing my wrists, and grabs hold of my hips. Fingers digging in hard enough to leave bruises, his abdominal muscles rippling. His dark stubble nearly disguises the curve of his upper lip, and when he throws his head back, his teeth bared, all I know is love.
This man has saved me.
This man has fucked me.
But this man, this one right here, has given me something that he’s showed no one else: all-encompassing trust.
I find his hands with mine, linking our fingers together.
“Fuck,” he grunts, “you feel good.”
He angles his hips, propping one hand up by my shoulder, and that’s all the prompting I need. I come, with his name on my lips like a prayer—penance. “I love you,” I whisper, as my orgasm tears through me.
Pale eyes bear down on me. “Again,” he orders, finding my clit with his fingers. He rubs in a tight circle, drawing the sensations out, determined to make me scream.
A moan wrenches from my throat, and then I give him the words again: “I love you.”
He orgasms with a roar, coming so hard that his shoulders tremble and his beautiful green eyes slam shut.
A man unraveled. A man undone.
Because of me.
Only once we’ve come down from the high do I brush my hand over the crown of his head. “Do you have something to tell me?”
Saxon’s fingers trace over my chest, tracing the shape of my breast before dipping down between my legs. “You won’t be working for Holyrood, in case that’s what you were wondering. It was a noble sacrifice, I’ll give you that. But if you even think for one minute that I’ll let you surrender the rest of your life to—”
“That’s not what I was hoping you’d say,” I interrupt, laughter climbing my throat.
“No? What else is there?”
I pinch his rock-hard side. “Saxon.”
He rolls on top of me, brushing my hair back from my face. All traces of good humor gone, he meets my stare. “I love you, Isla Quinn. I love you for reaching into the darkness and pulling me back to the light.” He takes my hand and lays it over his heart. “This is yours, and you . . . You are my only, sweetheart. I breathe, you inhale—”
“—and we both go up in flames,” we finish, as one.
47
Saxon
Isla sleeps like the dead.
Sprawled across the mattress, stealing my pillows along with hers.
I suspect that these last few nights that we’ve spent at my house in Oxford are some of the first that she’s experienced without night terrors. Maybe, if I hadn’t spent years in Holyrood, I would be more prepared to sleep a full eight hours.
I figure I’m lucky if I manage five.
The house is quiet as I rise from the bed, pressing a kiss to Isla’s forehead. Her strawberry-blond hair is tangled with her neck, and a gritty chuckle reverberates in my chest as I sweep the strands back before they strangle her. As if attuned to my touch, she follows the path of my hand, turning from her side onto her back, her chin lifting like she’s seeking a kiss. I’m no prince out to wake Sleeping Beauty, but still I take what she’s offering. A brush of my lips over hers, a nuzzle of my nose by her ear, and a roughly uttered, “I love you.”
She snores, none the wiser, and warmth floods my chest. This is not the life I imagined for myself. I expected the bloodshed. Hell, I even expected betrayal. But what I never expected was love. Isla brought me that hope and then she fed the beast, filling me up with so much emotion that there hasn’t been a day in the last week that I haven’t looked over at her and just smiled.